6/14/06 - Cleveland Indians vs. New York Yankees

Yeah, I know it's been a while, but enjoy this shot from the Yankees game over a month ago vs Cleveland. In this game, Randy Johnson hit Eduardo Perez with a pitch after Jorge Posada got hit. Always fun to see the players tussle a little bit.



As for the Bobby Abreu and Corey Lidle acquisitions, hopefully they'll work out. I don't think they gave up a ton, and Abreu likely replaces Sheffield in the OF for 2007. I don't really think the Yanks can win the championship this year, but they've been pretty resiliant. In the current format, just making the playoffs gives a team a good shot at winning it all.

Superman Returns

Spoiler free

I saw Superman Returns in IMAX 3D yesterday at 8am. The show was well-sold.

The parts I liked, I really liked in the movie - like Brandon Routh as Superman. The music and effects were also great.

The parts I didn't like, I really didn't like. Kate Bosworth wasn't a great Lois Lane. Lex Luthor in Smallville is a better take on the character. A few other plot points that spoil the movie.

IMAX made the movie better. The 3D less so. The landscapes looked spectacular but some of the action was hard to watch in 3D.

The writers definitely watched a lot of the 1978 Superman movie.

Overall, a nice film, although I don't agree with a number of the creative decisions. I think a few of these things have been brought up in other reviews.

Amendments

The proposal to ban flag burning in the Constitution failed. Now Congress should set its sights on something more useful: a Constitutional amendment banning stupid Constitutional amendments.

Larry Brown is Out

The New York Knicks are a disaster. What will make this firing even worse is that coming off a historic worst season, the team will almost certainly have a better record next year, which they will of course, then attribute to the new coach, Isiah Thomas.

Tags: basketball, Isiah Thomas, Knicks, Larry Brown, NBA

Misc Baseball Comments

Item #1
I haven't been reading Bill Simmons a lot lately, but he had a decent column today about the Mets / Dodgers game on Tuesday that featured the reunion of Nomar, Pedro and Derek Lowe.

Item #2
Jason Grimsley admitted to using human growth hormone. Was it working? His career ERA is 4.88! Up until now, Jason Grimsley was best known for stealing Albert Belle's corked bat.

Item #3
Greg Nettles had some comments about Barry Bonds passing Babe Ruth on the all-time home run list. He pointed out how Barry Bonds cheated. Nettles is one to talk (see #9 on this list). Someone GAVE him a bat full of superballs? Come on!
Tags: baseball, MLB

Pearl Jam: Life Wasted Music Video

Just trying out that handy YouTube embed feature again.

This is Pearl Jam's first music video in years, since the animated video to Do the Evolution. Artist Fernando Apodaca was involved in this process. I've also seen a video for World Wide Suicide out there, but for some reason that one isn't considered official?




Tags: Life Wasted, music, Pearl Jam, videos

Sink

This is the photo of a sink in a restaurant bathroom I was in recently. Isn't it strange? The water comes through the clear tube and drips down the large center hole. Then the water goes into a drain under those rocks. How unnecessary!


Tags: faucets, sinks

Pearl Jam at Continental Airlines Arena, East Rutherford, NJ - 6/1/06

My second Pearl Jam concert of the year was a great one. It's the last concert I'll go to for a while. The last few months, I got to see U2 at MSG in November, then Pearl Jam at Irving Plaza in May.

Overall, I've been to 8 Pearl Jam concerts now. In 1998 in Boston at Great Woods, then 2000 for 2 shows at Jones Beach, 2003 at Nassau Coliseum and 2 shows at MSG, Irving Plaza and now the Meadowlands.

We had fan club tickets for this one. Section 110, almost directly off stage right.

It was a very solid show, although there were a few odd miscues. The sound on vocals and Stone Gossard's guitar went out in the middle of the song "Alone" causing the band to pause, the stagehands to come out, and then the band resumed. Eddie Vedder jumped in the air at the end of "Alive" and landed funny, falling to the ground. He limped off stage and returned for a second encore with a bit of a limp. Eddie mixed up the words to "Once" as well.

I think we could see Susan Sarandon off on stage left with her son. Eddie looked over there a few times. It's possible that the Olsens were there too.

It was a great show. Surprisingly they had laser lights for the first song, "Severed Hand." I think that was the most lighting effects I've ever seen at a Pearl Jam show. They played 7 songs off the new album, 5 songs off Ten (their first album) and 5 off Vs (their second). The set was 30 songs in all, about 2 hrs & 15 mins.

The concert was well received in the press, with positive reviews from the Post, Newsday and a Jersey paper I don't recognize.

A funny thing at the concert - Eddie Vedder mentions the "last time the band was here" they got booed playing the song Bushleaguer. Not quite - they got booed at Nassau Collesium (I was there) in April, 2003. Apparently the band was flustered by this and cut their set short (see 4/30/03 concert here).

Back on 7/9/03 at MSG, Eddie Vedder read a bunch of signs in the crowd, including one that read, "Play Leash, you pussies!" (Leash is a rarely performed song). Eddie said at the time, "There's fuckin' children here, you know? You fuckin' cocksucker motherfuckin' asshole prick!"

This time, he mentioned that sign and said, "You know, I think it shows we're a resiliant type of band. You boo us, call us pussies and yet we still come back every fuckin' time." They then played Leash!! Pretty awesome. At the end of the song, Eddie said, "Pussies no more!"

What a great way to play to the crowd.

A great show all around. I wish I could have gone again on 6/3.

You can get download this concert (and previous PJ concerts) for $9.99. I just downloaded my copy and it sounds pretty good, although there were a few drum solos where the mix is a little heavy on the guitars, making it hard to hear the drums.

Setlist:
Severed Hand, Corduroy, World Wide Suicide, Do The Evolution, Marker In The Sand, Given To Fly, Dissident, Even Flow, Army Reserve, Immortality, Green Disease, Not For You/(Modern Girl), Alone, Jeremy, Why Go, Life Wasted, Rearviewmirror
Encore 1: Wasted Reprise, Man Of The Hour, Come Back, Footsteps, Once, Alive
Encore 2: Last Exit, Comatose, Leatherman, Glorified G, Leash, Baba O'Riley, Indifference


Tags: concerts, music, Pearl Jam, rock

Google Spreadsheets

Who knows if it'll be any good, but Google will be testing a new web-based spreadsheet. You will be able to download the sheets to your computer and edit them, and also invite other users to sign in and work on the web saved sheets. Apparently they will also be looking to do the same for word processing.

I don't know if this idea will work, after all, there are a ton of different functions one can use in Excel, and it's not clear if many of them will be available on the web-based spreadsheet. But one thing is clear to me, and that is that Google is really on the forefront of innovation. Yahoo! and Microsoft seem to be lagging behind in their web services. GMail forced the competing web-based email services to offer more space and Google Maps forced Yahoo and Microsoft to update their maps programs. Then the Google Desktop software allows you to search documents on your PC better than anything included with Windows, and has little Gadgets that are essentially duplicates of the Yahoo Widgets.

The innovation at Google is pretty cool. They're coming up with new ways to do "old" things (like Calendar) or new things altogether. Google Spreadsheets is just another example.
Tags: Google

2,000 Pounds!

Pat Robertson leg presses 1000 pounds in the video, but 2000 pounds in the photo.

The New York Times reports that Robertson is 76 years old and the world record for leg press is 1335 pounds. It's probably just liberal bias.


UPDATE (6/7/06):
Here's the video of him lifting 1,000 pounds.


Tags: Pat Robertson, weight lifting

Chrebet Retires

Wayne Chrebet retired officially from the New York Jets the other day, and he must have been one of the most popular Jets ever.

The story is pretty well known but here it goes again: a 5'10", WR with small size from Hofstra University walks on to the New York Jets training camp and eventually makes it to the team and has a pretty major role over 11 years.

The New York Jets website has a nice video interview with Chrebet on the front page and they did a nice news article with a ton of quotes from teammates, coaches and opposing coaches (including Edwards, Parcells, Belichick, Crennel, Mangini, Coughlin). Pennington, Coles and Martin also had nice things to say, with Martin's quote getting picked up in the AP story:

“He inspired me every day. I loved the way he played and how he never backed down from anything. He was an incredible teammate. He was a warrior; and I always felt you’d have to kill him to get the upper hand on him. If every player in the NFL had as much heart and desire as he had, football would be illegal.”

In general, I don't find much emotion in sports stories but this one I think is particularly touching. What a great career, and just a beloved player. I wonder if his #80 will ever get retired, a rarity in football since you need just about every number you can get.

Tags: Chrebet, football, Jets, NFL

Baseball

There's a lot of talk that the Boston / Yankees series this week will be for first place, but a lot of people are forgetting that Toronto has a great opportunity here. If the Yanks and Sox split, and Toronto takes a few from the Orioles, then they might be able to sneak into first. Toronto! See what a little money can do?

The Yankees have played Boston a lot recently. 4 series in the last 6 weeks?

The Yankee line up is looking a lot like spring training. Cairo, Phillips, Thompson, Cabrera, except now if I want to pay to see them it will cost more than $10.

Tags: baseball, Blue Jays, Red Sox, Yankees

Spoon!

The Tick Animated TV series is going to finally hit DVD! No, this isn't the silly live version with Putty from Seinfeld as the Tick, it's the original Fox Kids series that can now be found on Toon Disney channel at 4am. I think the reason for the delay on this DVD set is related to legal problems that came about after Disney acquired this programming from the purchase of FOX Family(along with Power Rangers and some other shows). It's about time for this classic to reach DVD.

I watched one the other day featuring the Tick's super-hero class with the student, Sarcastro, a sarcastic super hero who looks like Castro.


Tick: "everyone passes, except for Sarcastro....who passes with flying colors!"
Sarcastro: "really?"
Tick: "No"


Tags: cartoons, dvd, Sarcastro, The Tick, tv

Stop Twisting the Bible

Without weighing in either way on gay marriage, I'd like to point out that CNN.com's top story today was about how the President was going to lobby for a Constitutional Ammendment banning gay marriage.

CNN.com then posted this photo along with the link to the story:



Being curious about this, I was curious what the Bible really said. After all, Jesus was never one to speak in equation format.

Here's what I got from www.biblegateway.com which supposedly has an online searchable King James Bible. From what I can tell, he's not talking about gays anywhere here! It sounds more like Jesus is talking about divorce. Shame on CNN and the AP as well for using this sign. I'm sure we can look through the Bible and justify about anything if we take things out of context.

-----------
Matthew 19

1And it came to pass, that when Jesus had finished these sayings, he departed from Galilee, and came into the coasts of Judaea beyond Jordan;

2And great multitudes followed him; and he healed them there.

3The Pharisees also came unto him, tempting him, and saying unto him, Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife for every cause?

4And he answered and said unto them, Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female,

5And said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh?

6Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.

7They say unto him, Why did Moses then command to give a writing of divorcement, and to put her away?

8He saith unto them, Moses because of the hardness of your hearts suffered you to put away your wives: but from the beginning it was not so.

9And I say unto you, Whosoever shall put away his wife, except it be for fornication, and shall marry another, committeth adultery: and whoso marrieth her which is put away doth commit adultery.

10His disciples say unto him, If the case of the man be so with his wife, it is not good to marry.

11But he said unto them, All men cannot receive this saying, save they to whom it is given.

12For there are some eunuchs, which were so born from their mother's womb: and there are some eunuchs, which were made eunuchs of men: and there be eunuchs, which have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven's sake. He that is able to receive it, let him receive it.
-----------

I would like to recommend that those who use the Bible instead refer to verse 19 of the very same chapter:

19 ‘Honor your father and your mother,’[h] and, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’”[i]

Tags: Bible, CNN, gay marriage, Jesus

Security

I know everyone in the US feels like they're in danger following the terrorist attacks on 9/11/01, and everyone wants a bigger share of Federal money, but these recent Homeland Security grant changes are a joke.

This has got to upset anyone who feels like the Federal government wastes money, regardless of where you live or what you think about terrorism.

If you want to be safe, sounds like it's time to move to Louisville, Omaha or Charlotte.

Some highlights from the article (NY Times 5/31/06, by Eric Lipton):
The net effect was that the grant to New York City, which was $207.6 million last year, will drop to $124.5 million this year, while Washington will see its grant dollars drop a similar 40 percent, to $46.5 million this year.

Meanwhile, grants for cities like Louisville, Omaha and Charlotte, N.C., each jumped by about 40 percent, to about $8.5 million each. Newark and Jersey City, which received a combined grant, also saw a large increase, rising 44 percent to $34 million.

Overall, New York State will get $183.7 million, which is a 20 percent drop from last year. That means New York State's per capita share of grant funds, which totals $2.78 per person, will drop to an even lower level compared to some rural states, like Wyoming, which will get $14.83 per person this year.

Ms. Henke, who recently took over the office that distributed anti-terrorism grants, said the relative changes in the grant dollars are based on just the kind of detailed analysis of threat and vulnerability that officials in Washington have been calling for in criticizing past awards.

The competition for the grants this year kicked off in January when Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff announced that in the fourth year of these awards, which were started after the 2001 attacks, the department would put much more emphasis on directing the money to the most likely possible terrorist targets.
----------

So NY and Washington get less Federal money after a revised system to allocate dollars based on threat analysis, vulnerability and more probable terrorist targets. Maybe someone should have double checked this algorithm!
Tags: Homeland Security, terrorism

Broken Rules

As far as I can tell, this story clearly breaks the first and second rules of Fight Club.

Tags: Fight Club

Bonds 715

Since Barry Bonds hit his 715th HR today, passing Babe Ruth, it led me to thinking about if he'll go after Hank Aaron's career record of 755 HR's. After all, in one or two years, he could easily reach that.

Bonds is in the last year of his contract. If he went to the AL next year, he could be a DH and not have to worry about playing in the field. I think a team like the Kansas City Royals, who won't be able to turn their misery around in one year, should seriously consider trying to sign Bonds. At the very least they should see if it's economically feasible to do so. A Bonds signing would bring an excitement to their team like they haven't had in years. Sure, they might not be winning, but the place would be packed full of people trying to see Barry reach what was thought to be unattainable. The team's media coverage and profile would be elevated as well. Considering all the revenue sharing money they get, I think this would be an excellent idea. Also, the media scrutiny is probably less intense in the heartland than it would be on the coasts as well.

Some might point to Wade Boggs getting his 3000th career hit with the Devil Rays as a reason this wouldn't work. I doubt that the Boggs milestone had such an impact on team popularity. But in this case, things are different. Boggs' milestone was purely personal. The HR record has a bigger significance for most people than that.

Tags: 715, Barry Bonds, baseball, home run, MLB, sports

Baseball Notes

I haven't been paying attention to enough baseball lately.

Can you believe Barry Bonds still hasn't passed Babe Ruth? He's really breaking down, huh?

Scott Proctor just entered the game for the Yankees. I think he's a pretty good pitcher, but the Yankees are just TRYING to wear him out. He has thrown the most pitches this season of any reliever. He's going to get Tom Gordon Syndrome, or at least a Tanyon Sturtze Irritation.

While on MLB's main page, I just found out that Jason Bay has 10 HR in his last 10 games (pretty cool), the Pirates played an 18 inning game last night.

Here's my last oddity that I wasn't aware of. The Twins turned a triple play, two weeks after being caught in one! Both are worth watching on MLB's site.

Oh, and the Tigers and White Sox look like pretty good clubs. Toronto's record is almost as good as the Yankees'. How about those Mets?

Looks like it'll be an exciting year for baseball. Is this a return to competitive balance? Can we attribute this to revenue sharing?

Tags: baseball, MLB, sports

Yankees Just Got Their Copy of Moneyball

Well, at least they just finished reading it. Check out the following players in their major and minor league systems (parentheses for years with Oakland):

Jason Giambi ('95-'01)
Terrence Long ('00-'03)
Johnny Damon ('01)
Carlos Pena ('02)
Erubiel Durazo ('03-'05)
Octavio Dotel ('04-'05)

Tags: A'sbaseball, Moneyball, New York Yankees, Yankees

NBA Notes

A few NBA Notes:

Nothing like the Chicago getting the #2 pick in the NBA draft by way of the Knicks to remind everyone of the horrible Eddy Curry trade. I was thinking about this, however, since most people are surprised the Knicks gave up a pick that was not lottery-protected. If the Knicks traded a lottery-protected pick, it probably would have been a pick for at least 2010! Of course, for me, the jaded Knicks fan, the draft lottery provides an opportunity to read a whole new set of entertaining "Fire Isiah" and "Brown vs. Thomas" stories in the tabloids.

If Larry Brown leaves the Knicks, and coaches elsewhere, he could be getting paid by three teams next year! That's got to be a first.

This year's NBA Playoffs sure seems like it's been interesting! Three series-deciding games over the last few days, and LeBron James took the Pistons to the maximum in his first playoff appearance. The Heat then upset the Pistons last night. Unforuntaely, I'm not watching. The west coast games are on too late, and when they go to single or double overtime (which they did quite often), it's just too late to stay up. The schedule of the games is also so widely spaced out. There were no games on Saturday! It's too hard to follow, I'll just read the news items and watch a few highlights tomorrow.

A nice interview with Jeff Van Gundy by Mike and the Mad Dog today.
Tags: basketball, Knicks, NBA, Playoffs, sports