Pirates 2014 - Looking Back

As I sit at the keyboard on this Tuesday afternoon. the Pirates are about thirty hours away from taking the field against the San Francisco Giants in the National League Wild Card Playoff game.  I am excited in knowing that I will be attending this game tomorrow night, and I  am looking forward to the occasion with excitement and anticipation.

It was fabulous season for the Pirates, almost anyway you look at it.  The Playoff berth didn't come as easy as the one last year, it seemed, due to a bad start (10-18) in April, a bad seven game losing streak in August, injuries to key players, underachievement by key players (Jason Grilli, who got traded, Pedro Alvarez, who got benched), and a first base platoon that was, to be kind, very ordinary, it still took until the 162nd game of the season to be eliminated from the Central Division Championship.

I always like to look back on what I predicted each year to see just how smart or stupid I am.  So, here are some excerpts, in red, from The Grandstander of March 30, 2014.

Concerning the ultimate bottom line, I wrote the following:

OK, so how will they do?  Last year they won 94 games, which is a lot of wins for even really good teams.  To think that they will do this again is asking a lot.  Winning less than that in 2014 is not necessarily a step backwards. So, I am going to predict that we will raise this guy....

....89 times in 2014.  Eighty-nine wins will not be enough to overtake the Cardinals in the NL Central, but it will be enough to be in the race for a Wild Card spot, so what the the hell, I'll predict that Pirates will once again nail down one of the two wild card spots in the National League. 

The Record shows that the Pirates won 88 games, finished two games behind the Cardinals, and nailed down the first Wild Card spot.

I structured that pre-season post by focusing on some "People to Watch" for the upcoming season:

Andrew McCutchen.  After a torrid spring training, and, yes, we know that spring training stats are meaningless, it is almost frightening to think that he might actually be better than he has been in the last two seasons. Not since the days of Barry Bonds, and perhaps even the days of Dave Parker, have the Pirates had a player who is in the legitimate discussion as to who is the best player in the game.

Despite a two week stint on the DL, McCutchen led the team in HR, RBI, was third in the NL in batting and led the league in OBP.  But for an other-worldly season being enjoyed by the Dodgers' Clayton Kershaw, McCutchen would no doubt be the odds on choice for a second consecutive MVP award.

Travis Snider.  Yes, he has been the definition of mediocre since his arrival here, but if management is to be believed, injuries played a role in that underachieving performance, and he is now said to be healthy, and he did rip it up in Florida.  If that can continue, perhaps the Pirates don't have as big a problem in RF as is believed.

Snider continued to be overlooked and many thought he would be sent to the minors at one point. He wasn't, Jose Tabata was, and when rookie Gregory Polanco came to earth after a hot start when he was first called up, Snider pretty much took over the job in right field, and it will be Snider, not Polanco, who will have to be beaten out for the starting right field job come 2015.

Russell Martin.  Other than McCutchen, this is the position player the Pirates can least afford to lose to injury.

Do I really need to add anything to that?  Martin performed so well this year, that he will no doubt be the one free agent most in demand on the open market this season.  How the Pirates respond in attempting to retain him will be one of the big stories of the hot stove season.

Gerrit Cole.  I just think that this guy to be the best pitcher to come up through the Pirates farm system since Bob Friend.  He's big, he's mean, and in the last month of 2013 he was easily the team's best pitcher.  I just can't wait to watch him pitch every fifth day.

A couple of stints on the DL limited Cole's season long performance, but down the September stretch drive, Cole was dominant and everything that everyone hoped he would be.

Neal Huntington.  I am certain that no one is more aware of the Pirates most glaring weakness, the hole at first base, than is the GM.  How NH goes about addressing that as the season wears on will be interesting to watch.  I've long been critical of Huntington, and his ability to spread the b.s. in some of his statements to the public continue to drive me nuts, but he bought himself, and his "Plan", a lot of credibility last year, and his maneuverings at the trade deadlines were textbook.  How he does around July 31 and August 31 this year if the team is in the same position will be, again, critical to the success of the team.

As always, Huntington was the center of much discussion throughout the season.  As we all know by now, NH did NOTHING at either the July 31 or August 31 trade deadlines.  No trades, and his "in the end, the best deal was no deal" was a quote that was used to torch him, but in the end, it looks like he was right.  The Pirates are in the post-season, while other teams that made splashy deals are not.  

Okay, not bad as far as crystal ball gazing goes, but what about the other side of the ledger?  Here was another on my names to watch:

A.J. Burnett, or rather the absence of A.J. Burnett.  He was at worst the number two starter on the staff, and he is being replaced by a combination of Edinson Volquez, the coming-off-of-injury Wandy Rodriguez, Jeff Locke, and Jameson Taillon, who is now nursing a tender elbow of his own. How this plays out could be the key to the Pirates season.

Burnett was discussed so often by so many people that you would have thought he was still on the team, and there were people, including possibly Burnett himself, who thought that the Bucs should trade to Philadelphia to bring him back at the deadline.  Burnett ended up losing 18 games in Philly.  As for those other guys, Rodriguez failed utterly and was released.  Taillon underwent Tommy John surgery and maybe we'll see him in Pittsburgh in 2016.  Locke went back to the minors, was recalled midway in the season and had some good and bad moments.  The jury is still out on him, but there are more reasons to be optimistic about him than not. Volquez stunk with a capital "S" in spring training, had an ERA over 11.00, and Huntington was being excoriated for wasting $5 million on this bum.  He ended up leading the team in wins and will be getting the ball in the Wild Card game tomorrow night, and no one is complaining about it.

No mention was made of Tony Watson or Mark Melancon, and who even saw Vance Worley, let alone John Holdzcom, when gazing into the future back in March?

Oh, and there was one name I never mentioned at all.  Josh Harrison, and he turned out to be the story of the year for the Pirates.  When he was thought of at all, it was as the "25th guy on the roster", and okay utility guy, but if he was starting for you, well, you were in a lot of trouble.  When the right field position wasn't producing, Harrison played there and hit, when Starling Marte was slumping or injured, Harrison played in left and hit, and when Pedro Alvarez' season completely unravelled, Harrison took over and became the everyday third baseman.  He made the All-Star team, challenged for the NL batting title up until the last game of the season, and he will get votes, deservedly so, for the MVP award.

So I never saw the J-Hay Express coming, but do you want to tell me that YOU did?

Now it's on to the Post-Season.  A one game playoff is a pure crap shoot, and anything can happen.  If the Pirates get past the Giants, I think they have a shot against the Nationals.  After that, well, we'll just see what happens.

However, any way you look at it, it was another terrific season.

Sunday Morning Sporting Thoughts

Some thoughts and comments on the Sports Scene on a Sunday morning....

When Pitt lost to Iowa last week after an almost dominant first half gave them a solid lead, well, you could say that that was tough loss for the Panthers.  When Pitt, a twenty point favorite, lost 21-10 yesterday to the University of Akron, and appeared listless and uninterested throughout the game, well, there is only one word for it: BAD.   As in, that was a really BAD loss for the Panthers.

The good news is that Pitt is still undefeated, 1-0, in the ACC.  No one expects them to run the table in conference play, but they had better not have any more awful performance like yesterday's over the remainder of the season.

********

In the game story in today's Post-Gazette, this quote fairly jumped off the page and smacked me in the face:

"We don't play for the fans," Pitt wide receiver Manasseh Garner said. "We play for each other and for our families. That's one of the big things the coaches say, and I firmly believe that. The fans are with us when we win and sometimes they're against us when we lose, so we're definitely not playing for the fans."

Now, Garner is a kid and can be excused, I suppose, for saying something stupid, but the young man needs to learn a lesson that every college student needs to learn: Never, ever publicly criticize the paying customers.  That is bad, very bad, for business.  And if the Pitt coaches are teaching that, then perhaps THEIR bosses need to  impart the same lesson the them.

********

The Pirates will play their 162nd and, maybe, final game of he regular season today and they STILL have a chance to win the NL Central Division crown.  What a season and what a month of September this has been for the Pirates.  I will be writing a more complete wrap-up on the Bucs' regular season once it officially ends, but for now, all I will say is Fabulous Job, and I can't wait for the Playoffs!

********

Back to Pitt football.  

Akron brought its marching band to Heinz Field yesterday, and since Marching Bands are part and parcel to the Pageantry of College Football, it was fun to see them and hear them perform.  However, a big Bronx cheer goes out to the University of Pittsburgh for dispatching the Akron band to the upper deck of the north end-zone at Heinz Field.  It took the band the better part of a quarter to get to their seats and then get back to the field.  In a stadium that was only  - and I am being generous here - half filled, do you mean to tell me that the that University couldn't have found space for the visiting school's band in the lower bowl of Heinz Field?  I mean....

Oh and by the way, the only thing keeping me from presenting an H.A. Citation over this is the fact that I don't know exactly who gets the full blame for this rather unsportsman-like act.

********

The Steelers, sitting at 2-1, face a game today with the God-awful Tampa Bay Buccaneers.  This figures to be an easy win for the Steelers, but, at the same time, nothing that the Steelers have done yet has inspired the populace to start planning for Black and Gold themed Super Bowl parties.  Add to this steaming little bouillabaisse the fact that the team's already suspect defense has already been so decimated by injuries and, dare I say it, ineptitude, that they have signed ancient Brett Keisel and lured similarly ancient James Harrison out of retirement (and rumor has it that Joe Greene has started working out seriously down in Texas, just in case), well, no game can be taken for granted.  The Steelers not only need to win today, I think that they need to make a statement today in so doing.

********

On a  more serious note concerning Joe Greene, if you have not yet seen the NFL Network's documentary on Greene, you really need to do so.  Not sure when or if the Network will be rerunning it, but it is an absolutely terrific look on the Greatest Steeler of Them All.

To Absent Friends - Sally Kalson, Bob Kasperik

Melancholy Happy Trails go out today to two Absent Friends....

First, long-time Pittsburgh Post-Gazette columnist and reporter Sally Kalson died on Friday at the age of 63, a victim of ovarian cancer.

A liberal voice at the PG and in the community, Ms. Kalson's Sunday column was must reading, not only for what she had to say, but for her general observations about life and the world around us.  One such column from 2012, about her daughter's graduation from college, was chosen by the PG to be reprinted in her traditional Sunday spot on the Op-Ed page today in tribute to her.  Read it, please.

Not that I always agreed with her, mind you.  I vividly recall a column she wrote in about 1990 or so where she ripped Blue Cross of Western Pennsylvania over some customer service issue.  That particular column caused quite a bit of consternation among those of us who had to represent Blue Cross to its clients and the public.  She more than made up for whatever headache she gave the Blues in more recent years with her columns that excoriated UPMC Health Plan and how it has chosen to represent the public's greater interests.

Sally Kalson's voice will be missed.

*******

I first got to know Bob Kasperik as a voice on the radio with a couple of other guys who did weekly trivia shows on the old Doug Hoerth radio show.  In 2001, I met one of those guys, Jim Haller, a fellow SABR member, and in more recent years, through the magic of Facebook, I got to know Bob Kasperik, and even thought we never met face-to-face, I came to consider him a friend throughout the many "conversations" that we had on Facebook.  Bob died the past Thursday at the age of 68

You can check out his death notice in both the Post-Gazette and the Tribune Review today to learn all about all that Bob has contributed to to his schools, St. Vincent Prep and Duquesne University, about how he served his community, Derry in Westmoreland County, for over forty years as a pharmacist, and the large and loving family he leaves behind.

I am going to miss all those knowledgeable, caustic, and humorous comments that he had to make over the years about the Pirates, Steelers, and Duquesne basketball, as well as the comments on popular culture, particularly old time and current rock and roll.

I am sorry that I never actually got to meet Bob, but I am very grateful to Facebook for exposing me to such a terrific guy.

RIP Sally Kalson and Bob Kasperik.

"The Roosevelts"

I hope that you are all watching, or have already watched, PBS latest documentary from Ken Burns, "The Roosevelts, An Intimate History".   Like much of Burns' work, this is a massive effort - a fourteen hour film broadcast over seven nights.  The show ran from September 14-20 on PBS.  With one exception, I was unable to see any of it when it actually aired, so we are relying on the DVR to watch this one.

So far, we have seen episodes One through Four, and I did cheat a bit and watched the last hour of the final episode last Saturday night.  We are hoping to wrap up seeing the entire series by the end of this week.

It is a very, very good series.  If you are into American history, and Presidential history in particular, it really is a must see event for you.  I look forward to attaching this series in full, but I will leave you with these few impressions so far:

• The series made me realize how little I actually knew about Theodore Roosevelt.  His accomplishments as President are amazing, and he is one guy to whom the cliche "larger than life" can appropriately be applied.
• Many of the elements that we attach to the modern notion of the Presidency began with Teddy Roosevelt.
• The series spends a great deal of time discussing the period of FDR's life when he contracted polio.  He was between political jobs at the time, and was considered the front runner for the Democratic nomination for President in 1924.  That didn't happen, as we know, but how he dealt with his diagnosis, and his attempts at rehabilitation were covered in great depth.  His association with the mineral waters in Warm Springs, GA and his work with other polio victims were amazing to me.  Heroic, really.

The show triggered a long forgotten memory of mine.  It was 1962.  We were sitting in our living room one evening, probably watching TV, and my mother was upstairs with the radio on.  At one point she yelled down the stairs to my Dad  "Frank, Eleanor died."  No last name was needed.  After watching the series, it became so obvious to me how the single name, and the woman herself, resonated with people of my parents generation.

Great series.

Movie Review - "This Is Where I Leave You"

As I mentioned in the preceding post, we made our way to the new Cinemark Movie theater Complex in McCandless this afternoon and took in the movie "This Is Where I Leave You".  The movie is based on novel by Jonathan Topper, and is about a family who is called together by their mother to sit shiva for their recently deceased father.

I had read this book back in 2012, and, well, you never know how a book will translate to the big screen, but we both really enjoyed this story about this somewhat dysfunctional family drawn together under such  circumstances.

The movie stars Jason Bateman, Tina Fey, and Jane Fonda.  Each of them, as well as the rest of the cast are very good in this movie.  This is a terrific family story - funny, sad, touching, and sentimental.  

Well worth seeing.

And for what it is worth, this is what I wrote about the Topper novel back in 2012:

http://grandstander.blogspot.com/2012/08/book-review-this-is-where-i-leave-you.html

FINALLY - A New Movie Theater in the North Hills

You don't have to know me all that well to know that one of the hot button topics upon which I have kvetched for years has been the lack of a decent movie theater in the North Hills suburbs of Pittsburgh.  All that we movie going denizens of the North Hills have had available to us is the dumpy Rave Cinemas on McKnight Road which opened sometime during the Carter Administration.  Since that time, state-of-the-art movie theaters have opened all over Allegheny County - you know, digital projection, HD screens, surround-sound, cup holders in the seats - but to enjoy those amenities, North Hills residents needed to get in the car and drive 30-40 minutes to the Cinemark in Robinson Township, or even - gasp!! -  drive all the way to the SOUTH HILLS to see a movie in 21st century comfort.

Well, all that changed this weekend with the appearance elf this bad boy on the North Hill landscape:

Yes, Cinemark has finally opened it's newest movie palace in the new McCandless Crossing  retail/residential development.  Twelve separate theaters with digital projection, stadium seating, and all the other amenities that movie goers in the second decade of the 21st century have come to expect.

Mrs. Grandstander and I toddled on out there this afternoon for our first look at this long-awaited venue.  It is not as big as the Cinemark Multi-plex in Robinson, but it has all that that place has going for it.  It is going to be really nice to be able to attend movies in comfort and style and only have to drive about ten minutes to get there.

One thing that this venue has that the Cinemark in Robinson does not have is a bar.  Yeah, you read that correctly, a bar.  Honestly now, is it really necessary to be able to serve beer, wine, and cocktails in a movie theater?   Here's hoping that the movie going experience doesn't descend to the level of going to a Steelers game or an evening on Carson Street.  Still, since most of the movies we attend are on weekday afternoons, I'm figuring we won't be the ones who will be dealing with that particular problem.  I should note that today, when we arrived for a 1:15 matinee, there were indeed people lined up at the bar.  

The only other nit that I will pick here is that the parking seems to be a bit tight in the McCandless Crossing parking lot, and that this problem figures to be exacerbated once more and more of the development's stores and restaurants are completed and opened for business.

All in all, though, welcome to the North Hills, Cinemark!  Your arrival is long overdue!

To Absent Friends - Anna Mae Gorman Lindberg

The Post-Gazette reports today the obituary of one Anna Mae Gorman Lindberg this past week at the age of 98.  Who is Anna Mae Gorman Lindberg you may ask, and it is a question that not many would low off the top of their heads, but I have an interesting, if somewhat tenuous, family tie to Mrs. Lindberg.

As a 16 year old girl from Munhall, PA, Anna Mae Gorman and another Munhall teenager, Lenore Kite, were members of the 1932 USA Olympic swimming team.  Both of these young ladies learned to swim and trained at the swimming pool that was - and still is - located inside the Carnegie Library in Homestead.  

The family tie? Well, another young teen-aged girl who swam with Miss Gorman and Miss Kite was one Miss Ruth Madden, also of Munhall, PA.  Yes, the same Ruth Madden who married "city man" Frank Sproule in 1938, and became the mother of five children, including, in 1951, The Grandstander himself!  All my life I heard stories from my Mom and Dad about how she, my mother, learned to swim alongside these two Munhall Olympians.

Anna Mae Gorman, Lenore Kite, and others from that Homestead Carnegie Library swimming pool are immortalized with an exhibit in the Western Pennsylvania Sports Museum at the Heinz History Center.  Alas, Ruthie Madden is not included in the exhibit, as she never got much beyond being a recreational swimmer, but whenever I conduct a tour through the Sports Museum and see the pictures of Miss Gorman and Miss Kite, I do get a particular sense of pride, knowing that there are only two degrees of separation between these Olympians and me.

RIP Anna Mae Gorman Lindberg.

Best Wishes, Teke

When the Famous North Side Breakfast Group dined with former Pirate broadcaster Lanny Frattare earlier this summer, he made an allusion to the fact that former Pirates star relief pitcher Kent Tekulve "wasn't doing well".  Soon thereafter, Teke disappeared from the Pirates post-game TV show, but no one ever gave any definitive reason as to why.

Last night, news was released that Teke had undergone and was now recovering from heart transplant surgery.  

Wow.

Just goes to show that elite athletes are also human beings and are subject to the same physical and human frailties as anyone else.  Thank goodness for Teke, and for all of us, that we live in a world where medical science can effect remedies and cures that would have killed people just a generation or two ago.

So, best wishes go out to a genuine Pirates World Series hero, and a guy who could not be a better ambassador for baseball in general and the Pirates in particular.

Nothing would be better on Opening Day 2015 than to see Teke coming in from the Pirate bullpen to throw out the first pitch of the season.

Get well quickly, Kent Tekulve.

Olympians Come to Pitt

Thanks go out to my friend, Mark Matera, who clued me in on and invited me to join his son and him at an event at the University of Pittsburgh last night.  The event in question was the premiere of a documentary film called "The Renaissance Period of the African American in Sports."  

The film was produced by Pitt alumnus, Trustee, and Olympic Bronze Medalist (1948), Herb Douglas.  The film focused on nine African American track and field athletes who were on the United States Olympic Track and Field team at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, which were staged under the watchful eyes of Adolf Hitler.  Of course, the most famous of these athletes was Jesse Owens, who won four gold medals at those games.  However, other medals were won by these nine athletes, including a gold medal by Pitt's John Woodruff, and Mack Robinson, whose younger brother, Jackie, would go on to make some history of his own eleven years later.

Following the film, a panel discussion moderated by WTAE news anchor Andrew Stockey featured the following Olympians:

Harrison Dillard, winner of four Olympic Gold Medals, two each in both the 1948 and 1952 Olympics.  Dillard is now 91 years old.  His Olympic teammate, Herb Douglas, is 92, and if you saw both men you would put them in their late seventies or early eighties.

Bob Beamon, Gold Medalist in the long jump at the 1968 Olympics.  Beamon's Gold Medal is is most remembered because in a sport where records my be broken by fractions of inches, Beamon's Olympic jump broke the then world record by almost 22 inches.  

His record in the long jump stood for an amazing 23 years.

Edwin Moses, Gold Medalist in both the 1976 and 1984 Olympics, and Bronze Medalist in the 1988 Games.

Moses so dominated his event, the 400 meter hurdles, that he won 122 consecutive races in this event, a streak that lasted for nine years ands nine months (1977-87).





If you haven't been keeping score up until now, that was four athletes on stage with nine Olympic medals, seven of them gold, among them.

Hearing these men talk about their careers, with an emphasis on the African American experience that they shared, was remarkable and enthralling.  I only wish that Stockey would have asked Beamon to talk about the atmosphere in the Olympic Village in Mexico City after the protest on the Medal stand that was staged by Tommie Smith and John Carlos.  (For you younger readers who may not know what I am talking about, look it up.  It was a remarkable story, and a story that defined a distinct era in American history.)

Beamon did tell the story of his record setting leap in Mexico City.  About how he concentrated so hard not to foul, about all the years of training that led to this moment, about how is heart was pounding, and how, as he was at the apex of his jump, he took time to look at his watch. That last part obviously didn't happen, but it was the laugh line in the story.  This is obviously Beamon's "go to" story, and you can tell that he has told it many, many times over the years, but you know what?  That was okay by me and the rest of the audience.

The evening ended with Pitt Chancellor Emeritus Mark Nordenberg telling a very moving story about 1936 Olympic Champion John Woodruff, and also introducing from the audience former Pitt football player Bobby Greer, who became the first African American to play in the Sugar Bowl football game in 1957, after Sugar Bowl officials wanted to not allow him to play in segregated New Orleans, and Pitt said "he plays, or no one plays".

(During the reception prior to the event, Mark Matera introduced me to Chancellor Nordenberg, and I have to tell you that he is one very impressive gentleman.)

As we were leaving the event at the end of the evening, I got to say hello to and shake the hands of both Bob Beamon and Edwin Moses, and I have to tell you, it was a VERY cool experience.

I am most grateful to Mark Matera for thinking of me and including me in this experience.  It was a very memorable evening.

Steelers Prediction 2014

Since I probably watched the equivalent of about a quarter and a half of the Steelers during their practice game season, I won't pretend that I did a lot of in depth analysis of the team as they head into the 2014 season.  Therefore, my prediction is going to be based strictly on a gut feeling.  

This feeling is based upon the fact that the NFL is structured in such a way that no team stays on top forever, and that all teams will go through peaks and valleys.  The smart teams with strong organizations are able to ride out the valleys in such fashion that the periods of time in which they are in those valleys are short ones.  The Steelers, I believe, have proven themselves over time to be both a strong and a smart organization, and it is for that reason that I believe that they are ready to emerge from the two year valley that has produced consecutive 8-8, non-playoff seasons.

The money boys in Vegas has set the over/under line for Steelers wins at 8.5, so I say bet the OVER.  The Steelers are going to win 10 games this year and make the playoffs.

I will also make the following observations, for whatever they are worth.....

• One thing we do know is that since the end of last season, the Steelers have gotten younger and they have gotten faster.  The question is, have they gotten better.  I will don the rose colored glasses of a Yinzer Fan, and say that they have.  I hope.
• That said, the fact that they felt the need to re-sign a 36 year old Brett Kiesel is worrisome.
• All bets are off, prediction-wise, if Ben Roethliberger gets hurt and is lost for any significant (i.e., two or more games) length of time.

Okay, let's get ready to play real games that count with a look at the Old School Steeler logo,

and a couple of old school Steelers heroes.  I don't have to identify these guys for you, do I?

Lt. Columbo and Anne Francis

Readers who are also Facebook Friends of mine know that I have been on a recent kick of watching old episodes of the "Columbo" TV series that starred Peter Falk.  Last week I watched an episode from 1973 that starred the lovely Anne Francis, upon whom I had a crush in my younger teen years, as did, I suspect, many male teen aged viewers of "Honey West" back in the mid-sixties.  I say this with some conviction because my Facebook post on the topic elicited a huge response.  Okay, so maybe it was only a half dozen or so responses, but still a trend in my book.

Before I proceed, let me post a gratuitous picture of the lovely Miss Francis in her role as private detective Honey West:

Yeah!

Anyway, the response prompted me to dig out an episode from 1972, Season One, of Columbo called "Short Fuse".  This one starred Roddy McDowell, who shamelessly overacted throughout the entire episode, while wearing absolutely preposterous 1970's era hipster fashions.  Miss Francis played his girlfriend who he ended up treating rather shabbily.   James Gregory played the role of Roddy's victim in this one.  William Windom also had a semi-key role, and the "Special Guest Star" was Ida Lupino.

(An aside.  I was also a big reader of Mad Magazine in my teen years, and they once did a satire on some movie that McDowell was in.  In their satire, Mad called him "Roddy McTowell", and ever since,  cannot watch anything that features Roddy McDowell that I don't think of him as "Roddy McTowell".  Make of that what you will.)

The show followed the typical Columbo formula.  We know who did it, the killer underestimates the (seemingly) bumbling Lt. Columbo, and practically spells out what he did for the dim bulb police lieutenant, only to be out-witted brought down in the end.

Anne Francis would have been 41 years old when this one was made.  She looked good, but seemed to be just a bit old for the part that she played. Still, there was just something about that mole below and to the right of her lower lip.

I do enjoy watching these old episodes.  Despite the fashions of the era, they hold up pretty well.  I also can't help but noticing how incredibly cheap looking the sets are or these shows.  Really bad. But the stories are good, the writing can be hokey at times, but for the most part it's not bad, and Falk is terrific in his signature role.  It is also interesting to see how the series provided employment for TV stars whose own series had been canceled (Gene Barry, Leonard Nimoy, Windom) and old movie stars whose primes were long past (Ray Milland, Myrna Loy, Ida Lupino).  All actors really want to do is work, and shows like Columbo provided it for them back in the seventies.

Before closing, how about I throw in another gratuitous cheesecake picture of Anne Francis.  I'm guessing that this photo was circa mid-1950's.

All Games Count - Even the Ones in April

On this Labor Day, 2014, the Pirates sit at  71-65 in third place in the NL  Central, two games out of first place and two games out of the final wild Card spot.  By all accounts, it has been a pretty exciting season, and it looks like the Bucs are going to give us a nice ride over the final month of the season.  

Just for fun, I decided to do a little research to put to rest the old cliche that now that it's September and the weather gets chilly and the stadiums get packed, these are the games that "really count".  In point of fact, those games played in the chilly days of April before sparse crowds actually count too.  Here is how the team has fared, month-by-month:

April 10-18
May 16-12
June 17-10
July 15-11
August 13-14

So, had the Pirates been able to reverse that April record and gone 18-10, today they would 79-57, and would have far and away, the best record in the National League.  Even had they just scraped by in April at 14-14, their record today would be 75-61, which would still be the best record in the League.  And keep in mind that some of those additional April wins could possibly have been additional losses for the Brewers or Cardinals.

Moral of the Story:  All Games Count - Even the Ones in April.

The Bucs now have 26 games remaining.  I had predicted at the beginning of the season that they would win 89 games.  They will have to go 18-8 to achieve that, and that is really asking a lot, but if they do, then I'd say the NL Central championship would be theirs.   Playing .500, 13-13, would give then 84 wins and would probably not be good enough for a wild card spot. 16-10 would probably put them in the playoffs.  It's asking a lot, but the team is capable of doing it.  And as April and that stretch in mid-August showed, they ware also capable of going 11-15.  

Either way, it is going to be an exciting ride to the finish.

LET'S GO BUCS!!!!