Sporting Thoughts

As Howard Cosell used to say on his radio spots, "Speaking of sports...."

Obviously, the big sporting news these days is the 2024 Olympic Games that opened in Paris over the weekend.

Apart from the red ballcap people and he Fundamentalists getting their bowels in an uproar over the parts of the Opening Ceremonies (and, Surprise!, they didn't know what they were talking about), we have been enjoying these first three days of coverage.  We have watched basketball and soccer games, swimming events and gymnastics, but one sport that I have found to be tremendously entertaining has been the sport of Rugby Sevens.

I admit to being totally unfamiliar with he sport, although if you watch for a few minutes you can intuitively pick up on the about 80% of the basics of the sport.  To learn the nuances of the game, I have been furiously texting back and forth with Linda's stepson (does this make him my step-stepson?), Jeffrey, who was a club rugby player at West Virginia University back in his younger days, and that has been very helpful.  Here's the most amazing thing about the sport.  A match consists of two seven minute halves divided by a three minute intermission.  Yep, an entire match is over in about 20-25 minutes, depending on stoppage time.  Oh, and the action never stops.  The men's competition is already over with France winning the Gold Medal.  The Women's Sevens is currently in Pool play, and the USA has strong squad.

Like I said, it's great fun to watch, and I probably won't see it again until 2028, although Jeffrey tells me that Sevens is growing in the USA.  Can Major League Rugby Sevens be far behind?

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This past Friday evening major league European Soccer  Futbol came to Acrisure Stadium when Liverpool FC of the English Premier League and Real Betis of La Liga played a "friendly" game match, we Yanks would call it a pre-season or exhibition game, here in Pittsburgh.  

We and over 42,000 others showed up at Acrisure to watch.  The crowd was decked out predominantly in the red jerseys kit of Liverpool, so it was decidedly a home field pitch advantage for the Liverpudlians, who won the game match 1-0 1-Nil.   I have to say that we enjoyed the evening a great deal, and one can appreciate the game much more in person than when watching on the telly, but, that is true of most sports.  Also, it is fun to see any sport when it is being played at its highest level, and Liverpool FC is at the top of the chain when it comes to European soccer.

As you can see below, I played my part in cheering on Liverpool, but if you look closely, you will see that my shirt paid homage to an even greater team that came out of Liverpool.

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The Pirates.  

Our Pittsburgh Pirates acquitted themselves quite well with several series (Brewers, White Sox, Phillies, Cardinals) that wrapped around the All-Star break and found themselves 1 game out of the final Wild Card spot in the National League.  They then hit a bump in the road in Phoenix, losing two out of three to the Diamondbacks, one of the teams ahead of them, this weekend.  This morning, they sit in third place in the Central at 53-52, seven games behind the Brewers.  More importantly, the WC race looks like this:

Two games out of the final slot, with two teams ahead of them.  They lost a major opportunist by not winning that series against the D'backs this weekend.

More significantly than the losses have been HOW those losses have been occurring.  Mainly, by getting horrible production form the offensive side of the ball club.  Paul Skenes has been THE talk of MLB since he arrived in Pittsburgh in May, but in all of his games, the Pirates have been able to score more than one run for him only once.  All of his other games they've given him either 0's or 1's.  Perfect case in point was last Tuesday night against the Cardinals.  8.1 IP, 8 K's and a 2-1 loss.  His record is now 6-1 with 97 K's in 74.2 IP and an ERA of 1.93 and a WHIP of 0.87.  He has been unbelievable to watch in this amazing rookie season, and he goes tonight against the Astros.  Can't wait to watch.

Of note is the fact that the MLB trade deadline is tonight and thus far the Pirates have done nothing  - NOTHING - to add some kind of offensive punch to a lineup that desperately needs it.  With the pitching that they have shown so far, they are definitely in the chase for a WC spot, and with starting pitching led by Skenes, Mitch Keller, and Jared Jones they would be dangerous for any team to take on in a short series.  If Ben Cherrington ends up doing little or nothing at the trade deadline, the heat will get hot, very hot, in his kitchen.

"The Demon of Unrest"

 

Over the years, one of my favorite authors has become Erik Larson.  He has written historical non-fiction about such topics as devastating hurricanes, serial killers at the World's Fair, an American ambassador to Hitler's Germany, the sinking of the Lusitania, and Winston Churchill in his first year as Prime Minister of England.   All of his books are thoroughly researched, well written, and are both extremely informative and entertaining to read.

His newest, The Demon of Unrest is no exception.  In this one, Larson writes of the time period between Abraham Lincoln's election to the Presidency in 1860 and the attack on Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor in South Carolina that signaled the beginning of the Civil War.  The last quarter or so of the book covers the period of March 29 through April 14, that day of the attack on Sumter, and throughout, Larson Jumps back and forth between Charleston, Washington DC, and Montgomery, Alabama, the then capitol of the Confederacy, to write about events that were  taking place simultaneously during those perilous two weeks.  It was pretty gripping reading.

The subtitle of the book describes it best, I think: "A Saga of Hubris, Heartbreak, and Heroism at the Dawn of the Civil War."

One thing that is somewhat terrifying about this book is the parallels that can be drawn to what took place back in 1860-61 to events that we are seeing in our country today.  In his introduction to the book, Larson states that he was deep into the research for this book when the events of January 6, 2021 took place.  He writes:

"As I watched the Capitol assault unfold on camera, I had the eerie feeling that the present and the past had merged.  It is unsettling that in 1861 two of the greatest moments of national dread centered on the certification of the Electoral College vote and the presidential inauguration."  Larson concludes his introduction by stating that as you read this book "I suspect your sense of dread will be all the more pronounced in light of today's political discord, which, incredibly, has led some benighted Americans to whisper once again secession and civil war."

So true and the idea, frankly, scares the shit out of me.

Four Stars from The Grandstander for this one.

The "Thursday Murder Club" Series

It has been awhile since I have talked about books, so let's discuss the Thursday Murder Club series of novels by Richard Osman.  Osman is a British TV personality, talk show, and game show host, which I suppose makes him the Jimmy Fallon of England.  After visiting an upscale retirement community in England, Osman had the idea to write a mystery novel that would be set in just such a place.  Thus was born the fictional upscale retirement community of Cooper's Chase in the fictional town of Fairhaven in the non-fictional region of Kent in England.

In 2020, "The Thursday Murder Club" was published and became an immediate best seller and critical success in both Great Britain and the United States.  It features four main characters:

• Elizabeth, a retired operative, aka a spy, for MI5 of the British Intelligence Service
• Ron, a retired labor leader and liberal gadfly in British politics.  He was a bit of a rabble rouser back in he day, and he hasn't lost that characteristic his senior retirement years
• Ibrahim, a retired  (sensing a theme here?) psychiatrist with a penchant for being neat and orderly that tends to drive everyone else crazy
• Joyce, a widow recently moved to Cooper's Chase who, throughout the book, records her diary-like first person observations of the goings on in the story.  This keeps the narrative moving along.

Each Thursday morning, they meet in the Cooper's Chase "puzzle room", which they have reserved for their discussions of various murders, usually unsolved ones, that are in the news.  Naturally, they tend to get involved in real murders that often strike very close to home for all of them.  There is a peripheral cast of characters that enter our Club's orbit, including Kent police officers Chris and Donna, who are continually exasperated by the four seniors' interference in their official investigations, but who soon realize that they really need the help of these four old folks.

All of the stories - there have been four of them as you can see in the photo above - offer a true mystery puzzle for the reader, engaging characters, and lots and lots of wry, trenchant, and witty comments on aging, how people view older people, and how just because you get older, it doesn't mean that you have to get old, despite what society may think of you.

Steven Spielberg's production company has acquired the rights to these novels and casting has already been done:  Helen Mirren as Elizabeth, Pierce Brosnan as Ron, Ben Kingsley as Ibrahim, Celia Imrie as Joyce, and Jonathan Pryce as Elizabeth's husband, Stephen.  All are excellent choices, and I can't wait to see the movie.

In the most recent novel, "The Last Devil to Die", one of the characters experiences a major life event that casts a darker shadow over the proceedings, but it is a natural turn, I believe, that Osman handles wonderfully.  The four novels have come in rapid succession, and in his acknowledgements in the last one, Osman tells us that while the Thursday Murder Club isn't going away, he is taking a bit of a break before releasing a fifth novel.  The good news is that he will be writing a different story, this one "about a father-in-law/daughter-in-law detective duo", and he promises us that we will like them.  I am sure that we will.

The Grandstander bestows Three and One-Half Stars on the Thursday Murder Club series.

To Absent Friends - Bob Newhart

When someone as famous and as renown as comedian Bob Newhart passes away, as Newhart did yesterday at the age of 94, there is nothing that The Grandstander can do in this humble little blog that can offer anything new to the story.  Soon after the news of his death became public, the Internet was awash with stories and obituaries and tributes far beyond anything that I can add, so I won't be all that detailed here.

Newhart is perhaps best known these days for his two smash CBS sitcoms, "The Bob Newhart Show" (1972-78; 142 episodes) and "Newhart" (1982-90; 184 episodes).  Both shows emphasized Newhart's low-key, put upon Everyman humor,  as his Dr. Bob Hartley and innkeeper Dick Loudin dealt with the vicissitudes of life and dealing with the oddball cast of characters that populated his life.  Both shows were funny and are now considered television classics, and the final episode of the second series was perhaps the most surprising and funniest finales in television history.  When Series Finales are discussed, especially for sitcoms, the finale of "Newhart" is the one against which all others are measured.

However, if your pop culture awareness predates the 1970's, you knew Bob Newhart as an understated stand-up comic who appeared on Jack Paar, Johnny Carson, Ed Sullivan and countless other such television shows.   He was an accountant in Chicago, by his own admission "not a very good one", when he decided to try his hand at comedy, and he never looked back.  His comedy album "The Button Down Mind of Bob Newhart" won the Grammy for Album of the Year in 1960 (other nominees that year included Frank Sinatra and Nat King Cole).  HIs routines where he would have telephone conversations with folks like Abe Lincoln, the Wright Brothers, and Abner Doubleday ("Uh, why four balls and only three strikes, Mr Doubleday?...Oh, no one's ever asked you that before.") are all classics.  In fact, listen to THIS ONE, "Abe Lincoln vs Madison Ave".  Still funny over sixty years after he debuted it.

He made movies, notably Mike Nichols' "Catch-22" in 1970 and the Christmas comedy "Elf" in 2003.  As the years went on, his television presence lessened somewhat, but in 2013 he appeared on an episode of "The Big Bang Theory" as long ago television kids' science show host Arthur Jeffries, aka, Professor Proton.  Yes, perhaps he did play "Bob Newhart" when he did that, but he stole the show from the Big Bang's regular cast and he ended up winning an Emmy for that performance.  He played that same character in five more Big Bang episodes over the years and in three episodes of its spinoff show, "Young Sheldon."

Linda told me that she wasn't that familiar with Newhart's stand up bits, so today I downloaded an Anthology of Bob Newhart's classic comic routines, there are 24 of them on this album, and our plan is to one night turn down the lights, pour ourselves a couple of drinks, and turn our living room into a comedy club where we shall listen to the great Bob Newhart.

It was noted on the Today Show this morning that Bob Newhart was always gracious and accommodating, always worked clean, and was always funny, and it showed a great recent clip of him where he was asked by an interviewer if he was getting tired of working.  His response was "how could you ever possibly get tired of making people laugh."

RIP Bob Newhart.

 

Things Pirates

I am off to PNC Park shortly to take in a getaway day matinee game between the Pirates and the Mets.  The Pirates are six games into a critical ten game stretch with games against the Cardinals, Mets, and Brewers.  All are teams that are divisional opponents and/or teams with whom the Bucs are embroiled with in a battle for a Wild Card Playoff slot.  Thus far, the Pirates are 2-4 in the games that have been played, so things haven't gone exactly as hoped.

Here are the Wild Card standings as of this morning:

Not only are the Pirates 4.5 games out of the last WC slot, there are also three teams ahead of them in the standings for that spot.  Maybe, just maybe, if they beat the Mets today and sweep the Brewers in Milwaukee this week, they can get back into this race, but otherwise, things are not looking good, and the chances of GMBC making any significant moves at the trade deadline to improve the 2024 team grow slimmer by the day.

There is more to be written about this team, and I will get to it in the days and weeks ahead, but until then some happier Bucco news:

Both Reynolds and Skenes are fully deserving of making the All-Star team, so congratulations to them both.

Paul Skenes has easily been the Story of the Year for the Pirates, and one of the biggest stories throughout all of MLB this season.  If Major League Baseball had any sense of the dramatic, or of what the People Want To See, Skenes would be the starting pitcher for the National League.  The fact that it does make so much sense is probably why it won't happen.  In fact, I wouldn't be surprised of the Pirates tell the Powers That Be specifically NOT to pitch him in the game.  Gotta keep those innings limits in tact, you know.  

Off to PNC and root, root, root for our Home Team.  

#letsgoBucs

A Trio of Absent Friends - Orlando Cepeda, Bobby Grier, Remo Saraceni

In the month of June, The Grandstander said good-bye to four Absent Friends, so why not start July off where we left off in June by bidding adieu to three such folks.

Orlando Cepeda (1937-2024)

it is ironic that the death of Orlando Cepeda, 86, came within days of the death of his San Francisco Giants teammate, Willie Mays.  For so many years of my youth, the combination of Mays and Cepeda (and throw in Willie McCovey and Juan Marichal) made any game involving the Giants compelling and, if they were playing the Pirates, a source of dread.

Cepeda joined the Giants in 1957 and earned Rookie of the Honors.  In 1961, he led the National League with 42 HR and 142 RBI.  In the middle of his ninth season with the Giants in 1966, he was traded to the Cardinals and was instrumental in leading St. Louis to the NL pennant in 1967 and 1968.  He was the NL MVP in 1967.  He then spent three years with the Braves, and single seasons with the Athletics, Red Sox, and Royals, and he never really had a poor season.  His career prorated over 162 games would produce this hitting line:  29 HR, 104 RBI, .297 BA, .849 OPS.  He was voted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1999.

Numbers aside, I put Cepeda into this undefinable metric:  In the ninth inning of game with the Pirates clinging to a one run lead, what opposing batter would I least like to see coming to the plate.   Orlando Cepeda was one of those guys.

Bobby Grier (1933-2024)

Unless you grew up as a football fan in the City of Pittsburgh, and even more specifically, as a football fan of the Pitt Panthers, chances are you may not be familiar with the name of Bobby Grier, but his story is one that everyone should know.

He was the only African-American player on the 1954 Pitt football team that finished the season ranked 11th in the nation and was invited to play against Georgia Tech in the 1955 Sugar Bowl in New Orleans.  This was in a time when there were really only four Bowl Games to speak of, the Sugar being one of them, so this was a really big deal.  Trouble was, segregation was the norm in the American South, and Bowl officials were queasy about having a black player on the field in New Orleans.  To it's credit, Pitt said "Grier plays, or we don't come."  The governor of Georgia wanted Georgia Tech to forfeit the game if Grier was allowed to play.  (The "good old days" weren't always so good.)  In the end, Grier played and the game went on.

I would urge everyone to read THIS OBITUARY for Grier that appeared in today's Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, but I would like to highlight these opening paragraphs: 

Bobby Grier didn’t like to stand in the spotlight that his career as a trailblazing athlete created. Even after withstanding racism and becoming a central figure in the fight for Black civil rights, he was never one to make a show of himself.

Grier was held back because of his race but didn’t harbor any bitterness for it. He was a national celebrity because of his courage, but rejected fame. He had already accomplished so much while so young but still kept pushing to be the best athlete, soldier, worker and father he could possibly be. The insatiable determination to better himself and his family shined above his place in the history books to those who knew him.

I had the pleasure of meeting Bobby Grier at an event at the University of Pittsburgh honoring African-American athletes back in 2014. Well, "meet" might not be the right word, but I did get to shake his hand, and that was a pretty cool moment for me.

Remo Saraceni (1935-2024)

Learning about a person like Remo Saraceni is why I read the news obituaries and write about Absent Friends.

Here is why his death made the news.  He was an inventor, and his most famous invention was the "Big Piano" upon which Tom Hanks and Robert Loggia danced in the FAO Schwartz toy store in the 1988 movie "Big."  Surely you've seen it, but if not, HERE IT IS.

Okay, the big piano was why Saraceni's death made the papers, but what a back story he has.

He was born in Italy in 1935.  He got his father into trouble with the law when he, young Remo, made a kite out of a poster of Mussolini!  In 1964, he came to the United States to attend the New York World's Fair and here he stayed to seek a better livelihood.  He had no friends, no savings, and spoke no English, but he found work as a television repairman and took off from there.  He had a note on his bathroom mirror that said "America is where everything is possible."

It's a great story.

RIP Orlando Cepeda, Bobby Grier, and Remo Saraceni.