#Might be Whitaker's career best as well

[ubourgeois]

Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai (1999) dir. Jim Jarmusch

[sober-influencers]

Top 6 Sober Influencers of 2019

With the popularity of social media over the past decade, it seems like a new breed of influencers continues to appear every single day. When you hear the word “influencer” you might think a beautiful woman posing in a bikini by the beach or a famous YouTuber-turned inspirational speaker who sells their outrageously over-priced courses to fans. But, there is a wide range of people on social media today that the sober world is bound to catch up and put their niche to use. Sober influencers have grown their followings to share honest, funny, and sometimes hardcore truths about the journey to sobriety.

Today we’re sharing some of the most real and inspiring sober influencers of the internet in 2019! Follow away:

1. Holly Glenn Whitaker – Hip Sobriety

Holly began blogging when she first decided to get sober in 2012. She was a  businesswoman in San Francisco who seemed to have it all together. She also battled a secret addiction to alcohol, weed, and bulimia.

While she wanted to get herself into rehab, she couldn’t afford to skip out on her career so decided to take measures into her own hands. She ventured the path of self-improvement, coaches, a healthy lifestyle, and personal empowerment. Eventually, she realized she created the type of sober recovery program that worked for her personal needs. Today, she uses these methods to help mentor others on their own recovery paths.

Holly is the founder of Join Tempest. This is an online recovery support and school for those seeking a new approach to personal sobriety. She now spends her career helping people overcome their addiction to drugs and alcohol. She is a writer, speaker, and teacher for all who want to learn about addiction and recovery.

You can find Holly on Instagram at @holly.

2. Austin Cooper – founder of Sober Evolution

After a childhood of bullying, Austin grew up and turned to drugs and alcohol to help him cope with his pain and insecurity. After a decade of heavy drinking, his boss invited him to a meeting where he was met by his family for an intervention.

Austin realized his life was out of control and wanted to change for good. He started going to AA, a local 12 step support group and doing everything he could to get his life back on track. Shortly after the start of his recovery, he invested in his physical and mental health. Working out and reading books were his saving grace because it allowed him to put his mind to something worthwhile.

In 2016, three years after the start of his recovery, he created an Instagram account to share some of his favorite quotes and spread positivity in the online sober community. Not long after, he turned his page, Sober Evolution, into a brand. Sober Evolution shares stories of recovery, sells merchandise, provides free resources, and hosts events and retreats for those in need.

Find Austin and the community at @SoberEvolution.

3. Laura McKowen – Author, Speaker, Sobriety Teacher

Laura is a blogger and soon-to-be-published author who has been sober from alcoholism for over five years. She is known for her eloquent and healing writings shared through the internet and magazines.

With a long background in advertising, Laura left the drinking scene of her former career and now makes a living hosting online teachings and group coaching for people in recovery.

Her Podcast, Spiritualish, is also one of her more well-known assets in the recovery and spiritual communities.

Follow Laura on Instagram at @Laura_McKowen

4. Annie Grace – author of This Naked Mind

Annie comes from a high-level Marketing background where she fell into alcohol abuse. At 35, she realized her drinking problem was holding her back from pursuing further success. She then admitted herself into a recovery program and wrote a book called, This Naked Mind: Control Alcohol, Find Freedom, Discover Happiness And Change Your Life.

Today, Annie runs a podcast, speaks at treatment centers and events. She also runs her own business that helps people who want to overcome their alcohol addiction. Many of her programs work at rewiring the subconscious mind and past traumas for a better recovery.

Check out Annie and her project on Instagram at @ThisNakedMind.

5. Abigail Lalumandier – The Sober Style

Abigail is a fashion influencer who has been public about her sobriety since 2015. She is passionate about encouraging people in the sobriety collective to overcome addiction and pursue their passion in life. From her personal experience, it’s possible to trade in a life of drugs and alcohol for a dream career that inspires others.

Through sharing her story, she’s encouraged thousands of women who can relate to her. Everyday she gets to live her best life she is thankful for staying sober. Follow Abigail’s fashion & life at @TheSoberStyle

6. Jennifer Gimenez – Model and Actress

Jennifer Gimenez was known for her modeling career and appearance on VH1’s Sober House in 2009. But, what most people don’t know is that she became sober at the age of 29 and has been an advocate in the recovery scene ever since.

Dubbed “one of the nation’s leading experts on addiction” by Recovery Today magazine. Gimenez continues to work not only in acting but in the addiction recovery realm.

Gimenez’s Instagram is at @JenniferGimenez

Follow us if you want some sober inspiration on your social media feed!

Safe to say we can all learn something from each other.

If you or a loved one needs help, call us at 949-541-2622.

[scifigeneration]

Mapping the Moon for Apollo

by Timothy Swindle

Fifty years ago, on July 20, 1969, humans stepped onto another celestial body and into history. NASA

At an International Astronomical Union meeting in 1955, noted astronomer Gerard Kuiper asked for suggestions and collaborators on a project to make a map of the Moon. At the time, the best lunar atlases had hand-drawn images, and Kuiper wanted to use state-of-the-art telescopes to make a photographic atlas.

Only one person responded.

That was indicative of the astronomical community’s general attitude toward the Moon. After all, telescopes were designed to look at distant objects, and the Moon is rather close, and boring as well, since its appearance doesn’t change. Furthermore, Kuiper wanted to make a map, and that’s the sort of thing that geologists, not astronomers, do.

Kuiper proceeded, though, and by 1960, he had moved his small operation to the University of Arizona in Tucson. There he could take advantage of the region’s mountaintops and clear skies, and the university’s willingness to move into a field of study that defied traditional departmental boundaries. The next year, President John F. Kennedy announced that a national goal for the decade was to send a man to the Moon and back safely. Suddenly, the niche pursuit of making maps of the Moon had turned into a national priority.

For the next several years, Kuiper’s Lunar and Planetary Laboratory produced progressively better images of the Moon, using telescopes built for the purpose. Later they used images from robotic spacecraft to the Moon to produce a series of increasingly sophisticated atlases of the lunar surface.

A telescopic image of Copernicus Crater on the Moon, taken as part of a lunar atlas project, using a telescope built in the Arizona mountains by Gerard Kuiper. Lunar and Planetary Laboratory / University of Arizona

As a child, I was focused on the accomplishments of the astronauts, starting with the day in 1961 that the principal burst into my kindergarten classroom to tell us that Alan Shepard had been launched into space, and culminating in the Apollo 11 landing in 1969.

Like most of us who watched all those missions, I didn’t really expect to go into space science or aerospace engineering. But when I got the chance to study Apollo samples in graduate school, it’s not surprising that I gravitated to them. I eventually spent my career studying rocks from space. Similarly, I didn’t think much about the groundwork that went into mapping the Moon until I ended up at the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory. Once I started learning the stories and talking to those involved, though, I came to appreciate the number of extraordinary things that were done in that era as a result of the political race to the Moon.

Looking at the Moon from another direction

The Lunar and Planetary Laboratory’s first lunar atlases simply consisted of the best images from a telescope. But the group realized they could do better than this. The Moon always keeps the same face toward the Earth. But even on the side facing the Earth, the areas away from the center always appear distorted.

To correct for this, the group made a white globe three feet in diameter, then projected a high-quality telescopic image onto it from down the hallway. By moving around the globe, the surface features then appeared as they would from overhead. Near the edges of the visible portion of the Moon, the shapes of features shifted, with ovals becoming circles and squiggly lines becoming detailed structures. Although the idea had been suggested before, the “Rectified Lunar Atlas” was probably the best use ever made of the technique.

Lunar and Planetary Laboratory graduate student William Hartmann takes one of the images for the Rectified Lunar Atlas, which used an image projected onto a white globe to remove distortion. LPL/University of Arizona

Furthermore, the process yielded scientifically valuable insights. Graduate student William Hartmann, while moving around the globe to take the “rectified” images, noticed that on one edge of the Moon, there was a feature – now known as Mare Orientale – that looked a lot like many of the basins that were well known to telescopic observers. But it had some crucial differences.

For one thing, it had fewer later impact craters within it, suggesting it was younger and better preserved. Furthermore, it had a distinct bull’s-eye appearance, with concentric mountain ranges forming the rings. Hartmann realized that this might have been what all those basins had once looked like, before later impact craters and lava flows smeared out detailed features. And the idea of huge impacts ultimately led Hartmann and others to suggest that the Moon formed as a result of a giant impact on Earth, an idea that is still the basis of the leading theories of the origin of the Moon.

Shaped like a target ring bull’s-eye, the Mare Orientale is one of the most striking large-scale lunar features. Located on the Moon’s extreme western edge, it was formed by the impact of an asteroid-sized object. The collision caused ripples in the lunar crust resulting in the concentric circular features. NASA/GSFC/Arizona State Univ./Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter

Pinpoint landing

But one of the most impressive feats of converting those telescopic images into crucial information for Apollo came from Ewen Whitaker, an unassuming Englishman who had been the only one to respond to Kuiper’s solicitation in 1955. Whitaker moved to America to join Kuiper’s group and moved to Arizona with him.

When the robotic Surveyor 1 spacecraft became the first American mission to make a soft landing on the Moon in 1966, the mission team analyzed the photographs returned and reported where they thought they had landed. But they were wrong. Whitaker used the best telescopic image and compared what hills should be visible in what direction, and suggested the correct location a few miles away.

After Apollo 11 yielded the first successful human landing on the Moon, NASA wanted to use Apollo 12 to prove that it was possible to precisely target a specific location, based just on latitude and longitude. But you have to know the latitude and longitude of some location with precision.

NASA tasked Whitaker with finding exactly where another unmanned Surveyor mission, Surveyor 3, had landed. Whitaker gave his best estimate, and Apollo 12 aimed for it. The astronauts could not see Surveyor 3 on the way in, because it was in shadow. When they looked around after they landed, they found that they were within walking distance, after a journey of 240,000 miles.

Apollo 12 astronaut Pete Conrad examining Surveyor 3, with the Apollo 12 lander in the background. NASA

The maps of the Moon that were created at the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory have long since been surpassed, and those best-ever photographs of the lunar surface aren’t nearly as good as those of taken by more recent orbiters. But the organization that Kuiper started continues to explore. For more than a decade, spacecraft landing on Mars have utilized images taken from orbit by HiRISE (High-Resolution Imaging Science Experiment), operated out of the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory, to select their landing sites. At the moment, the OSIRIS-REx robotic spacecraft, also directed out of the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory, is maneuvering close to the asteroid Bennu, sometimes within a few hundred meters of the surface, making maps in search of a place to grab a sample to bring back to Earth.

After that sample is returned, no doubt scientists will analyze it for decades in the future, just as we are still analyzing the samples returned by the Apollo missions. It is the touchdowns and the samples that we remember, but it is the maps that come first.

About The Author:

Timothy Swindle is a Professor of Planetary Sciences and Geosciences at the University of Arizona

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license.

[aion-rsa]

New Christmas Movies to Stream: A Holiday 2020 Streaming Guide

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It’s the holiday season again. Thank goodness. After what has been a particularly difficult year, a little seasonal cheer has never felt more comforting or needed, even if the smiles need to be hidden behind  Christmas themed masks.

There’s never been a better time to curl up with a good Christmas movie on the streaming service of your choice. Of course that includes all of your favorite Christmas classics, which we’ve rounded up a schedule guide for here, but it also means a chance to try something new. Netflix has already gotten a hardy start to the holiday season, and yet more streaming carolers are headed for your door. So without further ado here is a guide to the new streaming presents waiting to be unwrapped.

Angela’s Christmas Wish

Available on Netflix on December 1

Certainly a Christmas movie meant for younger families, Netflix’s upcoming animated film, Angela’s Christmas Wish, promises gentle Yuletide cheer for all-ages. With computer-generated imagery, this film is a sequel to Angela’s Christmas. Like the earlier film, it’s set in the town of Limerick, Ireland at the turn of the 20th century. There Angela is desperate to be reunited with her father for Christmas. Unfortunately, Da’s in Australia. So her first notion is to travel Down Under for the holidays. When that doesn’t work, her next choice is to wish very hard…

The Christmas Chronicles 2

Available now on Netflix

Santa Claus never looked as cool as when Kurt Russell slipped into the red furs with The Christmas Chronicles, a mini-holiday event on Netflix. And with the much anticipated sequel, the man who once was Snake Plissken is bringing real holiday firepower back to the Christmas hearth.

Read more

Movies

New Netflix Christmas Movies in 2020 Ranked from Best to Worst

By Delia Harrington

Movies

Christmas Movies on Disney+ Streaming Guide

By David Crow

For starters Goldie Hawn reprises the role of Mrs. Claus in The Christmas Chronicles 2, but this time as more than a cameo. In fact, the whole film is set in the North Pole with Santa’s workshop never looking so grandiose in its Dickensian cheer—at least until Hunt for the Wilderpeople’s Julian Dennison tries to steal its Christmas magic! A sincere Yuletide epic, this is the first Christmas movie Chris Columbus has made since helming the original two Harry Potter movies. Before that? He directed the all-time classic Home Alone and wrote Gremlins. Will he finally  give Santa’s workshop the Hogwarts treatment?

Dear Santa

Available on VOD on December 4

After helming the sweet and heartfelt documentary, Batkid Begins: The Wish Heard Around the World, filmmaker Dana Nachman returns with this all-ages doc for the holidays. Dear Santa shines a bright light on one of the noblest duties of the U.S. Postal Service, which USPS has been executing for more than a century. With “Operation Santa,” the letters and Christmas wishes of thousands of children from around the country are gathered and sorted—and a lucky number are then answered by Santa’s helpers at the Post Office.

From Small Town, USA to Operation Santa’s ambitious outreach in New York City, Dear Santa might offer some much needed unity and happy tidings this holiday season.

Dolly Parton’s Christmas on the Square

Available now on Netflix

Dolly Parton is amazing, isn’t she? Just this year, she may save us all as one of the key sponsors of a COVID-19 vaccine that is showing significant promise. And in addition to sponsoring coronavirus research and being an absolute delight, this national treasure still found time to star in and write the songs for Christmas on the Square, another all-original Netflix Christmas movie musical.

The film is a bit of a Christmas Carol parable with Christina Baranski being a real Scrooge: She plays a woman who is going to sell her entire small town and evict all her neighbors on Christmas Eve. But with a little musical cheer and divine help from an angel—played by Dolly Parton, of course—she’s going to learn it’s a very Dolly Holiday, after all!

Fatman

Available now on VOD

Even Santa Claus has his limits. And they begin with threats on his life. That’s the amusing premise of Eshom and Ian Nelms’ dark comedic take on the Santa Claus legend. Essentially trying to ground Santa in the same type of earthy nihilism that James Mangold brought to Logan, or Clint Eastwood infused into his own onscreen legend via Unforgiven, Fatman stars Mel Gibson as Chris Kringle, a man at the end of his rope.

He’s over the hill and exhausted about the loss of Christmas Spirit in today’s youth. Worst of all, some snot-nosed kid he gave a piece of coal to has hired a hitman (Walton Goggins) to take him out. Essentially a Western in the North Pole, and a violent one at that, Fatman is amusing because of how straight it plays its nonsense. Definitely not for everyone, we’re sure this film will find its niche by the time of Chris’ big night.

Happiest Season

Available now on Hulu

A true crowd-pleaser, Clea Duvall’s Happiest Season is the type of holiday movie most filmmakers hope they’re lucky enough to make. As a story about family, love, and tinsel, this is an old-fashioned Christmas romantic comedy with a modern twist: It’s the love story of Abby (Kristen Stewart) and Harper (Mackenzie Davis).

In the film, Abby is going home for the holidays with Harper for the first time to meet her family, which includes a stiff WASPy patriarch running for mayor, Ted (Victor Garber). He and Mom (Mary Steenburgen) are happy to meet their daughter’s roommate… but they know her only as a roommate. Harper passed for straight her whole childhood and still won’t come out of the closet now with her father’s political career potentially on the line. Festive holiday cheer and familial anxiety abound in equal measure.

Read more

Movies

Fatman: Why Mel Gibson Found Christmas Spirit at the End of a Gun

By David Crow

TV

100 Best Christmas TV Episodes of All Time

By Wesley Mead

Our own Natalie Zutter said of the movie: “That tension will be familiar to all who have weathered past holiday seasons, while the comfort of a happy ending is a much-needed panacea. You’ll want to spend every future Christmas with Abby, Harper, and DuVall.”

Holidate

Available now on Netflix

Like all romantic comedy subgenres, the Christmas rom-com has been underserved in the last decade. Once a reliable staple of any multiplex diet, it could produce fleeting entertainments like The Holiday or genuine all-time classics like Love Actually.

Holidate will not be mistaken for a classic by anyone. It’s a film that gets by a lot on the general charms of stars Emma Roberts and Luke Bracey, as well as the ability to indulge an R-rated vocabulary in its humor. Otherwise, it’s a pretty standard rom-com setup with both Sloane (Roberts) and Jackson (Bracey) being ridiculously beautiful people who just can’t find a date for Christmas. So they decide to pretend to be a couple to appease each’s family by going on “holidates.” Guess what happens next?

Jingle Jangle: A Christmas Journey

Available now on Netflix

John Legend and Philip Lawrence wrote the songs to this all-original Christmas musical. Let’s repeat that. John Legend, the Grammy winning singer and songwriter behind “All of Me” and “Glory,” and Philip Lawrence, another Grammy winning songwriter partially behind hits like “Grenade” and “Marry You,” wrote the songs for a Christmas musical.

Read more

TV

Is A Muppet Family Christmas the Best Holiday Special Ever?

By Wil Jones

Movies

The Best Christmas Movie Soundtracks of All Time

By Ivan Radford

To top it all off, the film stars Forest Whitaker as Jeronicus Jangle, a toymaker who has just finished his masterpiece: a sentient doll that will change Christmas forever. There’s also a dastardly Keegan-Michael Key as a rival toymaker who wishes to steal the toy, but the point is it’s a Christmas musical with ear worms for days. What are you waiting for?

Operation Christmas Drop

Available now on Netflix

Operation Christmas Drop is a real procedure that is one of the most remarkable (and remarkably overlooked) performed by the U.S. Air Force. With cooperation with local authorities in Guam, the American military drops medicine, food, and toys over multiple islands across Micronesia, bringing Christmas to tens of thousands of people each year. And this event is finally getting recognized as the setting for a lovely Christmas comedy that it is.

In Operation Christmas Drop, the Netflix movie, Kat Graham plays Erica, a congressional aide who has come to the islands looking for a promotion, and perhaps unwisely toward a future as a Grinch. She’s here to determine if Operation Christmas Drop is money Congress no longer needs to allocate. But with the help of a dreamy smile from an Air Force captain, and a little Yuletide adventure, she might just discover Christmas miracles really do come from the sky. 

The Princess Switched, Switched Again

Available now on Netflix

Remember The Princess Switch from two years ago? It’s the one where Vanessa Hudgens plays both a small town American girl and a European royal who, as luck would have it, are complete doppelgangers. And they switch places just in time for the holidays! Either you recall it or you don’t, and if you do we’ve got good news: They made a sequel!!!

Read more

Movies

Inside Pixar’s Soul and the Secrets of Life Before Death

By Don Kaye

Movies

A Christmas Carol: the best and worst adaptations

By Robert Keeling

In the follow-up, the princess and small town gal switch places again during the holiday season. But wait, there’s more! Lady Margaret (Hudgens) also has an evil cousin named Fiona who looks pretty familiar (she’s also played by Hudgens)… and who switches places again with the princess who is not in fact a princess. Surely Santa won’t be the only one confused by all these hijinks come Christmas Eve.

Soul

Available on Disney+ on December 25

While technically not a movie about Christmas, we can’t imagine a more festive film for the actual 25th than Pixar’s long-awaited Soul. A new film co-directed by Pete Docter (Inside Out, Up), Soul is Pixar’s most ambitious film since Coco and a real emotional stunner.

In the movie, Jamie Foxx voices a guy named Joe, a jazz musician who finally gets his big break… and then falls down a manhole. Seemingly sent to the other side, Joe’s not ready to go toward the light and instead ends up taking another soul under his wing… literally since 22 (Tina Fey) is a soul who’s never lived, nor has any desire to do so until Joe teaches her the magic of jazz, pizza, and, well, living. It’s sweet, surprising, and more than its marketing suggests…

Captain Underpants: Mega Blissmas

Available on Netflix on December 4

Technically more of a “Christmas special” than a Christmas movie, Captain Underpants: Mega Blissmas appears just too blissful to ignore. Based on the mega popular Captain Underpants children’s books by Dav Pilkey, this Netflix special follows George and Harold’s misguided attempts to make Christmas “Blissmas,” a period of supreme satisfaction for everyone… but perhaps with too much selfishness. Can Captain Underpants save the day? Do you have to ask?

Also coming to streaming:

Mighty Express: A Mighty Christmas (Netflix, Dec. 4)

Super Monsters: Santa’s Super Monster Helpers (Netflix, Dec. 8)A Trash Truck Christmas (Netflix, Dec. 11)

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The horse of a lifetime is a much-used byword but never added apt than in the case of Borderlescott, the little admiration sprinter with the big heart.

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In his absurd adventure from handicaps to Group 1s, he was calmly the best horse accomplished at Robin Bastiman’s baby Yorkshire abiding and the alone luminary to backpack the dejected with red stars of appreciative Scots Jim Edgar and Les Donaldson, his committed yet apprehensive owners.

This cross-border abutment started with bald hopes of acceptable a chase with the 13,000gns dogie acquirement but Borderlescott took them all to the winner’s enclosures at the abundant summer festivals of York, Newmarket and Goodwood and on memorable trips to Paris and Hong Kong.

His antecedent affliction mark was a bashful 64 but he climbed the ranks so rapidly that he won the 2006 Stewards’ Cup at Goodwood off a mark of 102. He agitated 9st 5lb that day, a testing accountability because he measures a bald 15hh, and aloof as appreciably he about followed up the afterward year aback he was baffled a abbreviate arch by Zidane beneath 9st 9lb.

Then he fabricated the jump to Group 1 aggregation to win the Nunthorpe Stakes aback it was transferred to Newmarket in 2008, ambience a almanac time for bristles furlongs on the July course, and completed a acclaimed bifold aback the chase was aback on accustomed accommodation at York 12 months later.

Borderlescott (nearside) pips Benbaun to win his additional Nunthorpe, this time at York

Edward Whitaker (racingpost.com/photos)

For all his active triumphs, he remained the abiding underdog with an army of admirers acclaim for him. With his angry spirit, abundant near-misses and abrupt connections, he is assuredly one of the best accepted horses of the accomplished 20 years.

The amore for him knows no bound at the ancestors backyard abreast Wetherby area Rebecca Bastiman, assisted by brother Harvey, took over the training licence from her ancestor bristles years ago and area Borderlescott, now 18, still has pride of abode in the aforementioned box he active in his antagonism days. It will be his home for life.

“To us he’s not absolutely been a racehorse, he’s been added like a ancestors pet. All the family’s been complex with him,” says Rebecca, who acclimated to ride him in his assignment at home. “He’s aloof angry out now. He goes out with the blow of the horses and he’s got a activity of affluence really. He’s absolutely able-bodied and happy, and he gets so abundant fuss all the time. He loves the attention.”

Borderlescott at home with Robin and Rebecca Bastiman in 2012

Louise Pollard

In his adolescent days, Borderlescott was abundant added of a handful, as Donaldson recalls. “We had a horse alleged Sennen Cove with Robin, who phoned Jim one day and said he had a two-year-old for auction if we capital to appear bottomward and accept a look. Well, the aboriginal affair the horse did was head-butt Jim. Robin and the accomplished ancestors aloof looked and anticipation ‘Oh God, that’s it, they won’t buy him now’. But Jim and I had a wee altercation and we said we’d booty the horse.”

Borderlescott showed glimpses of his abeyant aptitude but aboriginal in his three-year-old division came the abreast assured accommodation to accept him gelded. “He was activity absurd in the backyard and at the races,” says Donaldson, “and we absitively that would be the best advance of action.”

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Any stud amount was absent but Borderlescott acceptable about £800,000 in prize-money in an 85-race career that yielded 14 wins, which additionally included the Group 2 King George Stakes at Goodwood, one of his blessed hunting grounds.

Age 18Starts 85Wins 14Biggest wins 2006 Stewards’ Cup, 2008 and 2009 Nunthorpe StakesPrize-money £798,863

“It was afterwards his Stewards’ Cup that we realised how accepted he was,” says Donaldson. “The acclaim that day at Goodwood was phenomenal. His aerial went aback and his arch was up and he trotted in like a superstar. The abutment he had was amazing and bodies were sending belletrist to the backyard aback he won contest and cards and presents on his birthday.”

Borderlescott and Royston Ffrench advance the acreage home to acreage the 2006 Stewards’ Cup at Goodwood

Julian Herbert (Getty Images)

Along with the wins, Borderlescott additionally recorded 20 additional places and ten thirds, with nine of the defeats by no added than a neck. Among the ones that got abroad were the 2006 Ayr Gold Cup aback he was baffled by Fonthill Road, who challenged out of his afterimage on the far side, and an unlucky-in-running accomplishment in the 2009 Prix de l’Abbaye.

“He was the blazon who could get exhausted in a abstinent chase but still be able to win a Group race,” says Robin Bastiman. “He’d biking so able-bodied and again hit the advanced and anticipate he’d done it. Already he got his arch in front, he’d stop.”

It wasn’t through any abridgement of genuineness. “The abundant affair about Borderlescott was that he did his best at all times but he was such a funny devil,” says Donaldson. “He was a fighter, he capital to do able-bodied in every race, and he sulked if he was beat.”

Proud owners Jim Edgar (centre) and Les Donaldson (right) accept the Outstanding Sprinter accolade for Borderlescott at the 2008 ROA Awards

Dan Abraham

Injury compromised his adventitious of a third afterwards Nunthorpe in 2010, aback he was sixth, and he won alone already afterwards that admitting antagonism on for addition bristles years until the age of 13. Admitting the odd what-might-have-been moment, his access attending aback in account at what he did for them.

“What a absurd horse to have. We had aloof a admirable time,” says Donaldson. And so say all of us.

Among the abounding strands of the Borderlescott story, two of the arch are adulation and loyalty.

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The 18-year-old will never leave the backyard area he has been back he was a dogie and there was never any crisis of his owners demography him abroad during his antagonism career, alike admitting allurement was put in their path.

“A cardinal of bodies capital to buy Borderlescott and some bodies asked why we didn’t accelerate him to a bigger stable, but it was admirable for us to see such a aggressive ancestors accept a acceptable horse like that,” says Les Donaldson, who endemic him with Jim Edgar.

“We accept a lot to acknowledge the Bastiman ancestors for. For a backyard with 20 horses to win two Group 1s was aloof incredible. They did so abundant for us. We’re so appreciative of the Bastiman ancestors and the way they looked afterwards the horse, and still do to this day. Rebecca aloof loves him.”

Having ridden him at home throughout his career and accomplished him in his final season, Rebecca Bastiman counts herself as Borderlescott’s cardinal one fan. “He’s aloof been an amazing horse to accept and he took us on some journey. He’s so special, he’s a diamond,” she says.

Borderlescott with Rebecca Bastiman and jockey Neil Callan afterwards his additional Nunthorpe win in 2009

Edward Whitaker

“I get so affecting talking about him because he’s such a nice horse and to accept all the memories with him is incredible. We’ve got pictures everywhere, paintings, book drawings, and photos of about every chase he won.”

Asked for her favourite moments from so abounding amphitheater highlights, she says: “It’s got to be aback he won his Group 1s. It was an amazing day at Newmarket and acutely on our home accommodation at York the accomplished army was abaft him that day. That was a absolute appropriate moment.”

Watch Borderlescott acceptable his additional Nunthorpe in 2009

Donaldson additionally cherishes that additional Nunthorpe achievement aback Borderlescott aloft the roof with a active accomplishment to snatch achievement by a close from front-running Benbaun. “To win at Robin’s home clue was fantastic,” he says. “One of my accompany said in all the years he’d been activity to York he’d never heard acclaim like it in the winner’s enclosure. The acquaintance was wonderful.”

Borderlescott’s final achievement abundantly came in Yorkshire in the 2012 Beverley Bullet with Freddy Tylicki in the saddle, acceptable the eighth jockey to win on him. “The accession he got there, you’d accept anticipation he was Sea The Stars,” says Donaldson with pride.

Watch Borderlescott acceptable the Beverley Bullet in 2012

Robin Bastiman appreciates the acceptance the owners put in him throughout Borderlescott’s career. “The owners accept been absolutely loyal. They could calmly accept beatific him to a added high-profile trainer but if you haven’t got adherence in this game, you’ve got nothing,” he says.

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The Borderlescott colours are still in the backyard with Royal Brave, an eight-time champ for the partnership, and Donaldson additionally has Milton Road active in his own name. None of them, however, will accept addition like Borderlescott.

Robin Bastiman, who begin his animated brilliant about 40 years into a training career that mostly bumped forth the bottom, had a favourite antic aback bodies asked afterwards Borderlescott during his antagonism days. “They’d ask, ‘How’s your acceptable horse?’ and I’d say ‘Which one?’ I’ve been at this bold a continued time and accepting a horse like him fabricated it all worthwhile.”

Even in retirement, Borderlescott still brings joy to the ancestors who aloft him to absurd heights. “When the horses are angry out calm you see them all active beyond the acreage and he’s commonly up there at the front,” says Rebecca.

“It’s abundant to accept him to this day and to watch him in the acreage still admiring life.”

More Fans’ Favourites:

Harry Angel: a dart awareness who was up there with the best aback on song

Overturn: from Plates to Cups to Champion Hurdles; a accurate warrior on all fronts

The Tin Man: the adept who has taken his owners on the chicken brick road

Limato: arbitrary but adorable appearance whose blaze is still afire strong

Red Rum: an Aintree figure who won hearts of a nation

Native River: the big affable behemothic with a amore of a bobcat and an eye for the limelight

Paisley Park: what makes Emma Lavelle’s brilliant stayer such a hit with the public

Lady Buttons: the queen of Yorkshire who has captured the hearts of a nation

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[justholdinghandsok]

Gillian's interview :)

submission by @melissascullysmessybun . Thank you so so much for translating this interview for us!

The truth is out there

I had no idea British rule in India lasted for over 300 years, and for that period of time lives of millions people were in the hand of very few people.

Berlin – I today’s world, there is something that’s been called The Scully effect. The Scully effect is a phenomenon initiated by worldwide famous fictional character Dana Scully, who inspired many young women to pursue careers in science, medicine and the law enforcement and as a result brought a perceptible increase in the number of women in those fields. Dana Scully is a character from worldwide popular TV series, The X files, and the person who brought Scully to life is a tiny (petite) woman, actress Gillian Anderson.

Scully forever changed the life and career of this actress, born (1968) and raised in Chicago (IL), who later moved to UK, where she still lives. Single mother of a three children (from two husbands), she writes, starers in theater, movies and TV series and she is actively engage in charitable and humanitarian work, especially within Neurofibromatosis network (from which her brother Aaron died) and the organization for sustainability education in South Africa.

But even after all those roles Anderson played in years after the show ended, it seems like she can’t escape the ghost of Scully. That fact was also visible at the premiere of her latest movie, The Viceroy’s House, directed by British director of Indian origin Gurinder Chadha, in which Anderson very convincingly embodied the character of Edwina Cynthia Annette Mountbatten, Countess Mountbatten ofBurma, socialist and advocate for labor rights. Edwina was a wife of Louis Mountbatten, king’s relative and the last Viceroy in India, who represented the Crown when India declared independence in 1947, which divided the territory into two countries, India and Pakistan, while the violence that followed the political moves killed over 200 000 people.

Exclusively for Politica, Gillian Anderson talks about the challenges of portraying the historical character, price of being popular, Brexit and the sudden discomfort it brought to her and her family…

Press: What was it like to connect to the historical character from today’s perspective?

Gillian: It was very easy, she was very likeableperson. I was surprised how much respect I’ve grown to have for her, after I’ve read her biography, the details from her early life, her activism and how much she was involved in war, and the events that led to The Partition of India. It’s always a good thing when you fall in love with the character. It helps you to be convincing and to do your job as best as you can. Forest Whitaker did the same, when he played Idi Amin (Gillian was his partner in the movie (she was not, lady didn’t do her homework)), and Forest believed that Amin’s motivation was justice, ha, ha.

P: How much did you know about historical events that led to The Partition of India before you took the role?

G: Not much, really. Most of the things were a lessions for me. I don’t think I even knew British rule in India lasted for over 300 years, and for that period of time lives of millions people were in the hand of very few people. It wasn’t a part of my education, it wasn’t something we’ve learn at school. But all of those new information, the fact that the small amount of people had power over millions of people. It had a very big impact on me.

P: What was the greatest challenge in Edwina’s character?

G: From technical point, probably her accent. She had a very posh accent and it took a lot of time for me to learn how to move and shape my lips so I could spontaneously speak the way she did. After the premiere, mother of one of our producers congratulate me and said: Great concentration! And basically that’s what it was: a lot of concentration so you don’t make a mistake.

P: You’ve managed to achieve the physically resemblance as well?

G: That was a challenge of a different kind. She had a sort of dislocated hips, so her entire body was somehow pushed forward. That forced her back to bend and her shoulders were stiff. It was very important for me figure out the way she moved, the way she walked. Edwina was a very active woman, the hostess of this huge palace, with a lot of stairs. Plus, she was taller than me, I’ve noticed that while I was watching archival footage. It was very exciting trying to overcome that, and to make the physical

appearance credible. Long after the shooting was over, I would caught myself walking like her, with my hips forward and my back shrugged. It took awhile to get things back to normal.

P: Edwina did a lot trying to find the way to prevent the conflict between the Muslim and Hindu populations?

G: She did, yes. She was restless, she was always on the field, in the conflict zones, trying to make people realize the need of peaceful cohabitation, the value of compromise. She was strongly against discrimination of any kind. She really did a lot. She was in contact with Nehru, Gandhi, the Muslim leader Muhammad Ali Jinnah, she often advised her husband…

P: Some sources say that she and Nehru had an affair, but the movie is not exploring that.

G: Yeah, I’ve read about that, but I really can’t say I’m sure it’s true. A lot of people in Britain didn’t appreciate her closeness to people from India, and, even more, they were against all the changes she made when she stepped in Viceroy’s palace. So maybe that’s where the story about their affair originated from.

P: She was very influential, the real proof of that behind every successful man stands a woman?

G: Yeah, but there is also a saying that the wives of powerful and genius men often go crazy. In real life it might be true, but not necessarily. There are examples of very influential and powerful first ladies, wives of US presidents.

P: As an American living in the UK, do you understand the fascination with the Royal Family? Or do you share it?

G: Hm, I do have a lot of respect for the challenges of neutrality, which is also part of the monarchy. And there is also a question of having strong leader as a head of the country and what happens when you don’t. So when you watch everything that’s been going on in the UK, with Brexit and everything, the existence of the crown became a basis of security and mental health.

P: Where you personally affected by Brexit?

G: The irony is: my daughter has a German passport, her father is German. She lives u UK, she goes to school there, so now the Brexit raised a questions like what does it all (the facts that she has a German passport but lived long in UK and is active student there) mean and will happen to her. It affects her, and we are all concerned. The final result of Brexit is yet to be seen, but what is certain is the this sudden insecurity at my home, in my family, which also brought a dose of worry.

P: It seems like you haven’t had much rest in past three years: you did movies, TV series, wrote a book, and you are very active in charity events.

G: Yeah, I don’t really have time just to sit and do nothing. Sometimes I think about slowing down a bit, and try to create a space for myself, so that I could be on still. But new challenges always emerge and than new choices have to be made.

P: What is your priority then: acting or activism?

G: My children are always my number one priority. Everything else shifts: sometimes it’s acting, sometimes writing and sometimes charity and activism.

P: And when do you write: during the day, or at night? Do you need a quite place for writing?

G: I definitely need a quiet room. But sometimes, there are long breaks on the set, so I use them to write in my trailer. And sometimes, I write on a airplane, because I spend a lot of time flying.

P: What was the most memorable moment from Berlinale, if there was one?

G: O yeah, it was! Freezing on the red carpet in that thin sleeveless dress!

*The questions on the side, in that almost purple box

Dana Scully is everywhere she looks

P: No matter what you did and still doing, people till identify you as Dana Scully. Is that bothering you?

G: It is how it is, no matter if that bothers me or not. I’m used to it.

P: So it isn’t annoying?

G: Oh please, don’t ask! It was so annoying, especially in that first period after the end of The X files. It took a long time and a lot of work to separate myself from her. It was very frustrating, because it was reflecting on the work, or the lack of it, because there wasn’t a lot of people who would want Dana Scully in their movies. Fortunately, I have manage to prove that I do have the acting talent. At one point I’ve stopped being angry at her existence and I’ve pushed her far enough so that now I can still play her role, without any stress and pain.

P: Many actors would be happy to have their television roles become phenomena and have such a powerful effect?

G: It’s true, but it may be true for Judy Dench or and any other actor in the UK, where, no matter how popular television role is, you will not have the problem working in the theater or on film, after the television series is done. In States is different, TV roles have been considered second-rate at the time. Now, the things have changed and all the most important television series are hiring the first-rate actors. And even here, on Berlin film festival, you can see that change: now there is a whole program dedicated to the premieres of the television series.

P: Are the people surprised when they see you on the street?

G: I’m the one who is constantly surprised, hhahah. There are days no one recognizes me: I walk the streets, go to the store, buy what I need. And there are days when every other person comes up to me. I don’t know what it is, is it the make up, the clothes, my hair, I have no idea. It’s like I am a Gillian Anderson on some days, and Dana Scully or any other character on other days.

THE END

Sorry it took so long, it was a loooooong day at the office. I’m sorry for all the mistakes, and if our grammar sucks, we did our best, and at least it’s better then the google translate shit. :)

[placetobenation]

Robin Hood

Release Date: November 8th, 1973

Inspiration: The legend of Robin Hood

Budget: $5 million

Domestic Gross: $32 million

Worldwide Gross: $35 million

Rotten Tomatoes Score: 54%

IMDB Score: 7.6/10

Storyline (per IMDB): An imaginative Disney version of the Robin Hood legend. Fun and romance abound as the swashbuckling hero of Sherwood Forest and his valiant sidekick plot one daring adventure after another to outwit the greedy Prince John (Sir Peter Ustinov) and his partner as they put the tax squeeze on the poor.

Pre-Watching Thoughts: We continue on through the 1970s with one of the more polarizing films in the Disney canon as this film has its fans, but also certainly has its detractors as well. This has always been one of my favorites films growing up and I remember watching this one constantly along with another film that we will get to down the line, and I’m hoping that this film has managed to hold up well since it has been a long time since I’ve seen it.

Voice Cast: This last few years has seen a lot of the same names show up for these films and we see a bunch of them return here, but this also is the last appearance for a couple of them as some new voices show up towards the end of the decade. At the top of the list for the returning actors is Phil Harris who voices Little John which is basically a carbon copy of Baloo since both characters are bears and this would be his swan song with Disney. We then have the pairing of Monica Evans and Carole Shelley return as they voice Maid Marian and Lady Cluck respectively, and sadly this would be Evans’ final film role as she would retire after it while Shelley wouldn’t return for quite a while. We then have Pat Buttram return as he voices the Sheriff of Nottingham in a pretty memorable role, and then we have George Lindsay return as Trigger the Vulture and then we have Barbara Luddy who voices the Sexton’s wife in a minor role. Finally we have Candy Candido as the Captain of the Guard and J. Pat O’Malley as Otto the blacksmith in one of his last film roles as he would transition into TV shortly after this. We then come to our debuting actors as we have Brian Bedford who voices Robin Hood in what would be his only appearance in an animated film, and then we have country singer Roger Miller who voices Alan-a-Dale in one of his few film appearances. Next, we have Andy Devine who voices Friar Tuck in what would be one of his final appearances, and then we have Peter Ustinov who voices Prince John as well as King Richard though he is better remembered as Prince John. We then have Terry-Thomas who voices Sir Hiss as he was starting to wind down his career by this point, and then we have Ken Curtis who voices Nutsy the Vulture though he was more famous at this point for being in Gunsmoke. We then have John Fielder who voices Friar Tuck’s Sexton though he would become famous for another role shortly after this, and finally we have the quartet of Billy Whitaker, Dana Laurita, Dori Whitaker, and Richie Sanders as the children Skippy, Sis, Tagalong, and Toby. Again we have a few voices debut here that would become standard bearers for the next couple of films while we bid farewell to a few, and again it will be interesting to see how much longer before the idea of returning voices starts to fizzle out.

Hero/Prince: I had neglected to mention this back in the One Hundred and One Dalmatians review that it was the first time I had a pair of heroes, and now we have the second instance of that happening as we have the duo of Robin Hood and Little John. They are deemed outlaws by Prince John as they rob from the rich and give it back to the poor who is taxed by the Prince, and things come to a head at first at an archery tournament where Robin and John escape the Prince’s plot. Prince John eventually has the entire town arrested after overtaxing them and Robin and John free them while also taking all the Prince’s wealth, and Robin escapes death again and he and John are deemed heroes when King Richard returns to reclaim his throne. Now in most circles, Robin Hood is the main hero and Little John is mainly his sidekick while Robin also had his band of Merry Men who are mysterious absent in this film, but Robin and John are in essence treated as equals and they are fine heroes for the film.

Princess: I was debating whether or not to include this character as a princess since she is never considered a princess even in the folklore, but I feel that she does deserve mentioning and that is Robin Hood’s love interest Maid Marian. She is the niece of King Richard and serves in his court as she remembers Robin Hood when they were children, and she reunites with him and falls in love with him as she is supportive of him in spite of Prince John. After King Richard returns, Marian and Robin get married as Richard muses that he now has an outlaw for an in-law. Again, she technically is not considered a princess though I felt it necessary that she should at least be mention, but she will probably rank at the bottom of the list of princesses.

Villain: We have had 20 films in the Disney canon prior to the release of this film and to this point, Pinocchio had the largest number of villains as they had 5 different villains throughout the film though they were not united under one cause. Here, we once again have 5 villains though they are united in one cause and that is the capture and/or death of Robin Hood as well as taxing the poor. At the top is of course Prince John who was placed in charge of England when his brother King Richard went off on the Third Crusade, and John would extort the poor people in taxes while being aided by his assistant Sir Hiss. He would have his personal collector the Sheriff of Nottingham be the main one in charge of capturing Robin Hood and he uses the vultures Nutsy and Trigger as well as John’s army to do so. They first try to capture Robin by holding an archery tournament which ultimately fails, and John in a fit ends up overtaxing the population of Nottingham and has them all thrown in jail. They devise a plot to lure Robin Hood out by threatening to hang Friar Tuck, but Robin and John save everyone and recover the taxed gold much to John’s chagrin. Before John can retaliate, King Richard returns to reclaim the throne and upon learning of John’s actions, he has John, Hiss, the Sheriff, Nutsy, and Trigger all arrested and working hard labor. Prince John is a classic example of a little brother being extremely jealous of his older and more successful brother, and when he takes the throne in Richard’s absence he becomes drunk with power by taxing the poor and living in excess with the Sheriff serving as his main henchman. He puts on this façade of a great leader, but in reality is a petulant child who complains when he doesn’t get his way, even going as far as to call for his mother and suck his thumb like a baby. Sir Hiss is basically a yes man to Prince John though he does call him out on some of his decisions, while Nutsy and Trigger try their best but are pretty useless as the Sheriff’s main henchmen. It is going to be interesting to see where these villains, in particular Prince John rank amongst the other villains, but in terms of the legend of Robin Hood they are all worthy villains to the great outlaw.

Other Characters: This is interesting because we have quite a number of characters that make up this film, but we have already covered quite a decent number of them and they are the main focus though there are some other characters that get some good time as well. At the top of the list we have Friar Tuck who serves as a protector to the people of Nottingham while supporting Robin Hood, and at one point he is captured by the Sheriff and is set to be lynched only for Robin and Little John to save him as well as the other townspeople. We then have Lady Kluck who is Maid Marian’s friend and lady-in-waiting and at one point fights with Prince John’s men during the archery competition, and then we have Alan-a-Dale who is the minstrel and serves as the narrator to the story though he is also a member of the town. We then have the brief appearance of King Richard at the end when he reclaims the throne from Prince John and has him and his minions arrested, and then we have the townspeople of Nottingham who are supported by Robin Hood and are oppressed by Prince John and his army. While a lot of the film focuses on the main characters of the film, the supporting characters are fine to help fill out the story though they are mainly just there as filler.

Songs: Given that this was a Disney film, you knew that they were going to come up with some songs to fit into the film even though to my knowledge no previous Robin Hood adaptation had featured any songs. The first song from this film is the song played during the opening credits titled “Whistle-Stop” and while it was mainly whistling and no singing it was a pretty catchy song and gets you fired up for the film. The next film is one of the centerpiece songs which is “Oo-De-Lally” sung by Alan-a-Dale which is another fun song early on, and the next one we have is the other centerpiece song “Love” which is sung as a love ballad for Robin and Marian. We then have “The Phony King of England” that Little John sings with the townspeople as they mock Prince John and that is another fun song, and finally we have a slight downer song in “Not in Nottingham” which is sung when the townspeople are imprisoned by Prince John. Again, the songs might not rank up very highly with the rest of the songs in the Disney canon, but they are still pretty good songs and fit just fine into this film.

Plot: When it comes to English folklore, there is perhaps no bigger story besides the story of King Arthur and that is the story of Robin Hood and his Merry Men to the point that there is still question as to whether Robin Hood was in fact a real person. The story is pretty much the same as King Richard leaves to go on the Third Crusade and Prince John is given control, and unlike his respected brother Prince John is a greedy ruler who taxes the poor. Robin Hood is still loyal to Richard and is deemed an outlaw by John due to Robin stealing from the rich and giving it to the poor, and John employs the Sheriff of Nottingham to track down Robin who is assisted by Little John and Friar Tuck. Prince John tries several plots to capture Robin Hood including imprisoning the townspeople only for Robin to free them and steal back the gold, and finally Richard returns and has Prince John along with his minions imprisoned as Robin marries Marian. There had been numerous adaptations of Robin Hood on the big screen and TV prior to this film and even a few animated films made about it as well, but this would arguably be the biggest and most successful adaptation until 1991’s Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves. While most adaptations are more action and have some suspense to them, this version is a fun adaptation though it does have a few dark moments in the film which was common for Disney films.

Random Watching Thoughts: Once again we have the storybook beginning; I find it funny they had to specify each animal as if they thought kids wouldn’t know what each animal was; It was a bit weird they called Marian a “vixen” and not just a “fox”; This is also the second film in a row where we see animations that will be used numerous times throughout the film during the opening credits; Reportedly, the reason while there are so many recycled sequences from previous films was because the film fell behind schedule and they did it to catch up and make sure the film released on time; Another fun fact is that Friar Tuck was originally going to be a pig and not a badger, but it was changed as they felt that having the friar be a pig would be offensive to the Catholic Church; Alan-a-Dale needs to watch how tight he pulls the strings on his lute if one broke up that easily; Robin scoffs at the notion that they are taking too many chances while an arrow is embedded in his hat near inches from going his head; Bit of fat shaming of John by Robin when he says the Sheriff and his posse couldn’t get him off the ground to hang him; It’s funny they tried to avoid the arrows only for John to then use one of them as a back scratcher; Prince John has got himself quite the convoy with a pack of elephants, hippos, and rhinos as his security; Is he that paranoid that he needed 6 padlocks on that chest?; So they had to have either been returning to or coming from London if they are going through Nottingham; It was interesting they had it be a plot by John and Hiss to send Richard off on the Crusade when in real life Richard went willingly; It’s mentioned about how John sucks his thumb, but what’s not talked about enough is how he tugs on his ear at the same time; Did Robin and John have these outfits stashed away somewhere because they were not carrying them at all when we first met them; Funny how Little John says there’s a law against robbing royalty, but yet they do it all the time by robbing the rich which would probably be royalty; A note is that Robin takes Prince John’ ring off before kissing his hand, but when he puts his finger in his ear the ring is on the finger though it is missing the jewel; Robin is quite the actor knowing he was having to say those nice things about Prince John and he didn’t believe them; Prince John’s name did go down in history, but not the way he probably wanted it; How much gold does Prince John have that he was able to have gold hubcaps for his carriage?; Little John must’ve had quite a bit of room in his dress to be able to fit all that gold; A bit scandalous scene there of Little John teasing the rhino guard; How was Robin able to coerce Prince John into giving him his robe?; The guards just kept right on going not even realizing that Prince John had falling out of the carriage; So Prince John offered 1,000 pounds for the capture of Robin Hood; Nottingham was quite the slum with all those houses being seized for taxes; Of all the places to hide the gold, why would you hide it in Otto’s cast?; It’s amazing that with such a large family that the mother can keep track of everyone’s birthday unless a bunch of them are twins; The Sheriff is real cold to not only take Skippy’s birthday present, but to also take the two other pieces of gold from the beggar not knowing it is Robin in disguise; I don’t know if I would be giving a 7 year old a bow and arrow as a gift; We got three rabbits and a turtle as friends because this was many years before “The Tortoise and the Hare”; Considering he only had one arrow, Skippy should’ve taken his sister’s advice and not shot it so high that it went into the castle ground; Of all the things do to when taking that oath, they had to cross their eyes?; I always thought badminton was first created in the 19th century, well apparently not since Marian and Lady Kluck are playing it; The shuttlecock goes down Kluck’s dress yet somehow manages to land exactly next to the arrow; Sis is eager to throw Skippy under the bus for exposing them yet it was Tagalong’s sneeze that gave them away; The children are so keen to see Marian marry Robin yet she thinks he’s forgotten her; Kluck was spot on in her mocking of Prince John all the way down to the thumb suck; The poster on the tree offered 1,000 pounds for Robin’s capture yet the one that Marian has in her closet says 1,000 ingots; Robin and Little John carved themselves out quite a bachelor pad in the forest; The pot was boiling over at one point yet Little John was able to pour several spoonfuls of water into it without it spilling over; That was a bit rude of Friar Tuck to just help himself to whatever they were making and he was quite a good amount of it; This archery tournament was quite the elaborate plan for Prince John to come up with to try and catch Robin; Another animation snafu is the ring Prince John is wearing is missing a jewel when he goes to rub his ear, but in the next shot the jewel is there; Hiss must really admire Prince John if he is willing to take his abuse that much; Bushel britches is quite the nickname that they came up with for the Sheriff; In case anyone was wondering, what Prince John said in French was “Such know how, brilliance, verve, and dynamism”; A nice callback there as Prince John remembers what happened last time and doesn’t let Little John kiss his hand; That is quite the array of archers competing and the shaggy dog can’t be bothered to carry his bow as he drags it on the ground; How was Hiss able to get into that balloon and considering that it could be filled with either oxygen or helium, how is he able to breathe easily without suffocating?; They haven’t seen each other since they were children yet Marian was quickly able to realize it was Robin in that disguise just by staring into his eyes; Again, how much gold does Prince John have that he can just have a golden arrow made?; The shaggy dog had to blow his fur up to see, yet it came back down and blocked his vision when he made the shot; If Robin wanted to not make it as obvious, he should’ve botched the first few shots intentionally and then picked it up towards the end especially since he tells the Sheriff he’s not that good right before he hits a perfect bullseye; I do like the touch of Robin using a bow and arrows made out of branches; The Sheriff says he can spot Robin through his disguises not realizing that he’s talking to Robin in disguise; If Hiss says he doesn’t drink, he’s going to be in trouble if he stays in that barrel for too long; It’s funny because Prince John is a whiner and a child, yet he is more devious than you think because he has clearly deduced the stork is Robin and is playing along with everything; They said to move the target back 3 paces yet Nutsy looked like he took a good 10-15 paces back; Prince John was not fooling around by sentencing Robin to sudden, instant, and immediate death, and he even had the executioner there to do it; Prince John tells Little John not to choke him so hard yet he says nothing about the sword jabbing into his back; Prince John was all tough until Robin knocked the sword out of his hand and he went running like a coward; Kluck tells Marian that this is no place for a lady as she jumps right into the fight; That’s quite the expensive honeymoon going to London, Normandy, and Spain; That’s an exact number of children to have and Marian seems way too eager considering she then bumped it up from 6 to a dozen; An interesting fun fact is during the scene where Kluck fights off the guards, the music is a mashup of the fight songs for the University of Southern California and the University of Wisconsin; As expected, Hiss proves himself to be a lightweight when it comes to drinking; As great a sequence as this is with “The Phony King of England”, it does hurt a bit when you know that most of the animations are borrowed from other films; You know the song became catchy when even the Sheriff and Hiss are singing it even though it is mocking Prince John; Does Prince John realize that by taxing the townspeople so much that they ended up in jail and now no one there will be paying him taxes?; This is a pretty sad scene seeing all of the townspeople in jail; That was a quick appearance by the Sheriff as he showed up right as the Sexton’s wife gave Friar the farthing; That’s quite a threat from the Sheriff to hang a man of the Church; I was wondering if Prince John was thinking of punishing Marian but didn’t because she is family; It’s safe to say that Prince John is obsessed with Robin that he is willing to have Friar Tuck executed just to draw Robin out; Nutsy was so willing to test the trapdoor even though he knew the Sheriff was standing on it; They were hiding behind one wall and then a second later they managed to sneak to another wall right behind Nutsy; Nutsy says that it’s 1:00 yet the clock clearly says 3:00; Trigger was so confident his crossbow was safely locked yet he shot the arrow just like that; The Sheriff was smart to have Trigger go ahead of him; Why would Little John just think to slam the door like that?; You would think that after being robbed as much as he has that Prince John would keep the gold locked up and under constant guard, not in his bedroom just begging to be taken; I feel that Friar saying that line about the tax rebate was an inside joke since most religions are tax-exempt; Ironically one of the prisoners was a stork that looks suspicious like Robin did when he was in disguise; That was a super quick turnaround for Little John to kidnap the Sheriff, tie him up, takes his clothes, and then take his place in the chair; I wonder what time of year it was that the sun was already starting to come up at 4AM; One of the arrows pierces a bag yet amazingly nothing falls out of it; Was that another inside joke to have the raccoons dressed as robbers?; How strong was Alan-a-Dale’s lute that it deflected the arrows with none of them piercing it?; Those guards are not great shots since it seems like they are missing Robin quite often; The Sheriff should’ve been a bit more cautious if he’s going to swing a flaming torch around like that in a closed space; Prince John was so confident Robin was killed even though he never saw the body float up to the surface; The look on Robin’s face when Skippy said he could’ve swam twice that far; Considering that Robin was standing there for quite a while, you would think Prince John would’ve told his archers to keep firing at him; Prince John was able to clearly spit out his insults to Hiss and chase after him while keeping his thumb in his mouth; Why does Prince John have to use the bigger hammer and the Sheriff gets the smaller hammer?; Good callback by King Richard saying he has an outlaw for an in-law after Kluck made the joke earlier to Marian; Did Skippy’s mother really give him permission to go with Robin and Marian?; That arrow must be bouncing off a lot of things for them to have to constantly avoid it.

Overall Thoughts: Overall, this film was still just as enjoyable as it was when I was a child, but it was not quite as good as some of the other films in this canon. It is interesting to see these films get good reviews when they come out only for the reviews to become more mixed to negative as the years go on, and sadly this is one of those films that suffers that as it is not held in high regard like when it first came out. The early part of the decade has been pretty tumultuous around the world with the American populace being fed up with the Vietnam War and the Watergate scandal was dominating the news, and Disney was experiencing some highs with the opening of Walt Disney World two years earlier. It will be a few years until the release of the next film and we were about to see a major shift in the animation studios, but we will get to that when we get there. As for this film, it is a solid film and is still a lot of fun though it doesn’t reach the same status as some of the other legendary films released to this point.

Final Grade: 7/10

[brido]

Okay. Let’s Look at the Veteran’s Committee Candidates.

The Baseball Hall of Fame just announced the 10 candidates on this year’s Veteran’s Committee ballot. And it’s a fun one since it’s from the “Modern Baseball” era. Don Mattingly, Dwight Evans, Steve Garvey, Tommy John, Marvin Miller (yawn, a union executive), Thurman Munson, Dale Murphy, Dave Parker, Ted Simmons, and Lou Whitaker are on the ballot. That’s just about the sweet-spot for my elementary school baseball card collection. Let’s see where these guys stack up now in 2019. I’ll go in order of their JAWS score, which is a combination of their career rWAR and peak 7 years. Google it. Okay... 

Lou Whitaker 

Sweet Lou gets no respect. And that starts at home, where he played 19 seasons for the Detroit Tigers, is the 4th-greatest player in their franchise history and doesn’t even have his number retired by the team. I guess, either does Alan Trammell, with whom Whitaker is forever linked. So maybe they’re waiting for Whitaker to join Trammell in the Hall, but still. No respect. He even hates the nickname “Sweet Lou” and that’s how I started this paragraph.  

Whitaker was the best player on the Tigers in 1983, 1989 and 1991. He was the best second baseman in the American League in 1982, 1985, 1986, 1988, 1991 and best in baseball in 1983. His career stats are similar to Ryne Sandberg, (of course) Trammell, Roberto Alomar, Joe Morgan, Joe Torre (who’s in as a manager, but could have made it as a player) and Barry Larkin. And JAWS ranks him as the 13th-best second baseman of all time, behind only Bobby Grich for non-Hall of Fame players. And only Robinson Cano and Chase Utley are better but ineligible. Over his long career (1977-1995), Whitaker is only behind Rickey Henderson, Wade Boggs, Cal Ripken, Mike Schmidt, Eddie Murray, Barry Bonds and George Brett for overall WAR.

And yet in 2001, possibly because WAR wasn’t really a thing yet, Whitaker only received 2.9% of the vote and fell off the Hall of Fame ballot after one chance. This feels like a crime. The man played the 1985 All-Star Game in replica merchandise purchased at the stadium in Minnesota. He wore a mesh cap and his number was drawn on in marker. Let the guy have something. Whitaker is probably the most-deserving player on this year’s Veterans Committee ballot. And if they vote for anyone, it might as well be him. A Hall of Fame with Trammell, and without Whitaker, feels like it’s missing something. 

Dwight Evans 

Dewey started his career as a stellar defensive right fielder - he has eight Gold Gloves - and then became a power hitter (by 80’s standards) later in his career. He was the best player on the Red Sox in 1974, 1981 and 1982. Although that team, at various times, had Carlton Fisk, Carl Yastrzemski, Jim Rice and Wade Boggs. Evans was the best overall player on the franchise from 1972-1990. And he’s the 4th-greatest player in franchise history (in terms of overall fWAR) after Ted Williams, Yastrzemski and Boggs. He played and lost two World Series with the team, all during the Curse of the Bambino.  

Evans was also the best right fielder in the American League in 1984 and 1987, and the best in baseball in 1981 and 1982. And he was the best overall right fielder from 1972-1991. Over that same 20-year time period, he was also the 11th-best player in all of baseball. JAWS ranks him as the 15th-best right fielder of all time with a 52.2 score. That’s a smidge below average for a Hall of Famer, but everyone above him is in the Hall of Fame, except for Larry Walker and Shoeless Joe Jackson.  

So the long career gets him his WAR numbers (where he remains 15th all-time), but it’s the relatively quiet peak (30th) that hurts him. Evans was ‘only’ an All-Star three times. He ‘only’ had three elite seasons. And he fell off the writers’ ballot after three tries. I think he deserved to win the 1981 AL MVP (he got 3rd), when he tied for the home run title (22) in the strike-shortened season. I also would have given him second in 1982, when he finished 7th. 

The career numbers (385 home runs, 2,446 hits) are good, but not great. Similar to Billy Williams, Tony Perez and Al Kaline. Slightly below average for an inductee. Also, you would think the Gold Gloves would help, but 8 did equally nothing for Jim Edmonds. And 10 ain’t doing much for Andruw Jones. So here we are. Right field is rough. Babe Ruth, Hank Aaron and Stan Musial played right. They bring up all the average numbers at the position. And I could honestly go either way on this one. Which means I’d probably have to vote no. 

Tommy John 

Tommy John played for fucking ever. He was pitching in the Majors at age 46. And only Cap Anson and Nolan Ryan played in more seasons than John (26). And that’s with him taking off the 1975 season to recover from his namesake surgery. He was a compiler, whether you’re impressed by that or not. And with that came 288 career wins (only Roger Clemens and Bobby Mathews - who was from the 1870’s - have more and are not in the Hall) and lands him 21st all-time in career fWAR.  

I should make a note here that fWAR and rWAR differs enough for pitchers that it makes a significant difference in his JAWS ranking. But in plain English, Baseball Reference thinks he was pretty mediocre in terms of Cooperstown worthiness. He’s 85th on JAWS for starting pitchers, which is behind way more non-Hall of Fame pitchers than I care to list. However, 80% of the pitchers with the most similar career stats (Robin Roberts, Bert Blyleven, Fergie Jenkins, Early Wynn, Tom Glavine, Burleigh Grimes, Don Sutton and Eppa Rixey) are in the Hall. That’s not nothing. And his Career Standards (44) would only be slightly below average for a Hall of Fame pitcher. 

And since I prefer fWAR for pitchers, anyway, it’s probably important that John is 30th all-time in JAWS for that non-official ranking. And only behind Roger Clemens, Curt Schilling and Kevin Brown for non-Cooperstown pitchers. He’d be an above average Hall of Fame pitcher by that metric. But maybe I’m getting ahead of myself. 

John was often the best pitcher on the teams he played on. He was the best on the White Sox in 1968, 1969 and 1970, and the best overall during his tenure there (1965-1971). He was also the best pitcher on the Dodgers in 1976 and 1978 (a pennant year), but second-best overall, after Don Sutton. He was the best pitcher on the Yankees in 1979 and 1980, and second overall to Ron Guidry. He was the best pitcher on the Angels in 1983, third overall after Mike Witt and Geoff Zahn. And he was the best pitcher on the Yankees in 1987, and best overall there from 1986-1989. John only had 3 elite seasons in his long ass career. You could make an argument for him being the best pitcher in the AL in 1979, when he got second in Cy Young voting. His teammate Guidry should have won it, but it went to Mike Flanagan instead. John also got second in Cy Young voting in 1977 (I would have given him 5th).    

Any way you slice it, John seems to be a top 10 pitcher in his era. I don’t love the Wins stat. Or the compilation of WAR stats. Especially with no real greatness on which to hang his hat. And I don’t think the ulnar collateral ligament reconstruction surgery that bears his name is so much an accomplishment for him as it is for Frank Jobe, the surgeon. John played for fucking ever. Which is not nothing. I just don’t think it’s quite enough of a ‘something’ to land him in the Hall.  

Dale Murphy 

There was probably a time in 1983, around the time Murphy won his second consecutive NL MVP Award, that people would have considered him the greatest player in the world. That was before WAR and everything, but still. He had RBI titles and that’s what got everyone horny in the 80’s. Well, that and (I’m assuming) cocaine.  

Murphy was the best player on the Braves a decade before they decided to become a National League dynasty. And he’s one of those guys that advanced stats made look worse. Like, I’m sure nobody wants to hear that Chet Lemon was better than Dale Murphy, but here we are. 

I’d say Murphy had five elite seasons. I would have given him the MVP in 1983, but not 1982 (I would have given that to Mike Schmidt and considered Murphy 5th). And then after a fairly decent peak, his numbers collapsed after 1987. Whoa. I just realized another hot shit Atlanta center fielder, Andruw Jones, kinda had something similar happen after he turned 30. But the end result is that Murphy is 25th on JAWS for center fielders. That’s behind Kenny Lofton, Jones, Jim Edmonds, Willie Davis, Jim Wynn, Vada Pinson, Cesar Cedeno, Chet Fucking Lemon, Johnny Damon and Fred Lynn. And it’s also behind Mike Trout (obviously) and Carlos Beltran. 

In his own career (1976-1993), he’s 28th in overall WAR. That’s not Hall worthy. But he seems like a nice and charitable Mormon man. I heard they can turn it off like a light switch. We all should too.  

Ted Simmons 

Should the top 10 players at every position be in the Hall of Fame? I think so. As it stands now, Simmons is 10th in all-time JAWS as a catcher and is the only one (other than Joe Mauer, who retired in 2018) who isn’t currently enshrined. If we go around every position’s top 10 non-enshrined he’s in a pretty elite company with Bobby Grich (2B), Scott Rolen (3B), Bill Dahlen (SS), Barry Bonds (LF), Pete Rose (LF), Manny Ramirez (LF), Kenny Lofton (CF), Larry Walker (RF), Roger Clemens (SP), six relief pitchers I don’t care about and non-eligible superstars like Mauer, Albert Pujols, Robinson Cano, Adrian Beltre, Alex Rodriguez and Mike Trout. It seems pretty clear to me that Simmons should be in the Hall. 

He was the best player on the Cardinals in 1972, 1973, 1975, 1976, 1977 and 1978 and was the best overall player there during his (1968-1980) tenure. He was also the best catcher in the National League in 1973 and 1977. And he was the best in baseball in 1978. And over his entire career (1968-1988), he was second best overall to Johnny Bench - the greatest catcher of all time - who’s own career (1967-1983) was occurring at the exact same time as Simmons’. 

Maybe he’s a victim of bad timing. Simmons’ contemporaries, besides Bench, include Gary Carter (2nd all-time) and Carlton Fisk (4th). But as Jay Jaffe has pointed out, there were 5 active Hall of Fame catchers in 1929 and every year from 1931-1937. So the fact that 4 Hall of Fame catchers would have played between 1974-1983 would not be weird at all. And we’ll talk about a 5th, Thurman Munson (1969-1979), in just a second.

Simmons’ bad timing also included a playoff drought for St. Louis. Which probably had more to do with trading Steve Carlton than the play of Simmons. I would say he had 4 elite seasons while he was in St. Louis. He has similar career stats to Alan Trammel, Joe Torre, Carlton Fisk, Gary Carter, Barry Larkin, Joe Cronin and Yogi Berra. And the top 10 in similarity scores are rounded out by Lou Whitaker (who I heavily insinuated should be in the Hall a moment earlier) and Miguel Tejada.     

There have been a lot of theories as to why Simmons still isn’t in Cooperstown. There were contract disputes. There was the fact that he was against the Vietnam War and against Nixon. He was seen as a bad defensive catcher, although current metrics show that to be way overblown. He butted heads with Whitey Herzog, who also wound up as a  Veteran’s Committee voter. Which would be even more bad timing. But I think Simmons has mainly been vindicated on all of those things over time. And the timing should finally be right for his induction. 

Thurman Munson 

His career was cut short after a tragic Cessna crash in 1979. Otherwise, who knows? Munson was the best player on the Yankees in 1973 and 1975. And the best overall from 1969-1979. He was the best catcher in the American League in 1970, 1975 and 1976 and the best in baseball in 1973. His 11-year career also includes a Rookie of the Year Award, two World Series rings and an MVP Award in 1976. The Yankees also made him the team’s first captain since Lou Gehrig. And after his death, the Yankees immediately retired his number and never replaced his locker at old Yankee Stadium.   

A short career makes for some sub-par Hall of Fame numbers. And nobody with similar career stats is enshrined in Cooperstown. And that 1976 MVP was a bit of a stretch, even though he was 10th in the AL in fWAR. I would have given him a top 5 finish in 1973, when he finished 12th, but what are you gonna do? 

Even with Munson’s untimely death, he’s still 13th all-time on JAWS for catchers. And he’s 8th in peak (WAR7) for catchers, above average for a Hall of Fame catcher and tied with Buster Posey. Which is extra fun since Munson and Posey both won a Rookie of the Year, an MVP, a Gold Glove, a World Series title, and a College Baseball All-American nod. And they’re the only catchers to do all that.

It might be hard to say yes to Munson without putting Ted Simmons in first. Simmons is two spots higher on JAWS. And over Munson’s career (1969-1979), he’s third in fWAR after Johnny Bench and Simmons. But that peak is still better than Simmons’. And Munson still hit .357 in the postseason. Including a 9-for-17 outburst in a losing effort against Bench and the “Big Red Machine” in 1976. I mean, a Yankees team that won back-to-back titles considered Munson their heart and soul. And they had Catfish Hunter, Goose Gossage, Reggie Jackson and some pretty good years around that time from Willie Randolph, Graig Nettles and Ron Guidry. I could honestly go either way. So why not? But Simmons probably needs to go in first. 

Don Mattingly 

Two of my closest friends consider Mattingly their favorite player of all time. And he’s in one of the greatest "Simpsons" episodes of all time. Oh, and unbeknownst to the writers, he was benched for refusing to trim his mullet in 1991. So there’s that too. But let’s talk about his career.

Donnie Baseball was the face of the New York Yankees when the Yankees were in the longest postseason drought in their post-Babe-Ruth history. They were in the World Series the year before he joined the team. They won the World Series the year after he retired. You could argue that they would have won it all in the strike-shortened season in 1994. But as it stands, Mattingly’s only postseason with the Yankees was that 1995 ALDS against the Seattle Mariners that ended in the bottom of the 11th with a walk-off double (ahem, THE Double) by Edgar Martinez and an elated Ken Griffey Jr. at the bottom of a doggy pile. Mattingly is considered the greatest Yankee to never play in a World Series with the team (probably Rickey Henderson only played 5 seasons in the Bronx) and he’s the only Yankee to have his number retired by the team, without winning at least one ring (Your move, Aaron Judge).

It definitely wasn’t his fault.

Mattingly was the best player on the Yankees in 1984, 1986 and 1987. Henderson was better in ’85, even though that’s somehow the year Mattingly won his MVP (I’d would have given him 4th, after George Brett, Henderson and Wade Boggs). Mattingly SHOULD have won an AL MVP in 1984. And there’s a really good argument for Mattingly winning it in 1986, even though the bozo writers gave it to Roger Clemens (Pitchers have their own awards, guys! And Boggs was on the same team! How are you so stupid???).

Mattingly was also the best American League first baseman from 1984-1987. And probably the best in baseball at first in ’85 and ’86. During Mattingly’s own career (82-95), Eddie Murray was better. And Mark McGwire played in more All-Star Games. But I already know what you’re gonna say about that. Pat yourself on the back for your moral superiority.

Mattingly won 9 Gold Gloves. He was the A.L. MVP in 1985. He won a batting title in 1984. And then he got into a clubhouse wrestling match with Bob Shirley in 1987, injured his back, and wasn’t really the same after that. I guess, it was the same year as Hogan-Andre at WrestleMania III and wrestling was pretty big at the time, but yeah. The Yankees promptly released Shirley, by the way. Mattingly would have moments where he looked like his old self. He was still great, defensively. But the back problems persisted. And Mattingly ended his career after only 14 seasons, when he was 34-years-old.

Mattingly is ranked on JAWS as the 40th-best first baseman of all time. That’s behind first basemen like Rafael Palmeiro, Todd Helton, McGwire, Keith Hernandez, John Olerud, Will Clark, Fred McGriff, Norm Cash, Dolph Camilli, Gil Hodges, and Carlos Delgado. That’s also behind not-yet-eligible first basemen like Albert Pujols, Miguel Cabrera, Joey Votto, Jason Giambi, David Ortiz, Mark Teixeira, and Paul Goldschmidt. He has 222 career home runs, 2,153 hits, and a .307 career average. Of the 10 most-similar batters, only Kirby Puckett is in the Hall of Fame. He would be well below average for a Hall of Fame first baseman. Better than Mark Grace. About half as good as Frank Thomas.

Should Mattingly be in the Hall of Fame? No. Then again, he was better than Harold Baines, so what do I fucking know? But Mattingly spent 15 years on the writers’ ballot. He never got higher than 28.2% of the vote (his first year). His final season only garnered 9.1%. His peak wasn’t high enough. His career wasn’t long enough. And he definitely shouldn’t have played grab ass with Bob Shirley in 1987. The sideburns, however, can stay.

Dave Parker 

They called him “The Cobra”, he used a sledgehammer in the on-deck circle, he wore a Padres helmet AND a Reds helmet in the 1977 All-Star Game… while he was on the Pirates, and he loved cocaine. Boy did he ever, apparently. He was also the best player on the Pirates in 1975, 1977, 1978 and 1979. And then he was the best player on his hometown Reds in 1984 and 1985. I’d also say he was the best right fielder in baseball in ’75, ’77, ’78 and the best in the N.L in ’85. Parker was a seven-time All-Star, he won two batting titles, three Gold Gloves, two World Series rings and received MVP votes in nine different seasons, including winning one in 1978. He was baseball’s first million dollar contract. I think he had five elite seasons. He deserved that ’78 MVP. And I would have given him 2nd in 1975 (he got 3rd), 4th in 1977 (3rd again), 6th in 1979 (10th) and 5th in 1985 (he got 2nd). Parker also got 5th place in 1986, which is stupid. Dude had a 0.7 fWAR, but he also had 116 RBI and you know how stupid these guys were with the RBI. 

It’s possible the cocaine got the best of him. Or the injuries. Or the weight gain. Because it looked like he was well on his way to a Hall of Fame career in the late 70’s, and except for a brief bump (sorry) in 1985, he didn’t do much else after 1979. That leaves Parker as the 5th-best right fielder, even in his own exact timeframe in the Majors (1973-1991, after Dwight Evans, Dave Winfield, Andre Dawson and Reggie Jackson). He would be well below average for a Hall of Fame right fielder. JAWS ranks him as the 39th-best right fielder of all time. That’s behind Larry Walker, Shoeless Joe Jackson, Evans, Reggie Smith, Sammy Sosa, Bobby Bonds, Gary Sheffield, Brian Giles, Jack Clark, Tony Oliva, Rocky Colavito, and Rusty Staub. He’s also behind not-yet-eligible players like Ichiro Suzuki, Bobby Abreu, and Mookie Betts. He was better than Darryl Strawberry. Miles behind Tony Gwynn.    

With over 2,700 hits and 339 home runs in 19 seasons, Parker does have similar career stats to Tony Perez, Billy Williams, Harold Baines and Andre Dawson. Not quite inner-circle guys. And Parker never got more than 24% of the vote from the writers. And I think he’s relegated to the Hall of Very Good. But he’s not a Hall of Famer. 

Steve Garvey 

They called him Mr. Clean, even though he totally wasn’t. He has some, uh, ugly relationships with women. A weird fact that dashed all of his hopes to become a Republican Congressman later in life. I think a lot of Garvey’s popularity and fame during his career had to do with his looks. He was never the best player on the Dodgers. And during his tenure there (1969-1982), he was second to Ron Cey in overall fWAR. And while he was the best first baseman in the National League in 1975, 1976 and 1978, he was only 7th-best over the 15 years he played first base (1973-1987) after Keith Hernandez, Darrell Evans, Rod Carew, Eddue Murray, Gene Tenace and Pete Rose. JAWS ranks him as the 51st-greatest first baseman of all time, behind too many non-Hall players than I care to type. His career numbers are similar to Orlando Cepeda (#33), but they look more like those of John Olerud (#22), Will Clark (#26) and Mark Grace (#41). Even though all of those players were better.  

It was the FAME part of the equation that Garvey seemed to have down. He was a 10 time All-Star. He remained a part of a Dodgers infield with Ron Cey, Bill Russell and Davey Lopes for 8.5 years. He played in 1,207 consecutive games (1975-1983), which is the 4th-longest streak ever. He won a ring with the Dodgers in 1981 and was a two-time NLCS MVP. And in 1974, he won an NL MVP while only finishing 20th in the League in WAR. And he got really close again in 1978. But he didn’t really deserve to be in that conversation either. Of all the player’s on this year’s ballot, Garvey is the weakest candidate. 

[swipestream]

New Release Roundup, 22 September 2018: Science Fiction

Three best-selling space operas return in this week’s roundup of the newest releases in science fiction.

Agents of Mars (Starship’s Mage: Red Falcon #3) – Glynn Stewart

Captain David Rice and the crew of Red Falcon have spent two years infiltrating the arms smuggling underworld of the Protectorate of the Mage-King of Mars. When the co-opted rebellion on Ardennes reveals a supply chain of weapons intended to fight Mars, this makes them the perfect team to investigate.

His new mission brings him across old friends and old enemies alike, but as his suspects start turning up dead, David realizes he isn’t the only one following the loose ends.

As shadowy enemies move to position themselves for civil war, Red Falcon’s crew must chase an ever-shrinking set of clues. If they succeed, they might just buy the Protectorate peace for their lifetime.

But if they fail…

By Right of Arms (Terra Rising #1) – J. T. Buckley

The Confederated Nations of Terra receive a mysterious distress signal from Earth’s closest celestial neighbor, Alpha Centauri. Captain Aaron Richardson and the crew of the TNS Intrepid are shocked and horrified by what they find. What they discover launches them into a new universe of political and military intrigue.

Using ancient legends, they forge Earth’s position in the Principean Empire and discover the secrets of Earth’s distant past. Thwarted at every turn by pirates, they must fight a race of aliens who are intent on killing all humans and destroying the Earth. Unable to do it alone, they must seek assistance of new allies to save their home.

Empire Dawn (Road to Empire #1) – Dietmar Arthur Wehr

The grand experiment of a democratic Commonwealth of Star Nations has failed. With colony after colony leaving the Commonwealth, Earth finds itself in desperate straits as ecological disaster and mass starvation looms in the near future. The collapse of the Commonwealth means there’s now a power vacuum but no shortage of ruthless egos looking to fill that vacuum.

Will it be the Republic of Corona, the most prosperous and populous colony world, or a resurgent Earth under a messianic leader or perhaps a power-hungry interstellar corporation? With stakes this high, political intrigue, backstabbing and betrayal are par for the course.

Infinite Exodus (Infinite Exodus #1) – N. R. Whitaker

Locked inside an unreleased game awaits a world of untapped possibility–and consequences.

Gerard is a would-be scientist, not a soldier, but his father is nowhere near fit for the open-ended rescue mission into the Parallel, a hyperrealistic VR world that was stolen for government applications from genius game developer Ned Dixon. As a fan of Dixon’s immersive and often twisted worlds, Gerard thinks he knows what he’s getting himself into by taking his father’s place, but within the Parallel awaits an infinite number of sinister surprises.

The mission is simple: Play through the deadly game’s storyline to save the living researchers trapped within. Not so simple? Dealing with a snarky A.I. who knows Gerard doesn’t belong and fending off the monstrous angels Dixon programmed to make the crew’s job as difficult as possible.

Initiate (The Animus #1) – Joshua Anderle and Michael Anderle

It was just one fight, but it changed Kaiden Jericho’s life forever.

He was in a gang but was trying to change his future when a board member of the elite advanced academy NEXUS made a snap decision and offered him a chance. Then fate, or an unbalanced genius, offered him another.

The Nexus Academy is for the elite trainees from Earth, and now trials from our alien allies, as they teach the future generation how to fight, lead, hack, spy, and many other talents and tactics.

Hired by companies, governments and NGOs, these graduates work to pay off the massive debt their training at the academy accumulates. You don’t become the best of the best by staying alive. With the Animus, you are closer to perfection with each death you suffer.

Kaiden Jericho would rather skip the death part, thank you very much.

Invasion (Blood on the Stars #9) – Jay Allan

War…like none that has come before.

The Hegemony has launched the invasion Tyler Barron and his Confederation comrades have feared, and all the Rim is ablaze with the fires of war and destruction.

The Hegemony has brought its vast fleets, its advanced technology, and its endless legions of grim cyborg warriors to impose its system of rigid genetic hierarchy over all humanity on the Rim.

The Confederation fleet is outnumbered and outmatched, but they will fight nevertheless, struggling and dying to hold back the onslaught any way they can, even as the Marines they leave behind dig in and prepare to defend worlds swallowed up by the advancing battle lines.

Barron and his people will fight, they will fight like demons unleashed, and Jake ‘Raptor’ Stockton will lead his wings of strikefighters in one desperate attack after another into the teeth of the enemy armada, but time is running out…even as the enemy pushes relentlessly toward the Confederation’s Core and final victory.

The Last Strike (The Last War #5) – Peter Bostrom

His son is dead. His ship is dead. His career is dead.

But Spectre is very much alive. And with his plans of galactic domination laid bare, Captain James Mattis must gather what allies he can to stop him.

Admiral Pippa Spears and the HMS Caernarvon make a mysterious discovery in the wreckage of the USS Stennis, one that could change the outcome of the war. And in the uproar after the assassination of the American President she and Captain Mattis race across the galaxy after the suspected shooter, knowing full well the murder is another of Spectre’s schemes to throw them off guard while he carries out his sinister plans.

Plans that Mattis and Spears are close to unraveling.

The cost of failure is unthinkable: a destroyed Earth and an unstoppable immortal foe.

The Lazarus Protocol (SynCorp Saga #1) – David Bruns and Chris Pourteau

A climate in crisis. A world on the brink. And we did it to ourselves.

After centuries of exploitation, Mother Nature is mad as hell. Flooded coastlines drive refugees from their homes. Dust storms bury cities. New species disappear every day. And humanity is next…

While some look off-planet for answers, the American President, in an election year gamble, recruits a brilliant billionaire inventor for the most important scientific undertaking since the Manhattan Project: reversing climate change by geo-engineering Earth’s atmosphere. But the New Earth Order, a mysterious cabal of reactionary activists, has another agenda.

Lemuria – John Triptych

Nick Dirkse is a workaholic software developer, and he’s desperate to save his crumbling marriage and reconnect with his neglected children. So he takes them on what promises to be the ultimate vacation in a tropical paradise.

The island, newly built off the southwest coast of India, is named for the mythical land of Lemuria. And it’s a world-class private resort to indulge the modern-day rich and famous.

But this seemingly luxurious wonderland hides a terrible secret, a nightmare so real and terrifying it will test the outer limits of Nick’s courage and resolve if he is to save the ones he loves.

Reclamation (Legacy War #6) – John Walker

Humanity has unlocked another secret of the Orbs but it has put them on a collision course with their enemy, the terrorist group known as the Tol’An. As they race to collect another of the powerful devices, they must face another of their enemies, the cold corporate mercenaries known as the Kalrawv Group. Hidden away on an illegal mining facility, their purpose there can only mean one thing: they are trying to take the Orb for themselves.

But Earth has an ally in the Pahxin people and the battleship Stalwart is committed to assisting with the operation. As the two ships depart Earth, they head out to raid a planet which is known for destructive weather patterns. The unstable system holds the powerful secret from a long dead civilization, one which must be collected before either of the nefarious groups get their hands on it.

Tempest (Legend of the Galactic Heroes #7) – Yoshiki Tanaka

Reinhard, under his Golden Lion banner, is setting out to bend history and the universe to his will. Meanwhile, with no flag of their own to raise, Yang and his compatriots have escaped the murderous hands of the Free Planets Alliance’s government and dubbed themselves the “Irregulars.” Yang receives word that an Imperial fleet is closing in on the capital of Heinessen, and in a daring move, recaptures Iserlohn Fortress. In the meantime, Reinhard’s invasion of the Free Planets Alliance proceeds steadily apace. Standing in the path of the Imperial fleet is a fleet of FPA Navy vessels commanded by the elderly Admiral Bucock.

An old lion roars out a life-or-death challenge, and a young lion answers it—the final battle of the Free Planets Alliance now begins!

The Theos (The Survivors #5) – Nathan Hystad

“The Theos await you. Only then will we stop the Unwinding.”

Some secrets prefer to stay buried.

When Dean’s closest ally is kidnapped by an ancient race, his grief threatens to turn to madness. With the support of his friends, he embarks on a mission to get his loved one back, and stop the eventual destruction of the known Universe.

But Dean can’t do it without solving an age-old mystery. He must find the real Theos this time, and he’ll stop at nothing to accomplish that.

Join the Survivors as they battle for every race in existence.

New Release Roundup, 22 September 2018: Science Fiction published first on https://medium.com/@ReloadedPCGames

[archiebwoollard]

3 Methods for Training PPC Teams

To Nerd, or Not To Nerd

My whole life, I have been a nerd. From elementary through high school, I took advanced classes. I had a free period in high school and chose to fill it with an independent study. I played violin in the orchestra. I read books for fun. I raised my hand in class, always. I never really had a problem with the label of “nerd”. So when I became a PPC Nerd courtesy of Hanapin, I was actually thrilled. I found my people!

But lately the term “nerd” is grating and I’m over it (sorry marketing team! Please don’t make me give my PPC Nerd shirt back!). While us nerds have embraced the term recently and even celebrate it, it still doesn’t feel right. Wanting to learn and be the best at your job doesn’t make you a nerd, it makes you an engaged human being.

As one of the lead trainers for Hanapin’s Services department, I take great pride in making sure our team is engaged. And let me tell you, it isn’t easy. While we all wear our PPC Nerd shirts proudly, taking the time out of being awesome account managers to dig in and learn how to be better at our jobs is not something we always do willingly. In this blog post, I will talk through 3 ways to train your PPC teams and make sure the “nerds” do more than just claim to be one, but truly walk the walk and talk the talk.

Build Solid Foundations

If you join our team with no prior PPC experience we don’t give you a client and push you in the deep end. How disastrous for all involved. Instead, we develop expertise and confidence with an intensive training program: 11-week classroom training plus 1 year of hands-on training through dedicated account support. Hanapin’s approach to our 11-week program is more acutely outlined in the blog Using A Reverse Classroom Approach to Training. That covers how we train. I want to talk about the what and the why.

What: Cover It All The Best You Can

Google, Bing, and Social Platforms all get fair coverage in New Hire training. And if you are thinking, “well, people can just teach themselves–all of those platforms have ‘how-to’ videos and articles”, my response is, “yep, absolutely and you should read and watch those”. But if you have taken any of the certification exams, you might have noticed the platforms tend to favor their own methods and products. If you only learn the awesome tools and options available for automation or use default campaign settings based on your goals, you are basically learning how to set it and forget it. Any account manager worth their salt knows you need more than that to be successful.

Learn how to change bids manually and project the results. Run analysis on placements and performance instead of setting all bids to “top of page”. Build a report from scratch in Excel. Do audience and keyword research outside of the platforms. Don’t accept the campaign defaults as law: understand what each setting actually means.

Why: You Have To Learn How To Walk Before You Can Crawl

As a Sophomore in high school, I was given a copy of Strunk and White’s Elements of Style. I read it front to back, made notes in the margins with metallic gel pens, and dog-eared numerous pages. Mrs. Whitaker was highly critical of any prose that strayed from the bounds of proper grammar. When asked why, she would respond: “You have to learn and understand the rules before you can break them.”

Take the time to learn the impact of each moving lever. Automation and AI can only get you so far. You will have a much stronger team if you force them to learn the rules and show their work. And if you want to learn how to build your PPC team, reserve your HeroConf London ticket to catch Molly Nagy’s session on hiring the best PPC teams.

Set aside dedicated time

Keeping up with the industry is hard work. If your team is anything like ours, we like to have our noses to the grindstone and we love our work so much that we just forget to look up and around. We keep up with #ppcchat and industry blogs and newsletters on the regular. In my opinion, reading is different than studying. Which is why once a month our team steps back from the daily work and devotes an entire day to learning.

The point is to engage with what is new in the industry and what is ultimately going to enhance partnerships with clients. We bring in vendors to train on the latest betas, industry leaders to talk philosophy, etc. But mostly we do something totally radical: we teach ourselves.Teach One Another

I’m going to pull a bit of knowledge from an unlikely source: Cliff Calvin of Cheers. Cliff postulates, “ A herd of buffalo can only move as fast as the slowest buffalo. And when the herd is hunted, it is the slowest and the weakest ones at the back that are killed first. This natural selection is good for the herd as a whole, because the general speed and health of the whole group keeps improving by the regular killing of the weakest members.”

Okay, so Cliff is using this analogy to talk about the consumption of beer. I have no idea if it has any semblance of scientific fact, but I like it still. The whole “we are only as strong as our weakest link.” And while I am not going to go so far as to indicate any individual on our team is a weak link and therefore should be “killed off”, we all have weaknesses and blind spots. Every. Single. One. Of. Us. By working together and teaching each other, we are going to fill in those gaps and blind spots and get better and stronger as a team.

So we get together and we work in teams to better ourselves for the group. We create case studies, we put together presentations, we even have spirited debates. We do this for the love of learning and for the love of having fun as a team. Nerd or not, no one said learning had to be boring and one size fits all.

Training Is Never Complete

As PPC managers, we can’t always be looking for the next level of our careers without thinking about how we are going to get there. We have to build solid foundations, be brave enough to take a step back from our work every now and then, and be humble enough to admit we don’t know everything. Our industry is full of experts. It is both intimidating and inspiring. But it isn’t enough to read blogs, try new automation, and use the latest testing platforms. We have to be engaged with what we are doing.

So if you identify with the term “nerd”, embrace it. Or if you are like me, push it aside and dig in a bit deeper. Either way, keep the love of learning PPC alive with your teams.

from RSSMix.com Mix ID 8217493 https://www.ppchero.com/3-methods-for-training-ppc-teams/

[theinquisitivej]

Late to the Party – ‘Attack the Block’ (2011)

As much as I get the impression that the enjoyable ingredients of Attack the Block should make for a recipe to a delightful and previously undiscovered film, I’m afraid it just doesn’t quite work for me.

         On paper, I’m really not sure why that’s the case. It features John Boyega and Jodie Whittaker in prominent roles, who have both firmly established their strengths as actors and are going to be involved in things I enjoy for some time to come. Its director Joe Cornish is a writer who has contributed to Stephen Spielberg’s The Adventures of Tintin: Secret of the Unicorn and Marvel’s Ant-Man. In this film, his story once again tells a thrilling narrative with a decent sense of humour which conveys high stakes, even with its small scale. Aliens invading South London could work as the premise for a summer blockbuster, but by keeping the focus tight and looking at a limited group of characters in one location, it feels intimate and suggests the director knows his limits and makes full use of the film’s £8 million budget.

         This approach is heavily felt in the design of the alien creatures. Rather than making the aliens technologically advanced and consequently complicated and expensive to depict, the film makes them animalistic, and unknowable. Their pitch-black fur and lack of detail means that the only feature you can see of them is their neon jaws. This makes for a visually striking silhouette and accentuates the danger of their teeth nicely, but it also shows that the film knows how to make something feel eerie and dangerous without having to rely on extensive effects. Add to that a score which uses the brooding, echoing techno beats that you would hear in old-school grungy sci-fi, and you have an atmosphere that is easy to get into and enjoy. There are a lot of technical accomplishments and positive features which should make Attack the Block a firm recommend.

         However, there are multiple elements to the film which prevented me from gelling with it. It’s a shame, because I think what the narrative tries to do with its characters is commendable. For the most part, we follow a small ragtag gang of young teenagers who all live on the council estate in which the film is set. There are other supporting characters who make the estate feel like a populated area, including Nick Frost as Ron, the local drug dealer who knows everyone and is known by everyone, and Jumayn Hunter as Hi-Hatz, a criminal with a hold over the local area. Luke Treadaway is a posh-spoken student and one of Ron’s frequent customers, and clearly feels out of place in this environment. Finally, Jodie Whitaker is Samantha, a nurse in training who’s recently moved into the area. She comes across as the secondary protagonist of the story, as she’s the first person the film focuses on, until the group of kids are introduced and form the central focus of the film.

         The first thing we see the group do is mug Samantha, who is threatened with a knife held by Moses, their leader played by John Boyega. They wear hoods and scarves to mask their face, partly to protect their identities from Samantha, but also because this starts the central arc of the film. At first, Samantha sees these boys as little more than a physical threat, a gang of dangerous youths who are so detached from her world and frame of reference that she literally cannot see the people they are underneath the front they present to the world as these masked criminals. As the narrative shifts from her perspective to these kids, we spend time with them and are meant to get to know them, seeing their relationships to each other, as well as to their friends and neighbours, generally establishing that these are real people. When we meet Hi-Hatz, we get a sense of who the real danger is, and that the front these kids put on might just be a way to impress this guy and gain the same kind of local success and power that he has.

         Once the aliens show up in full force and the paths of Samantha and the boys cross again, her impression of these kids continues to be that they’re dangerous, and she wants nothing to do with them and doesn’t want them anywhere near her home or world. But the aliens are a real danger to all of them, so they’re stuck together. As things progress, she has to rely on them more and more, and gets to know them and Moses in particular. The distance between them shrinks, leading to her ultimately embracing them as her neighbours by the end of the film. It’s a well-meaning arc which brings people together and shows prejudices and social barriers being broken down in front of us, which I think is a great thing for a narrative to demonstrate.

         But unfortunately, for this arc to work you need to feel connected with the main characters, and I never felt that. When the teenagers encounter Samantha after the aliens have landed, you need to have some reason to like them so that you can see that her impression of them is unfair and off-base. Yet while I didn’t hate or fear these kids, I didn’t like them all that much either. Despite their claims that they were as scared as she was, and that they would never have used the knife, pulling a knife on someone is still pulling a knife on someone, and that’s a pretty hard-hitting first impression of these characters. True, the film’s point may be that we should look to empathise with and understand these kids and others like them, and not necessarily dismiss them for their actions.

         On the other hand, after their first scene, when we’ve just seen them mug Samantha, we see them go after the creature that crash-lands nearby and kill it. This makes them seem like a group of violent and brash kids, which doesn’t help convey that they absolutely never would’ve used the knife. It would be one thing if they killed the creature in self-defence when it was on top of Moses, but they choose to pursue it with the intention of killing it only after it’s left them, and the danger has passed. And yes, I could potentially see the argument that, as a dangerous looking alien, it might be a threat to other people or even the rest of the world, so maybe they should go after it and stop it from harming anyone else. But I don’t get the impression that they’re thinking about that when they go to kill it, so it just comes across as them doing it for the sake of it rather than for any deeper or more ethical reason. When we see them go on to carry and parade its corpse as they wonder around the local area, it all just seems like a group of teenagers harming an animal and treating it like a laugh as they chuckle about it and shove it in other people’s faces. It’s uncomfortable for me to watch, and it makes it difficult to warm to their characters once the true conflict of the film starts.

         This could be forgiven if I felt like these were endearing characters with their own identities and personalities which reminded us that, while they may be young and brash and make questionable decisions, that’s not all there is to them. Indeed, Moses was compelling as the brooding, enigmatic leader of this gang. Maybe that’s because Boyega inhabits his role with such comfort that you can already see his star power developing at this stage of his career, but I also did like that Moses takes responsibility for his mistakes. His feelings of insecurity plaguing him with concerns that, wherever he goes, he will always bring trouble makes him more sympathetic than some of his companions who lack the same amount of character development.

         However, apart from Moses, I can’t grasp any of the unique attributes which are meant to mark each member of the group out as distinct people, so I can’t really attach myself to any of their personalities. True, when people go around in a friend group they do start to blend together and merge into this one linked, connected social identity and personality as they all bounce off each other. We often show a familiar chemistry and shared understanding with one another in our friendship groups which tends to identify the group as a whole rather than the individuals who make it up, and this is especially true during our teenage years. However, this is leant into so much that I really only took in the slightest hints that each boy had something unique to them, such as Jerome being the smart one by virtue of his glasses, but little else. In stark contrast to the kids from Stranger Things, Misfits, or last year’s IT Chapter One, I neither felt a strong sense of the individual identities within this group dynamic, nor warmed up to them nearly as much.

(In fairness, however, two of those examples are taken from TV series which have a lot more time to flesh out their individual characters)

         Sadly, this didn’t come across as a film where the comedy or action could make up for having characters I was disinterested in. The action will often be frantic, but not in a controlled way which makes you feel the energy of the situation, but rather in that way where the camerawork is moving excessively in order to hide the budget and limitations of the film. It’s difficult to make out where characters are in relation to one another in some sequences, which is the often a deciding factor to whether or not audiences will feel the adrenaline of an action scene. There are some decent laughs throughout the film, with the best ones coming near the end when you are at your most familiar with the characters. However, the jokes in between these occasional highlights don’t really elicit a laugh from me, so the comedy doesn’t come as hard and fast as it does in, say, The Cornetto Trilogy, with which the marketing and description on the back of the box are encouraging you to associate this film. It’s unfair to compare this to some of my all-time favourite comedies, sure, but my point is that each of those films show how to balance character drama, visceral action, and exceptional comedy, and Attack the Block doesn’t really have as much going for it in any of these areas for me, which means none of these areas of the film are picking up the slack.

         I should stress that my issues with Attack the Block are very much down to personal taste. There are many commendably constructed technical features and positive storytelling elements to this film, some of which I mentioned at the start of this review, which makes me eager to encourage you to give the film a chance and see what your own opinion towards it will be. My favourite take-away from the story is how the characters will often have a shining moment where they accomplish something impressive, and, often, is something they had wanted to do since the beginning of the film, before aliens start showing up. The film isn’t just about breaking down social barriers, but about living up to your potential and moving past all the empty bluster you put out there about yourself when you’re young and trying to impress your friends or prove something to the world. Whether it’s the guy who gets away from an alien by jumping a gap which he said he could do but never tried, or the young pre-teens wanting to be taken seriously and earning their chosen nicknames when they deal with the alien by the bins, or Moses’ arc where he goes from causing trouble and being looked down on for his mistakes to bravely putting himself out there and saving the day, the narrative shows how these kids don’t need to prove anything to people like Hi-Hatz. When it comes down to it, they have what it takes to fight the monsters.

          Attack the Block feels like an underappreciated gem in many respects, and I suspect it will be for many people. Its characters are just not for me. I’m sure that if you can click with it, then there is a lot to enjoy, and I can see how the set-up would be really engaging if it hits the right note for you. But it didn’t do so in my case, and honestly, that’s fine. A film can still have interesting components and the power to be enjoyed and meaningful to other people without me needing to enjoy it.

4/10.

I couldn’t connect with Attack the Block’s characters, which made watching it a drag. However, its messages and design aesthetic are really positive elements which makes me suggest you check it out and find out for yourself whether it’s your cup of tea.

[someyankee]

The 2017 Baseball Memorabilia Haul

I’ve delayed this long enough.  2016 was a big year for me in terms of no longer just buying cards of guys from the 1980′s and 1990′s.  I ventured out and started spending money on stars playing today, and prospects for the future!  I continued that this year, but also filled out a lot more players on that 1980/1990 list that I’ve been working on! 

2017 was by far my biggest year ever in terms of collecting cards. The most I’ve ever gotten in a single year.  I hope you enjoy checkin’ em out!!!

FIRST THINGS FIRST.  THE ALBERT PUJOLS FROM LAST YEAR. 

BIG BOY CAME BACK A 9!  Which is crazy good!  I’m ecstatic about it.  The Corners sub-graded an 8.5 and the Edges graded a 9, while the Surface & Centering hit at 9.5.  Part of me wants to do a re-grade to see if the corners and edges could possibly come back a bit higher... but hey.  a 9 is still insane.  And that auto is great. 

Albert is currently looking like he’s at the end of his career, but even if he sticks around for another several years being basically unplayable - his peak was so nuts he will still be regarded as one of the best players in Baseball history.

Now to the new additions to the collection, by order of when I received them:

01.) 2013 BBM SCM Original #206 - Shohei Ohtani (BGS 9.5)

Newest big star in MLB.  Shohei Ohtani is an awesome pitcher, and what makes him unique is he’s also great with a bat.  Was desperately hoping he was going to sign with the Yankees, but unfortunately he came in immediately deciding he didn’t want to live on the East Coast.  Which sucks.  Boo.  But hey, I hope he still does good.  Just not against us.

02.) 1989 Donruss #635 - Curt Schilling (PSA 10)

Curt Schilling is a piece of crap.  A terrible person, with terrible opinions, and his attitude keeping him out of the Hall of Fame so far has brought me some great joy.

With that said he’s one of the best pitchers of all time.  His unpopularity atm made this purchase very easy on my wallet.

03.) 1983 Fritsch #013 - Jose Canseco (PSA 10)

Before Jose Canseco lost his finger and opened up a can of worms about steroids, he hit a lot of dingers and was very popular.  He also is a butthead.  I probably spent too much on this one, but eh.  He’s off the list now.

04.) 1988 CMC Calgary Cannons #034 - Edgar Martinez (PSA 10)

I’d been wanting an Edgar Martinez card for a long time.  He has no rookie card that really looks great though.  This was my favorite of the bunch I had seen.

Edgar is one of the best designated hitters ever.  Not the best, but at least top 3.  Deserves to be in the hall, and I’m glad he’s taken a big jump in the votes and looks like he could get in next year!

05.) 1978 Burger King Tigers #013 - Lou Whitaker (PSA 8)

I had a PSA 8.5 of Alan Trammell.  You can’t have just Trammell though without Whitaker.  For 19 years, those 2 were the starting 2B and SS for the Detroit Tigers, and they were damn good.  Trammell & Morris just made the Hall of Fame thanks to the Veterans Committee, but left Whitaker off the ballot in a decision that was just baffling.  Hopefully Whitaker gets his due soon enough.  He’s arguably the best of those 3.

06.) 1995 Upper Deck SP Top Prospects #011 - Carlos Beltran (BGS 9.5)

Carlossss!!!  The very next day after I purchased a Lou Whitaker, I got this card.  No real reason other than I really like Beltran.  I don’t think he’ll ever get Hall of Fame votes or anything, but he was a big player in New York. 

I don’t like the Astros, but I’m glad he finally got his WS Ring before retirement.

07.) 1998 Bowman’s Best #120 - Adrian Beltre (BGS 9.5, AUTO 10)

This is it.  The biggest purchase I made this year, and by far the most I’ve ever spent on a single card.  A tough grade on its own, but I managed to get one with the Topps Certified Auto as well!

I got this card in March.  Beltre went into the season with 58 more hits to go before he reached a career milestone of 3000.  He ended up going into the season with an injury that kept him out for a little less than half the season.  Because of that, I was super worried he wasn’t going to come into the season very productive - but in 94 games he was still able to hit .312/.383/.532 and reach the 3000 hit mark.

He’s currently sitting on 462 Home Runs also.  With only one more year left on his Rangers contract, I don’t know if he’s going to be able to make it to 500 before his career his up.  But who knows, if he has another stellar year this year - maybe he’ll get signed to a few more years and hit just enough to reach another milestone.

I may have spent a lot on this guy, but I can see the value of it being much higher in the future.

08.) 2011 Heroes & Prospects #GSA2 - Gary Sanchez (BGS 9.5, AUTO 10)

El Gary.

Gary Sanchez rolled into the 2016 season late and in only 53 games put up a really compelling case for Rookie of the Year.  Unfortunately he didn’t get it.

Gary wasn’t as GODLY in 2017 as he was at the end of 2016, but he showed some real big sparks of greatness and I think he’ll be incredibly fun to watch for years to come.

This card is the GOLD Version of this set.  Only 10 of these exist.  Only 2 have been graded a 9.5.  I’m happy to have one.

09.) 2000 SPx #094 - Alfonso Soriano (PSA 10)

Alfonso Soriano came up as a 2nd Baseman on the New York Yankees.  In 2002 and 2003 he mashed a lot of taters.  We then traded him for Alex Rodriguez.

Soriano spent most of his career on the Chicago Cubs where he was... pretty mediocre.  He hit dingers but didn’t get on base a ton.  He ended his career with over 2000 hits and over 400 home runs.  I thought he was fun.

10.) 1983 Topps #083 - Ryne Sandberg (BGS 9.5)

Ryne Sandberg played his career on the Chicago Cubs as a second baseman.  He was really good.  He could hit dingers and also defend really well.

A PSA 10 of this card cost over 300.  Nutty.  I ended up settling for a BGS 9.5 since I was able to get it for much cheaper.  If PSA did raw grade reviews I might see if I could get it converted to a PSA 10... but they don’t.  Hrm.  Oh well!

11.) 1959 Menko #JCM14b - Shigeo Nagashima (PSA 7, HAND CUT)

This is the coolest card I got all year.

Shigeo Nagashima is the most popular player in the history of Japanese baseball.  More popular than his teammate Sadaharu Oh, the Home Run King.  This isn’t a rookie card unfortunately!  It’s a second year card.  However I got it because last year I was able to nab a Sadaharu Oh rookie from this exact same set!  Put them next to each other, and they match very well.  A rookie card of Nagashima would be really cool - but I’m really really happy with this one!

12.) 2013 Elite Extra Edition #071 - Gleyber Torres (BGS 9.5, AUTO 10)

Gleyber Torres will be on the Yankees this year.  Gleyber Torres will be great.  I am ready for The Yankees to win the World Series.

13.) 2016 Bowman’s Best #B16ARO - Amed Rosario (BGS 10, AUTO 10)

The Mets had a million problems last year and it took them forever before they called up Amed.  He wasn’t great, but he’s young and has a good shot to bounce back.  At least I hope.  Also, that’s a sick auto.

14.) 1978 Burger King Tigers #015 - Alan Trammell (PSA 9)

I already had a PSA 8.5 of Alan Trammell.  But I wanted a higher grade.  So I got this one!

15.) 1987 Leaf #043 - Rafael Palmeiro (PSA 10)

Rafael Palmeiro was a very talented player.  He was a lock for the Hall of Fame.  But then he did something very dumb.

His downfall came when he testified to a room of Congressmen that he had never used Steroids, and then only 6 weeks later he failed a drug test. 

He was a lock for the Hall of Fame.  But the announcement that he failed a test killed his good standing with fans.  Despite being 1 of only 5 players to have 3000 hits and over 500 Home Runs, he fell off the Hall of Fame ballot on his 4th year with only 4.4% of people voting for him.

16.) 1993 Upper Deck SP #273 - Johnny Damon (PSA 10)

Johnny Damon was a good player.  Not great, but very good for a long time.  This was his best moment.  He never did anything big on the Red Sox, no siree.

17.) Some Didi Gregorius

The Bowman with the facsimile is a rookie card.  The card next to that has a real autograph!  Both of these cards came with the purchase of an autographed ticket from Didi Gregorius’ first game in Yankee Stadium.  He hit a home run on the first pitch he saw.

18.) 2014 Sal Top Prospects #017 - Aaron Judge (JSA AUTO)

Aaron Judge is big, and strong, and also my friend.  I don’t think this card is really in the best condition to be graded, which is why I haven’t done that yet - but I really like the photo and the Autograph.  You can tell he’s a big boy.  I like it very much.

19.) 2010 Bowman Sterling #025 - Carlos Santana (BGS 9.5, AUTO 10)

Not his biggest card or anything - but for a First Baseman who has been nothing but good his entire career, this card was cheap as hell.  Not one of my favorite players, but deal was a bit too good to pass up.

20.) 2003 Upper Deck USA Baseball #J-5 - Justin Verlander (PSA 10)

I don’t think I’d have been able to get this card for this cheap had Verlander not been on the Tigers still.  One of the better pitchers of this era, and while he looked to be falling apart in 2014 - he’s been great every year after.  Probably only needs a couple more good-not-great years and he’s pretty much a lock for the Hall.

21.) 2005 Upper Deck USA Baseball #DB-GU - Dellin Betances

A throw in with another card I had purchased.  I forget which.  I hope Betances can bounce back after falling apart last year because he is very fun when he is striking out everybody.

22.) 2008 Upper Deck USA Baseball #QA-SS - Stephen Strasburg (BGS 8.5, AUTO 10)

Aaaaugh!!! The 8.5 on this card KILLS ME.  But despite that, I’m happy to have it.  Strasburg was one of only 2 big current players on my list when I first started collecting cards again over 5 years ago.  His popularity and scouting reports which pretty much guaranteed he was going to be a huge star made all of his cards wayyyyy out of my price range. 

Strasburg is still a very popular player, and still very good.  In 2015 & 2016 he wasn’t able to get any more than 150 IP though.  Take that and add in that his ERA had been steadily climbing with each year, and this card became affordable.

However, in 2017, Strasburg had a real bounceback year.  175 Innings Pitched, and an ERA of 2.52 in a year where offense was the highlight.

I may just get this encased with a grade for the Autograph.  I really love the rarity of this card.  Only 20 in existence, great autograph, and it spells his name wrong.  A lot to like!

23.) 2010 Upper Deck USA Baseball #USA-62 - Corey Seager (JSA AUTO)

This was a throw in if I added 10 dollars to the Strasburg card.  Corey Seager is the starting shortstop for the LA Dodgers.  He’s really damn good, and will probably be good for at least another 10 years.

24.) 2008 Bowman Chrome #BDP48 - David Robertson

DEALIN’ DAVE IS BACK ON THE YANKS.  I love him.  I’m planning to get it slabbed very very soon.  That is all.

25.) 2010 Bowman AFLAC #FL - Francisco Lindor (BGS 9.5, AUTO 10)

Francisco Lindor had a rough start to the year, hitting only .252/.312/.456 in the first half.  That’s rough when you supposedly had turned down an 100 million dollar offer at the start of the year.

However, he bounced back in the second half hitting .298/.366/.563.  Like Corey Seager, he’s probably going to be a great player for years to come.

I don’t think I got as good a deal on this card as I did on the Joey Votto that I bought at the end of last year - but for the price I got for it... it’s gotta be up there.  A really great way to end the year!

Andddd that was the last one!  Hope you enjoyed.

[caveartfair]

New Research Models How Artists Can Benefit from Holding Equity in Their Work

Moneybox, 2013. Gianni Motti Perrotin

When a work is sold at auction, several people cash in: Depending on the terms of the contract, typically the seller rakes in the lion’s share, the auction house pockets some fees, and, if there’s a guarantor, she’ll receive a payment for assuming the risk of a no-sale. But with few exceptions, the artist who actually created the work remains wholly removed from the transaction, receiving nothing even if the auction price is significantly higher than what the artist originally sold it for.  

But what if the artist continued to hold an equity stake in the artwork after that first sale? In other words, what if they continued to own a slice of the artwork? As the work’s value rises, the value of that equity stake would rise as well, even if the tangible object was held by someone else.

New research conducted by Amy Whitaker, assistant professor at New York University Steinhardt, in conjunction with Luxembourg School of Finance professor Roman Kräussl, quantifies just how lucrative such an equity stake could hypothetically be for an artist with a major secondary market. The pair looked at the returns that Robert Rauschenberg and fellow artist Jasper Johns would have seen had they been able to retain a 10% equity stake in a small sample of works sold by their dealer, Leo Castelli, between 1958 and 1963, the early years of careers that lasted decades. Whitaker and Kräussl then compared those returns to what they would have seen had they invested the dollar value of that 10% stake in the S&P 500 index.

The research is a quantitative test of a model, dubbed “fractional ownership,” that has been long been advocated by Whitaker as a way to bring equity to the art market. Under the outline of the proposed system, an artist would forgo some cash from the primary sale of an artwork, say around 10% of the overall price, and instead retain that stake as equity.

This equity stake provides a different and better way value to early-career works compared to the current system, argues Whitaker, in which artists don’t retain any stake in their early works. While early-career works cost a relatively small amount in dollar terms when first sold (and so don’t bring much income to an artist) they can go on to be some of the costliest pieces in an artist’s oeuvre. The artist doesn’t see any direct financial benefit from the upswing. Artworks are not just creative projects divorced from economics, but amount to investments by artists in themselves—this model aims to give artists benefits similar to those of early investors.

Johns and Rauschenberg are two of art history’s most successful and lucrative artists, so their experience will not be generalizable across the field, Whitaker acknowledged. But the exercise is intended to prompt a conversation about the potential benefits for an equity stake model for living artists, who currently see little direct upside when their early works get sold and resold.

Whitaker and Kräussl sifted through archival material and market data, analyzing both the primary and secondary market sale prices for 10 pieces by Rauschenberg and nine by Johns, selected because they appeared in both the records of Leo Castelli Gallery and in auction data. Their study is among the first to use primary market data in such an analysis.

Examining the returns of each individual work, the pair found that a 10% equity stake in Rauschenberg’s portfolio would have generated returns from 2.8 times to 140.8 times greater than if that money had been invested in the S&P 500, depending on the painting. The scale reflects the range between the artist’s worst-performing and best-performing work included in the research. Johns’s portfolio would have trounced the market by a factor of between 24.9 to 986.8. These results amount to “absurdly strong outperformance of the market,” as Whitaker puts it.

For example, take Rauschenberg’s State (1958), first sold for $300 in 1959. The value of a 10% equity stake ($30) would have become $44,000 as the work’s value increased. That same $30 would have returned only $2,417 over the same time if invested in the S&P 500.

The fractional ownership model might also have prevented one of art market history’s most fabled conflicts.

In 1973, art collector Robert Scull auctioned off Rauschenberg’s Thaw (1958) for $85,000, pocketing a hefty profit on an artwork purchased for only $900 just 15 years earlier. Rauschenberg didn’t see any of the returns from the increased price. The artist was so irked that Scull could profit so handily from his work that Rauschenberg confronted the collector after the auction, shoving him. Had Rauschenberg  taken a 10% equity stake in Thaw (foregoing $90 in cash), when the painting hit the auction block, the artist would have made $8,500 and Scull might have been spared a shove (Scull would also made $8,500 fewer dollars from the sale).

The incident sparked proposals in the United States to help ensure artists saw some return for secondary sales of their work. Chief among them was the artist’s resale royalty. The mechanism, which is in effect for member states of the European Union as well as California, entitles living artists to a certain percentage of any resale of their artwork. Federal proposals for a resale royalty have failed through the years, and where the scheme does exist in Europe and California it has proved cumbersome to administer, yielded relatively little benefit and, some economists argue, reduced the competitiveness of the U.K.’s art market.

Fractional ownership, meanwhile, wouldn’t rely on government administration or set fees as a percentage of the overall sale but instead function as a marketplace where equity can be traded. Instead, it would rely on blockchain technology for a leaner, decentralized system. The equity could be traded independently of the piece, with blockchain allowing the work’s history and authenticity to be verified without violating the privacy of the current owner, who may not wish to be identified.  

And unlike resale royalties, fractional ownership also provides the potential for gallerists to keep an equity share in work by young artists, incentivising them to adopt the model.

The system also has potential tax benefits, including that the artist can deduct part of the value of the equity stake in a work should it be donated to a museum. But the scenario raises a challenge for any future application of the model, including how a work is valued once it leaves the market and permanently enters a public institution. Even for work held privately, collectors may also have to regularly value their work to create some foundation for the equity price. And the value of an equity stake could suffer if there is mismanagement by an owner—such as if an unexpected divorce forces an ill-advised sale at the wrong time and hurts the work’s value.

Whitaker plans to tackle some of these questions in future studies by modeling larger portfolios that map more heterogeneous performance, and also further explore the tax implications of donations. Future models will also look at a “more dynamic portfolio construction” with frequent buying and selling of art that would more closely resemble how such a market would function in the real world.

While fractional ownership has a long way to go before widespread implication, Whitaker argues that it’s crucial to start a dialogue about equity and value in the art market now—one that thinks about how the status quo functions from the perspective of an artist.

“To see the potential of the outsides gains leads us to believe that this structural intervention in markets for creative work deserves serious consideration,” reads the study, “and that it is perhaps artists themselves who should decide whether to take the risk of retained equity.”

from Artsy News

[jenmedsbookreviews]

Yes … believe it or not, it is getting to that point in the year that we both welcome and dread. Christmas. You may have missed it, but I’ve started posting a few festive reads on the blog over the past few days, just something Mandie and I thought (back in July/August) was a really good idea. Possibly not as we’re about as enthusiastic about Christmas as the Grinch, but hey ho (ho ho), it’s not all bad. I think. Do stop by for a few festive reading tips won’t you? Hopefully there’s a little something for everyone from the cosy and the kiddie, right through to the dark and the deadly. Always room for a little festive crime right?

Well, I had a busy old week last week achieving not a lot whilst seemingly doing loads. The week started perfectly – I was only at work for half a day before I was heading off down to London for November’s First Monday Crime panel. This month saw Barry Forshaw interview Stuart MacBride, Elodie Harper, Vaseem Khan and Simon Booker. An interesting debate was had by all regarding the idea of crime fiction v ‘literary fiction’, biggest mistakes made by newbie writers and whether there should be limits on how far you take your crime fiction.

A fantastic panel and I can heartily recommend both their books and First Monday Crime and if you want to find out more about next months panel, you can do so at their website here. December’s panel promises to be a doozy with Chris Whitaker, Louise Jensen, Mel McGrath and Susi Holliday alongside chair Claire McGowan. On top of that you’ll get to witness ‘Pitch the Audience’ where MC Howard Linskey will try to corral Rod Reynolds, Abir Mukherjee, Cass Green, Leye Adenle, Susi Holliday, Derek Farrell, Lisa Cutts, Chris Whitaker, Mason Cross, and James Carol as they bid to become ‘Pitch the Audience’ Champions for 2017. And books and pub visits. What more could you want? I’m booked. Maybe see you there?

And speaking of books, couldn’t resist the opportunity of getting a couple of signed books while I was there. Well … I went all that way. 😉

Book post wise, it’s been quite a quiet week for me. Nowt new there then lol. Just the one, a copy of Sai-Ko from author Gabriela Harding. Can’t wait to take a trip to the dark side with these short stories.

Other purchase wise, I’ve been good. At least if you own Amazon lol. I purchased the Killer Women Crime Club Book 2, Give Me The Child by Mel McGrath (also on audio); Little Liar by Clare Boyd and The Death Knock by Elodie Harper. From Netgalley, just the one, Know Me Now by CJ Carver. Also on audible was WhiteOut by Ragnar Jonasson. Well a girl needs to have the whole set.

Reading wise it’s been a bit of a mixed bag as my head is all over the place with work. I have managed 3.4 books though – one of them being a collection of short stories.

Books I have read

A Christmas Wish by Erin Green

Flora Phillips has an excuse for every disaster in her life; she was abandoned as a new-born on a doorstep one cold autumn night, wrapped in nothing but a towel. Her philosophy is simple: if your mother doesn’t want you – who will?

Now a thirty-year-old, without a boyfriend, a career or home she figures she might as well tackle the biggest question of them all – who is she? So, whilst everyone else enjoys their Christmas Eve traditions, Flora escapes the masses and drives to the village of Pooley to seek a specific doorstep. Her doorstep.

But in Pooley she finds more than her life story. She finds friends, laughter, and perhaps even a love to last a lifetime. Because once you know where you come from, it’s so much easier to know where you’re going.

A story of redemption and love, romance and Christmas dreams-come-true, the perfect novel to snuggle up with this festive season.

A wonderfully uplifting and heart warming tale of Flora, a woman who is in search of her birth mother having been left on a doorstep as a baby. Great for Christmas, my review of this book will be on the blog this week. In the meantime you can buy a copy of the book here.

…

The Advent Killer by Alastair Gunn

Christmas is coming. One body at a time. 

Three weeks before Christmas: Sunday, one a.m. A woman is drowned in her bathtub.

One week later: Sunday, one a.m. A woman is beaten savagely to death, every bone in her body broken.

Another week brings another victim.

As panic spreads across London, DCI Antonia Hawkins, leading her first murder investigation, must stop a cold, careful killer whose twisted motives can only be guessed at, before the next body is found. On Sunday.

When the clock strikes one . . .

A terrifying British debut thriller, The Advent Killer introduces DCI Antonia Hawkins, with the second in the series coming from Penguin in 2014. Fans of Chris Carter and Richard Montanari should be paying attention.

Now Christmas and murder … finally something I can identify with. Not literally of course and not in quite so gruesome a fashion as is presented in Alastair Gunn’s debut novel  I’ll be sharing my thoughts on this one very soon as one of my ‘festive reads’. You can buy a copy of the book here.

…

Twelve Slays of Christmas by Jacqueline Frost

When Holly White’s fiancé cancels their Christmas Eve wedding with less than two weeks to go, Holly heads home with a broken heart. Lucky for her, home in historic Mistletoe, Maine is magical during Christmastime—exactly what the doctor prescribed. Except her plan to drown her troubles in peppermints and snickerdoodles is upended when local grouch and president of the Mistletoe Historical Society Margaret Fenwick is bludgeoned and left in the sleigh display at Reindeer Games, Holly’s family tree farm.

When the murder weapon is revealed as one of the wooden stakes used to identify trees on the farm, Sheriff Evan Grey turns to Holly’s father, Bud, and the Reindeer Games staff. And it doesn’t help that Bud and the reindeer keeper were each seen arguing with Margaret just before her death. But Holly knows her father, and is determined to exonerate him.The jingle bells are ringing, the clock is ticking, and if Holly doesn’t watch out, she’ll end up on Santa’s naughty list in Twelve Slays of Christmas, Jacqueline Frost’s jolly series debut.

After a bit of a gruesome murder, it was time to go all cosy. This is a beautiful book, full of all the festive spirit a lover of the season could want. Give or take the odd murder … I’ll be reviewing this very soon but you can buy yourself a copy right here.

…

CWA Anthology of Short Stories: Mystery Tour

Crime spreads across the globe in this new collection of short stories from the Crime Writer’s Association, as a conspiracy of prominent crime authors take you on a world mystery tour. Highlights of the trip include a treacherous cruise to French Polynesia, a horrifying trek in South Africa, a murderous train-ride across Ukraine and a vengeful killing in Mumbai. But back home in the UK, life isn’t so easy either. Dead bodies turn up on the backstreets of Glasgow, crime writers turn words into deeds at literary events, and Lady Luck seems to guide the fate of a Twickenham hood. Showcasing the range, breadth and vitality of the contemporary crime-fiction genre, these twenty-eight chilling and unputdownable stories will take you on a trip you’ll never forget.

Contributions from: Ann Cleeves, C.L. Taylor, Susi Holliday, Martin Edwards, Anna Mazzola, Carol Anne Davis, Cath Staincliffe, Chris Simms, Christine Poulson, Ed James, Gordon Brown, J.M. Hewitt, Judith Cutler, Julia Crouch, Kate Ellis, Kate Rhodes, Martine Bailey, Michael Stanley, Maxim Jakubowski, Paul Charles, Paul Gitsham, Peter Lovesey, Ragnar Jónasson, Sarah Rayne, Shawn Reilly Simmons, Vaseem Khan, William Ryan and William Burton McCormick

A brilliant collection of short stories and perfect for dipping in and out of, which is exactly what I’m doing ahead of my stop on the blog tour next week. Featuring some of the best crime writers around, you’d be mad to miss it. I’ve already powered through 34% of the book without even realising it. You can preorder a copy here.

…

Blogging wise, not quite as traumatic as last week, i.e. you haven’t had to suffer any more videos of me, but still busy none-the-less.

#BlogTour: Whiteout by Ragnar Jonasson

#Review: Zenka by Alison Brodie

Festive Reads: Mr Men & Little Miss at Christmas

Festive Reads: This Way To Christmas by Anita Bijsterbosh and Christmas Stories for Kids by Uncle Amon

Festive Reads: Enid Blyton’s Christmas Tales

Festive Reads: Santa, Please Bring Me A Gnome by An Swerts

#BlogTour: #IntoTheValley by Chris Clement-Green

#BookLove: Tracy Fenton

Review: Mr Men & Little Miss for Grown UpsFestive Reads: A Christmas Flower by Bryan Mooneyffiths163

#BlogTour: Bad Sister by Sam Carrington

Review: Elephant and Sheep and other stories by Patricia Furstenberg

The week ahead is another full one – are there any other kind. Personally, I am off to the UK launch of The Man Who Died by Antti Tuomainen on Wednesday and I can’t wait. It’s in the running to be my book of the year! Then the weekend sees the long awaited arrival of Hull Noir. Looking forward to lots of brilliant panels and getting to catch up with some amazing blogger friends.

In the meantime, I’ve a mixture of the usual reviews and blog tours to keep you all amused, starting today when I’ll be reviewing The Puppet Master by Abigail Osborne. Wednesday is the tour for The Future Can’t Wait by Angelena Boden and Saturday it’s Dying Day by Stephen Edger. And there will be some sharing of the #booklove with blogger Victoria Goldman.

And in other news – with the notable and excusable exception of Christmas Day and Boxing Day, today marks a whole year of posting every day, at least once, sometimes more. I set myself the challenge to see how long I could keep it up and I have to admit I am fluffing knackered now, but hey. Quite an achievement for a moderately busy gal like me I think. Go me. May have to celebrate.

Have a brilliant week all. See you on the other side

Jen

Rewind, recap: Weekly update w/e 12/11/17 Yes ... believe it or not, it is getting to that point in the year that we both welcome and dread.

[buddyrabrahams]

Christian McCaffrey talks Call of Duty, draft, Panthers in interview with LBS

Christian McCaffrey has Panthers fans hyped. They think he’s the future.

The rookie from Stanford represents a new breed of NFL player — the hybrid athlete who can line up just about anywhere on the field. The league is unquestionably trending in this direction, favoring young players like Green Bay’s Ty Montgomery who can play multiple positions and confuse defenses. It’s essentially the NFL version of the Golden State Warriors’ ahead-of-its-time strategy to play five versatile wings who can switch every screen.

During his historic college career, McCaffrey came to be known for much more than simply being the son of former NFL wide receiver Ed McCaffrey and being a white running back.

In his three years in Palo Alto, McCaffrey amassed 3,922 rushing yards; 99 receptions for 1,206 receiving yards; and 33 total touchdowns. As a sophomore he broke the NCAA’s record for all-purpose yards with 3,864. (The man whose record he broke, Barry Sanders, was his childhood hero.)

McCaffrey decided to stop giving Pac-12 coaches nightmares and declared for the draft after his junior year. Now that he’s a pro (McCaffrey has 87 yards rushing, 51 yards receiving, and one touchdown in three preseason games), he’s lining up endorsement deals.

This interview is brought to you by Activision and its new game, Call of Duty: WWII. This game marks a Call of Duty return to the World Wars for the first time in nearly a decade (Call of Duty: World at War was released in 2008).

Activision hosted a Twitch livestream of McCaffrey playing the beta version of the game in Charlotte Friday, and he chatted with Larry Brown Sports on the phone after the event. We discussed his transition to life in the NFL, his decision to skip the Sun Bowl, the Mayweather-McGregor fight (which was set to take place the next day), Game of Thrones, Drake and much more.

About to start playing the @CallofDuty #WWIIBeta with @LEGIQN. Make sure you watch here: https://t.co/UMgYO7r7Em #ad http://pic.twitter.com/7L5XB9IwVD

— Christian McCaffrey (@run__cmc) August 25, 2017

What was the livestream like? What are your early impressions of the game?

Oh my gosh, I absolutely love it. I’ve been playing Call of Duty forever, so it felt good to get back to the World War II days, the boots on the ground, combat gameplay, it definitely was a lot of fun.

You were 7 when the first one came out, so you’ve kind of grown up with the franchise as it’s developed. Athletes obviously take endorsement decisions seriously, especially when you’re a rookie and you’re just creating your brand. So, why did you and your team choose to partner with Call of Duty?

You’re right — a lot of people, they choose wisely on endorsements and who they end up signing with. For me, I’ve always wanted it to be genuine, something that I like and stuff I’m actually into. If I never played Call of Duty before, I wouldn’t want to do something with Call of Duty, but I really love the game, so I thought it’d be cool to do something with them, and got lucky enough to them agreeing to it, so now we’re here. Had an absolute blast (Friday).

This is the second time Sledgehammer Games has led development on a Call of Duty game. The first one was Advanced Warfare, which people really liked. Is there any insight you can give to the video game aficionados about what makes this version cool?

The maps are awesome, the new maps. Depending on what maps you play, there are bunkers, so a lot of people use smoke grenades just to get through the whole maps, and it can get chaotic, but it’s a lot of fun. The turrets are a lot of fun. The turrets are stronger than they’ve ever been in any Call of Duty. And I think the sniping is elite. I think the sniping is a lot better. All in all, it’s an unbelievable game. I cannot wait for the full version to come out.

After being around the NFL for so long, how crazy is it for you that you’re in these shoes now?

It’s a lot of fun. It really is cool, you know what I mean, being an NFL player and having opportunities like this. It reminds me that I’m blessed and when these opportunities come up, I’m extremely thankful that I’m living out my dream.

"Having no limitation as limitation" -Bruce Lee #MoveInSilence #KeepPounding http://pic.twitter.com/Wz4qm1VBXz

— Christian McCaffrey (@run__cmc) August 25, 2017

I know we’re only three weeks into the preseason, but has anything surprised you so far about life in the NFL or the competition?

No, not really. I got lucky going to the Panthers — such a welcoming team. A lot of guys on the team really do a good job in giving you the rundown on what the league is like, and they treat you like family as soon as you step in the building. It’s awesome because they understand you’re a rookie but they also need you and want you to help their team win. I’m thankful for the veterans and the entire organization for accepting all of us rookies. I think we’ll have a great team and hopefully win a lot of football games this year.

When wisdom speaks, you must listen. http://pic.twitter.com/a1vrRxy0tZ

— Christian McCaffrey (@run__cmc) August 14, 2017

Who are some of those veterans that you’ve found yourself getting a lot of advice from and gravitating toward?

The whole running back room is who I spend pretty much all my time with, in meetings and on the field. Guys like Jonathan Stewart, Fozzy Whitaker, Cam Artis-Payne, Jalen Simmons, all those guys. Such solid guys. You can tell it really is like a family, and we feed off of each other’s success and we want each other to do well. They’ve kind of showed me the ropes to start, but you’ve got guys all over the organization who know how to lead, who have been there and done that. Luke Kuechly’s been great. Ryan Kalil’s been great. Greg Olsen’s been great. Cam (Newton)’s awesome. Thomas Davis is great. Shaq (Thompson)’s been there, done that. Kurt Coleman. Kawann Short. Julius Peppers. You go down the list, you’ve got guys who have experienced success. As a rookie coming in, you’re all ears.

Your stock rose quite a bit leading up to the draft. Why do you think it is that as the draft approached, teams got higher on you and your projected position kept going up?

I don’t know really. I think that’d be a question for them, but I was always confident in my abilities, and I think a lot of times it’s hard for people to actually watch the games. You hear about certain guys, but when you play in the Pac-12 a lot of your games are late, 7:30 games. A lot of people on the East Coast are asleep so they know your name but they’ve never really seen you play. That might be one of the reasons, but I’m not really sure 100 percent.

#KeepPounding http://pic.twitter.com/H9fJELReEP

— Christian McCaffrey (@run__cmc) April 28, 2017

Do you have any regrets or hesitations when you look back on the bowl game and deciding not to play?

Uh, no. I’ll always, I told my team and told my coaches, I’ll always regret not playing in it, but I’ll always understand why I did it. It’s hard for me to not play in the game but I know it was a business decision I had to make and it worked out great.

I know for a guy like you it must have been an extremely difficult decision, and I read that your teammates embraced you and they understood. One report even said they gave you a standing ovation. Were your teammates understanding of that decision?

Yeah, they were great. I had some unbelievable teammates at Stanford, and to this day I keep in touch with them. I absolutely love those guys, I’d go to bat for them, so I can’t express how lucky I was to go to a school where those will be guys that will be my friends for the rest of my life.

OK. Christian, I’m sure you have some goals in mind for your rookie season. Anything you’d be willing to share that you’re hoping to accomplish this year?

I usually keep my goals pretty private, but I do have a lot of them. A lot of new goals hopefully I can reach, but I keep those to myself.

You’re such a workout fiend that your strength coach at Stanford designed a special workout just for you. Take me through how your training is changing now that we’re heading into the season — what’s changing in your lifting and conditioning approach?

I still lift and condition all the time despite being in-season; I think it’s important to continue to gain strength and continue to be conditioned. It’s just that it creeps into recovery. But really, nothing’s changed. I still try to maintain everything. It’s not about putting a lot of weight on the bar or trying to make any gains as much as it is about maintaining everything and being able to stay healthy for the whole season.

And what about your nutrition — as you’ve come into the pros, has anything changed with the way you’re eating?

I’ve always had a pretty strict diet, so nothing’s really changed there. On off days I have to eat in order to have success and put my body in the best position it can be so on Sundays I’m ready to roll.

First one in the books felt so good. #BBTB #KeepPounding http://pic.twitter.com/2byZUCm3ZX

— Christian McCaffrey (@run__cmc) August 10, 2017

What’s the last TV show you were obsessed with?

Oh, Game of Thrones right now.

It’s the last season, right?

Yeah, so the last episode comes on Sunday.

What’s your go-to album right now?

Ooh, go-to album. Man, that’s tough. I’d probably say any Drake album. I can always rely on Drake.

Take Care. I always end up going back to Take Care.

Oh man, Take Care is one of the best albums, if not the best album ever, so that’s great.

You’re a big mixed martial arts fan. You excited for Saturday? And what’s your prediction for Mayweather-McGregor?

I train with a lot of UFC guys back in Denver. I’ve been an MMA fan pretty much my whole life, and I’m a huge McGregor fan, have been since day one. So I’m gonna go with him. I know I’ll probably get some heat for it, but I think he’s gonna shock some people.

He’s a warrior. He’s accomplished a lot of things people didn’t think he could.

He is. He’s the definition of a warrior.

The dude who was yelling “Heisman!” behind you after the Rose Bowl victory — did you ever find out who he was or how he got on the field, or was he just some random guy?

You know, I have no idea, but I’ll put that guy in my ring any day. (Laughs) I appreciate his support.

Upside from the start! Watch @CMcCaffrey5 dominate this game of Pee Wee football. http://pic.twitter.com/0z83GeLQhV

— Carolina Panthers (@Panthers) July 7, 2017

I saw that Pee Wee football game you played against the NFL mascots. That was real, right — with the Sharpie in the sock?

Yeah, that actually happened.

Now that celebrations are allowed again in the NFL, do you have anything planned for this year harkening back to the Sharpie days, or are you going to be more businesslike?

No, I’ll probably keep it simple like I always do, but if something happens, something changes, you guys will know.

Aaron Mansfield is a freelance sports writer. His work has appeared in Complex, USA Today and the New York Times. You can reach him via email at aaroncmansfield@gmail.com.

from Larry Brown Sports http://ift.tt/2xLQUMK

[brido]

Was Robinson Cano A Hall of Famer Before This Happened?

Another one bites the dust. Robinson Cano tested positive for a PED-masking substance this week, which, for all intents and purposes renders his Cooperstown candidacy a moot point. He’s now banished to Rafael Palmeiro Island with Manny Ramirez, Mark McGwire and the rest of the great, what-if and say-it-ain’t-so players we’ve come to love and forget over the past twenty years. But just how good was Cano? Let’s take a look with Bill James’ tried and true Keltner List method to see just how many tears we should be shedding for the latest in a long list of players to let us down.    

1. Was he ever regarded as the best player in baseball? Did anybody, while he was active, ever suggest that he was the best player in baseball?

I don’t think so. Albert Pujols, Miguel Cabrera and/or Mike Trout have basically had a lock on that designation for Cano’s entire career. He finished 3rd in A.L. MVP voting in 2010 and he was 4th in baseball in fWAR in 2012. But nobody was saying he was THE guy.    

2. Was he the best player on his team?

Well, to be fair, Cano played on the Jeter/A-Rod Yankees from 2005-2013. Those Yankees also had Jason Giambi, Jorge Posada and Johnny Damon. But Cano would have been the best player on the Yankees in 2010, 2012 and 2013 and over that 2005-2013 time period, he was second to A-Rod in overall WAR, edging out a fading Jeter. In 2014, Cano went to Seattle. There were some strong years from Nelson Cruz and Kyle Seager, but since 2014 (2014-2018), Cano has led the Mariners in overall WAR. And you can add 2014 and 2016 to the years he was the best on his own team.      

3. Was he the best player in baseball at his position? Was he the best player in the league at his position?

Yes. Cano was the best second baseman in baseball in 2010, 2012 and 2014. And he was the best in the American League in 2013. During his own playing career (2005-2018), he’s been the best second baseman in the American League and second in overall WAR to Chase Utley.   

4. Did he have an impact on a number of pennant races?

Yes. All in New York. Cano played in 7 postseasons from 2005-2012 and has one ring with the Yankees.  

5. Was he good enough that he could play regularly after passing his prime?

This is Cano’s 14th season in the bigs. He got MVP votes in 2016. He was an All-Star last year. You could probably argue that he’s still in his prime. Dude’s on fucking steroids. That’s what they do.    

6. Is he the very best baseball player in history who is not in the Hall of Fame?

No. Barry Bonds. I don’t even have to look. 

7. Are most players who have comparable statistics in the Hall of Fame?

No. But Cano does have similar stats to Ryne Sandberg. And Joe Torre, who was a borderline candidate as a player and is in the Hall as a manager. On the list of 10 most similar include Scott Rolen, Jeff Kent, Matt Holliday and Ken Boyer, who are borderline candidates (I’ve said yes to Rolen in the past). But his career numbers after 14 seasons look most like Miguel Tejada.

8. Do the player’s numbers meet Hall of Fame standards?

Cano gets a 48 on the Standards list, with a 50 being average for a Hall of Famer. 305 home runs, a .304 batting average. 2,417 hits. That’s pretty fucking good for a second baseman.     

9. Is there any evidence to suggest that the player was significantly better or worse than is suggested by his statistics?

I guess there is now. 

10. Is he the best player at his position who is eligible for the Hall of Fame?

Yes, actually. Cano is the 7th-best second baseman of all time, according to JAWS. And Rogers Hornsby, Eddie Collins, Nap Lajoie, Joe Morgan, Charlie Gehringer and Rod Carew are all in the Hall. Carew was mostly a first baseman, but whatever.   

11. How many MVP-type seasons did he have? Did he ever win an MVP award? If not, how many times was he close?

Cano got MVP votes in 8 different seasons. He got 3rd in 2010, 4th in 2012 and 5th in 2013 and 2014. I would have given him 4th in 2010, 3rd in 2012 and 5th in 2013. So 3 elite seasons. That’s okay. 

12. How many All-Star-type seasons did he have? How many All-Star games did he play in? Did most of the players who played in this many All-Star games go into the Hall of Fame?

Cano has been an All-Star 8 times. And that puts him in pretty elite company. Just as a comparison, Utley has 6, Jose Altuve has 5, Dustin Pedroia and Ian Kinsler have 4. But, I could also point out that Roberto Alomar had 12 and Ryne Sandberg and Joe Morgan had 10. Not that Cano is done.  

13. If this man were the best player on his team, would it be likely that the team could win the pennant?

I kinda hate this question considering Mike Trout hasn’t played in any World Series games. But the Yankees made it to the ALCS in 2010 and 2012, when Cano was the best player on the team. But those teams also had Jeter and A-Rod and CC Sabathia.     

14. What impact did the player have on baseball history? Was he responsible for any rule changes? Did he introduce any new equipment? Did he change the game in any way?

I can’t think of anything. 

15. Did the player uphold the standards of sportsmanship and character that the Hall of Fame, in its written guidelines, instructs us to consider?

Nope. 

Conclusion: There might not be a lot of glory in being the best second baseman of your era, but that designation gets you elected into the Hall of Fame. Or at least it should. So if there isn’t already a Chase Utley Career Appreciation Club, let that begin now. Cano would have gone to the Hall, eventually. In the meantime, focus your outrage on the exclusion of Bobby Grich and Lou Whitaker. Possibly even Willie Randolph. Because for now, the only plaque Cano is getting is as the starting second baseman on Rafael Palmeiro Island.