JSngry

I don't know about THE best Muse album, but James Moody's two for the label are certainly among the best for both the label and for Moodyt: This one is special: This one is extra-special: Moody had a killer fastball, but he could throw curves any time, any way.

Cogent points all, and I can only suspect tat the "rejection" he got was due to where he was looking for acceptance. But old habits die hard, especially once they pass the point of being habits and turn into essence. Woods had been a first call studio player in NYC and knew that game really well (so well that he decided to walk away from it to preserve his sanity). So, you know, he'd been off on his odyssey, found himself, and I guess he thought that he would come back to a place where other people had gone through the same thing. Not an unreasonable assumption, really, look at all that was going on in LA at the time, between Pacific Jazz, Shelly Manne (who use Pete Robinson to very good ends, btw) & the various ripple effects out of the Don Ellis orb, hey, one would think, wouldn't one! But you know...he was Phil Woods and he was getting career advice from Leonard Feather and the audience in Donte's was probably not the people in LA who would have dug it, so...coming home is not just about geography as much as it is about tribe, and once you leave the tribe, finding a new one can be a lonely path, especially if you feel the need to have one at all. Anyway, that Testament record is something to ponder, and Pete Robinson should not be lost in the shuffle of his time/place, just as Bayete/Todd Cochrane should not be lost in his.

Here ya' go:

Players, maybe not so much, but organizations, definitely. If there's any real gut-level enragement about this "scandal", it that it's one more sign of management taking control of the execution of the on-field game. Labor now hired not just to work to the best of their ability, but to work as told, regardless of natural abilities. "Cheating" is a word that trivializes the trend. That might be a metaphor for life in the 21st Century, or it may not be.

My favorite Woods album from this ear is not necessarily his best - it's the Testament record with Pete Robinson, made when he first returned to the US and naively assumed that he could continue to play a progressive music like he had been doing with the ERM (which is probably my favorite Woods, period). The poor guy went all in with electronics and such (Pete Robinson registers today as a key player from that time/place that has all but been forgotten today) only to realize in a big hurry that, no, this was America, you are Phil Woods, you will play bebop now. His dry (very dry) liner notes tell the story.

I'm not even sure it's a relevant comparison, never mind a tasteful one!

Hey, they won. They did the work, they got it done, they won. Isn't that what we like to see, hard, difficult work rewarded with success? Astronauts, not Astros! Joe Rotator Cuff needs to stop thinking like a jock and start thinking like the 21st Century Multi-Media Cross-Platform Entertainment Talent Tool that he is expected to be and just figure that shit out, get on with successfully executing the code, and then reaping the rewards that come with that.

I gotta think he's got somebody working on his behalf...but maybe he's an extremely agile/facile octogenarian businessman. Could be. All I can say is that it's gratifying in the extreme to see him getting all this profile and work at this point in his life.

Has it been curtailed? Or is it going to continue as soon as somebody finds a newer, sleeker, less obvious technology that's more seamlessly integrated and doesn't involve something Flintstoney analog-primitive like banging on a freaking trash can?

Nothing would disappear. People will just find new and innovative ways to beat the sign stealing, new ways of calling pitches, new orthodoxies of working the hitter. There's no cheat that can't be beat.

Cyrille seems to have really surfaced as a leader these past few years...does anybody know who's managing him these days? Looks like they're doing great work!

Maybe I'm just insensitive, but I've been in unfamiliar/unfriendly jam sessions where cats would have routines worked out to deliberately set you up to fail. They knew what was coming and you either picked up on it or fell on your ass. Sometimes it was just a test and sometimes they were just mean-spirited motherfuckers. But either way, you were at peril and it was on nobody but you to deal. So I really don't feel a lot of worry about a dynamic of one team trying to fuck you up by any means at their disposal, Sink or swim, every tub on its own bottom, as they used to say. As far as delaying the game, hell, if they knew what they were going to be dealing with, why didn't they plan ahead and get their "scheme" in place before the Series, not during the game itself? Because it contaminates the athlete's natural competitive performance instincts of just doing what comes naturally? Give me a break, are they that dumb, that they can't process multiple possible scenarios? Seriously. it's NOT "just a game", and hasn't been for a good long time now. Ask the owners, ask the agents, ask the press, ask the players. Ask anybody except a fan.

I continue to be amazed at how "we" just assume that there's no way to actually talk to an actual person these days. "Chatting" may or may not have you exchanging key words with a bot. A phone call gets you to a real person in real time, at least for now. AI's not that developed, at least not yet. I love getting through to a real person and then talking to them. Sometimes they're as surprised as I am that it's happening!

Yeah, I mean look motherfucker - you just won the World Series. You beat the cheating. You're not exactly a tragic victim entitled to reparations here, you won. Praise your players for being stronger than the cheaters, hell, they weren't unnerved, and they didn't "lose" shit. They won. EVERYBODY gotta be a victim these days, even the winners. Makes me sick to both my stomachs.

1 (888) 280-4331 - if it was actually sold by Amazon. They actually answer the phone and actually listen to you and talk to you.

Totally agree. The only thing that motivates (most) people more than they acquisition of money is the fear of death. Granted, most is not all, but people will definitely come out to a game to watch a greedy motherfucker get killed, if not this year, then soon enough. So...maybe that won't be the end of it. Instead, it might be all the incentive the game needs to not just legalize it, but glorify it - COME SEE A CHEATER DIE. GOOD SEATS STILL AVAILABLE!!! God, I wish I could live to see more of the 21st Century than I'm going to... That guy needs to be fired. I like your solution better, deal with it on its own terms, own the solution, not the problem. This guy's too emo, like oh boo hoo, they're stealing our signs, what can we do what CAN we do???? Kill a motherfucker with a fastball, that's what you can do. Only then everybody would be like oh dear, is winning THAT important that you'll KILL somebody who's stealing your signs? Really? How desperate have we become, it's just a game, cheating is a part of any game, you shouldn't KILL somebody over a game. So there we go again. This world today is a fucking 24/7 clown show, nonstop big top, hurry hurry hurry.

Of course I see the difference. The rules were broken. But if/when the rules get changed, hey. And I don't see why they shouldn't be, really. It's just a question of how you do it, not if you do it, and the technology makes it almost silly not to do it. Almost.. It''s still against the tules. But everything gets legalized eventually if there's enough money and/or glory in it. And winning brings both, because this is a fucking circus right now, this world is. As for the appeal to the ethos of "nothing but his own eyes"...are we talking about the business of athletics in the 21st century? Seriously? Besides, thieves have "better eyes" than most people. Better eyes and more money, if they have better lawyers to go with them. Wanna buy a ticket? I hear there's still good seats available!

I'm glad he did all these other things, because I don't think that sticking to jazz would have really gotten him anywhere past already.

Good lord, talk about thinking analog... There are digital solutions to changing signals on the fly. In fact, some are already being discussed. https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/mlb-exploring-ways-to-use-on-field-technology-to-help-prevent-sign-stealing-report-says/ "Distracting", yeah, sure. Until you get to the generation of players who doesn't really have to take the time to think about it too much, if at all. We are transitioning away from being an all-analog species. E-Sports are here to stay. At what point do live sports just seem quaint and or stupid and/or archaic, like boxing? But oh yeah - tradition. That only works if you have nostalgia and somebody to sell it to. Baseball is not football, nor is Allstate State Farm. But yeah, football got a defensive equivalent of sign-stealing, right there on the field, in real time. https://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2017/02/08/tony-dungy-on-stealing-signals-its-been-done-legally-for-years/ https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/24639497/new-york-jets-say-defense-knew-matthew-stafford-signals-rout I have any number of reasons for not feeling fondness for Tom Landry, and that's certainly one of them. But just one.

Ok, all I could find was "Kiss The Cook"...

Awesome indeed!

I hope that everybody will agree that signal stealing is a fundamental part of the game, always has been, always will be. What seems to have upset everybody this time is that technology was involved (that, and maybe also that the Astros have been kinda "douche" lately (no offense to any active douchers out there, we thank you for your service and for your personal commitment to demonstrably higher standards of social responsibility). But hey - MLB has been quite proud of itself for its advanced metrics, of getting data and then utilizing it to potentially effect a winning outcome. You think that there was a convention of scouts & GMs at which everybody got together and said, "ok, here's the data we're looking for, here's what we're going to do with it, and here's what it's going to look like once we do"? Of course not. People figured that shit out independently and then they implemented it independently. It's not an edge if everybody does it the same way at the same time, right? So now sign-stealing has entered the technological age. Genie's out of the bottle. Better get out in front of it and allow it. Set some guidelines and enforce them. If you're going to consider electric-eye umpires... How does it improve the game? Well, pitchers still gotta pitch, hitters still gotta hit, and fielders still gotta field. And teams with ingenuity will figure out a way to beat the signal-stealing. It should be fun to watch, actually. Defenses gonna shift? You know they're doing it, so figure out how to beat it, learn how to hit 'em where they ain't. Teams gonna steal your signs? You know they're doing it, so find a way to beat it, learn how to sign 'em what it ain't. It's not complicated, all it takes is imagination, desire, and a proactive work ethic. Stealing, that's the American way. Stealing before you get stole from, that's the EPITOMIC American way, it's downright Founding Fathers Constitutional! 20th Century people are getting really, really lazy. It's a new day, so let a man come in and do the popcorn.

KTC?

Ok, I'll be the asshole here and say that other than it being against the rules, I don't see anything particular intrinsically wrong with the methodology and the technology itself. AFAIC, it really should be legalized and, of course, regulated. And of course, I'm just a little bit or more amused that all this indignacious uproar about unauthorized/surreptitious collection and application of unknowingly collected data and activity is occurring in a world where such things pretty much drive damn near every element of our individual "private" lives. Technology continues to alter pretty much every aspect of our interactions today, and far past the initial impact of the hardware and software. Behaviors change as well, and as they do, morals eventual do. An "unfair advantage", perhaps, and in the current boundaries of acceptability, definitely deserving of admonishment. But in time, one which is likely to be adopted as one more tool to winning. Better that than the stenchy breaths of "legalized gambling" seeking to guarantee an outcome by paying for deliberate underperformance. You can lose on purpose, but you can never win on purpose. The fix is never in except to lose.

Yes! Dusty In Memphis is a damn good record, all of it!