ghost of miles

Mookie's catch last night reminded me of this recent media-attention-getting play: https://www.si.com/mlb/2020/10/16/cpbl-taiwan-baseball-lin-che-hsuan-home-run-robbery-video

It sure was--I followed it online last night while working on various tasks around the house. Agree with Matthew that the DH rule may have helped out Roberts... is MLB considering making that permanent for the NL after this year? I'm normally an AL partisan, though I have no antipathy for the Dodgers, and while I have great respect for the organization and the team's performance on the field, I find the Rays to be the most insufferable, whiny "underdog" team (one that by normal rights would be sympathetic and likeable) that's ever come down the MLB pike.* (And they're sure as hell no "underdog" to anybody who's followed the AL East over the past dozen years, despite their ongoing we-don't-get-no respect schtick. Outside of one mediocre stretch in the mid-teens, they've either made the postseason or been in the running every year since 2008.) So I'll just be pulling for a great series. Without a deep sense of data for both teams (though I'm much more familiar with the Rays this season, owing to their AL East membership), I'd say slight advantage Rays, but that's based only on what I've seen in a limited number of games. And Kevin Cash has done an excellent job of managing his pitching staff throughout these no-day-off matchups. Wouldn't be surprised to see this one go the full seven as well. *(Note of apology if I've overlooked the presence of any longstanding Rays fans in these threads.)

We re-aired The Last: Final Recordings Of Jazz Greats this past week, and it remains archived for online listening.

This album as part of the Ellington Reprise set:

I know we have a separate box-set bargain thread, but upping this one to mention that Kathy Sloane's book about the Keystone Korner club, which comes with a CD of live performances from the club, is currently selling new for $6.90 + $3.99 shipping. It's a $40 list price title, and an excellent volume about the club's history (full disclosure: I'm friends with editor Sascha Feinstein, who also selected the tracks for the CD--a daunting task, as you might well imagine): Keystone Korner: Portrait of a Jazz Club

Appreciation again for mentioning the panel--it was interesting to hear the stories and details that came out of that discussion. I wonder if there's potential for a book about the Left Bank, similar to Kathy Sloane's Keystone Korner: Portrait of a Jazz Club that Indiana University Press published a few years back (and which can currently be purchased for $6.90 new through that Amazon link----that's a bargain price, especially considering that it comes with a CD of live recordings from the club).

Inspired to revisit this after hearing "Debris" play in the background during a Freaks and Geeks episode:

The bonus disc of Stepping Stone material from the Woody Shaw Complete Columbia Albums set. I have the Mosaic CBS set and the Stepping Stone CD reissue, but I really wanted the additional Village Vanguard sides. Did Michael Cuscuna ever say why they didn't expand beyond the studio-only concept and include all of the live recordings on the CBS box? I think it would have increased the size to five CDs at most.

Thanks for the heads-up--I may take a break from radio work to tune into that.

Best wishes to you both, Dan. Obviously Lyme, while not contagious, would be a matter of great concern as well.

That Zombies set is fantastic!

My bad on the World Series location—I thought the bubble was staying in California for the duration. Well, then, a potential Braves-Rays matchup taking place in Texas... that really *would* be an all-southern World Series!

I wouldn’t start sweating it yet re the Rays-Astros series. They’re a much better team (in terms of pitching, anyway) than the 2004 Yankees, and this year’s Astros certainly aren’t as good as the 2004 Red Sox. It’s interesting how people define the South. I’m definitely aware of the more micro-regional categorizations that you cite... but as a damn Yankee (in more ways than one ), I grew up thinking of the South as all of the states that were aligned against the North in the Civil War. I haven’t traveled through the South as much as I’d like to, though my girlfriend and I spent a wonderful few days in Memphis a couple of years ago. But for me *Louisville* even feels a bit like a southern city (Kentucky as the “gateway to the South” and all that jazz). Even southern Indiana, where I live, is sometimes said to have a southern vibe in terms of cultural attitudes (and among the Black community my hometown of Indianapolis was/is sometimes pejoratively referred to as “up South”). Anyway... I still think a Braves-Rays series would be a neat geographical matchup—even if the games themselves will be played in California!

OK, that is bizarre. Last year the Braves gave up a record 10 runs in the first inning of a playoff game against the Cardinals. Today they gave up *11* runs in the first inning against the Dodgers. What a nightmare deja vu for Braves fans. Forgot about the all-St. Louis series! But I tend to think of St. Louis as a midwestern city. Until recent decades there haven’t been many southern-based MLB teams. Braves moved to Atlanta in the mid-1960s, right? And then you had the addition of the Astros and Rangers, followed by the Rays and the Marlins. Odd to me that Memphis hasn’t had an MLB team... Charlotte seems like another city that might viably sustain a team at that level. Ten of the Dodgers’ 11 runs scored with two outs, and all of it starting with Mookie being ruled safe on a replay after first AB of the game. Incredible.

It did! Here's an online scan of the back cover:

Ironic, isn't it, that in the last four years the NY team that got closest to the World Series was Girardi's 2017 swan song--and in a season when they weren't expected to be competing at that level. In the present-day postseason, I'm not shocked that the Rays are rampaging over the Astros... but I am mildly surprised that the Braves are handling the Dodgers with such ease so far (outside of L.A.'s furious near-comeback in the 9th last night). Would a potential Atlanta-Tampa Bay matchup be the first all-southern MLB World Series?

Rereading this for a Night Lights show in progress—highly recommended for anyone with an interest in Hazel Scott:

You're preaching to the choir, at least in my case. Plenty of room for Brother Jack McDuff's "Rock Candy" and Cecil Taylor's Unit Structures and everything in-between, sideways, up and down ways, etc. Not advocating an embrace of mediocrity, rather the greater interest of an expansive musical universe and the hidden and not-so-hidden relationships within.

Well, I think the conventional jazz history take--and there's a dangerously reductive term/concept to use in and of itself--has been that jazz, starting with bebop, moved towards becoming more of an art music, and that hard bop and soul jazz were in part responses to that, an attempt to shift jazz into a more groove/gospel-derived and influenced direction. That is a really simplistic explanation of it, and not accurate, or at least not that basic, in a lot of ways. But that's the line that's often been touted, in my experience. Plenty of counters to be found to it as well, though, in jazz writings of the past several decades. Informed by the highly-charged spirit of the (mid/late 1960s) times in which the pieces in Black Music were written, perhaps? 2020 quite a different vantage point for viewing all of this, but I like to think things are less prone to factionalization now... I could be quite deluded on that account, however. But there should be room enough even in the narrowest of musical mindsets for Jimmy Smith *and* Cecil Taylor *and* James Brown. I mean, the listener's loss if he/she wants to write off entire artists/genres of music because they're too "commercial" (a slippery definition anyway), though of course nobody should be obligated to like what they don't like. Jumping ahead a few years, did Baraka ever offer up any opinions on Herbie's Head Hunters?

Present and accounted for!

Eh? Very respectable years, actually (1972-74): Lee May stats--Baseball Reference I think the first baseball card I had of him was as an Astro (1974 set), though he landed with the Baltimore Orioles not long afterwards. He was still an Astro on the 1975 Topps card:

Really glad that Mark posted that conversation between Early and Iverson, because the smooth jazz analogy had been on my mind since I first started following this thread. There’s another conundrum for modern-day white critics, whether they’ve come around on soul jazz or not... make room for another elephant!

It’s an excellent, in-depth read—and definitely seek out the unabridged UK edition. About 200 pages were lopped off from the American version.

Not sure what to think of Cashman's role. I am of the school of thought that he inherited the work of Gene Michael, Bob Watson and others when he came on board in 1998 and doesn't deserve all that much credit for the late-90s run of championships. All of the core 4 and other homegrown players like Bernie Williams, the guys they'd picked up in trades like Paul O'Neill--that was all pre-Cashman's arrival. He and/or the people working for him have made some great trades in recent years, a la Gio Urshela and Luke Voit, position players who bloomed with the Yankees. But we seem to be way behind the curve in developing and improving pitchers, using analytics in the smartest/most effective ways possible, etc.--at least compared to Tampa Bay and Houston. And the AL East is only going to get tougher, with Toronto coming on, Boston having Chaim Bloom (Rays connection again!) in place to rebuild the Red Sox, and the Orioles seemingly on the upswing as well. So yeah, we might be better off with a younger wizard like Bloom running things, but agreed that it's unlikely Cashman will get the boot. And he has put a competitive team on the field nearly every year. Biggest priority this off-season, besides resigning DJ (which should be a no-brainer, unless he wants 5-6 years) should be beefing up the pitching. I doubt we'll see Bauer in pinstripes, though, despite the attractiveness of his claim to wanting only a one-year deal. He and Gerrit Cole would have to smoke the mother of all peace pipes for that to come to pass. And while I find him an entertainingly provocative athlete, not sure the Yankees would want to chance the possible drama of having him aboard... we're still not that far removed from the A-Rod era, after all. Lots of questions around the pitching, though. How effective will Severino be coming back mid-season after having hardly pitched for 2.5 years? Will Montgomery become a more consistent backend starter? Should they resign an aging Tanaka? Can Garcia or Schmidt bust out as a starter? They probably let Paxton walk, which is too bad... a highly-effective pitcher when he's healthy, but that's the catch. Domingo German is another question mark as he returns in 2021. I'm hoping that Matt Blake can work some wonders with the current staff and prospects in the pipeline.