Confessions of an Errant Mind

There's much of that these days. My beloved Cubbies have the second best record in all of baseball since June 1st, and are now a scant 2 games behind the Milwaukee Brewers (the Brewers are in first place?!). As bad as this team looked in the opening week of the season, things have certainly come together. The starting pitching has been solid. The bullpen has improved. For the first time in several seasons, watching this offense is actually bearable. Tonight, they even go for their second straight sweep of the Cardinals (last year's world series champs) in St. Louis.

Are there problems? Sure. An offensive upgrade at centerfield, shortstop, or catcher wouldn't hurt. Another solid starting pitcher would remove some uncertainty. But I actually feel some hope about this team--something that's been in scant supply since the debacle of Game 6 in 2003.

During the day, I get my Cubs fix at a few places: Northside Baseball has mostly intelligent, moderated discussion. The blog Bleed Cubbie Blue is also often intersting. For the podcast friendly, there's Bricks and Ivy Radio, usually entertaining. Unfortuantely, the actual Cubs.com site is NOT a great place for fan discussion, since most of the conversation there rarely rises above a 5th grade level.

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Today's Tribune has a portrait of how the storied Wrigley Field scoreboard really operates. Count me out of that line of work--no air conditioning, danger of lightning strikes, and people constantly getting in the way. Still, there's few things more thrilling than seeing those flags waving when walking up for a ballgame. Sarah and I will be there in a week to see the Cubs lose (probably) to the Brewers--it's been a couple of years for me, so I'm looking forward to the pilgrimage. The Cubs can't seem to make up their minds about winning a lousy division--their pitching and offense have shown signs of dominance, but haven't been quite consistent enough.

In other Cubs news, it was good to see Sammy Sosa get his 600th home run last night in a semi-Cubs related way. Given his current average of .220 or so and an OPS in the .500s, one has to think it's the last major achievement of his career. Despite all the steroid speculation, I'm glad he got over that hump.

Image: http://www.chicagoadventures.com/images/sports_2004_cubs_01.jpg

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A lego enactment of a play from a recent Twins game. Wow. Batgirl's motto is "Less Stats, More Sass." It's got to be one of the most entertaining blogs of any kind I've read. It probably helps to be a fellow parent.

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Today's "Get Fuzzy" strip pulls no punches commenting on an almost century of baseball futility. For the record, the Cubs last won it all in 1908. I actually have several comics with a similar theme on our fridge. It's always fun to laugh at losers, right? I actually wonder what it would do to the mentality of Cubs fans to actually win a world series. It hasn't destroyed the Red Sox, I guess...

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Today's opening day, and while I'll confess to having more enthusiasm for the Twins than I have in years past, the Cubbies are still my team. It's now been 99 years since the North Siders have won a World Series. They spent $300 million this off season to try to fix that, though according to prognosicators, we shouldn't bet on it. On top of that, news comes out this morning that the Cubs will have a new owner next year. As one of the best sports franchises out there (financially speaking), I'm guessing a pitched battle will ensue. We can only hope that it's a fan who finally poinies up.

Good luck to both the Cubs and Twins today!

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That's normally how I think of this stretch of sports time. The NFL is over and it's another month or two before baseball. I'm just not that big a basketball fan, and honestly, there's not much happening in the NBA or college right now anyway. This year, the pain is a little less, though. Even though my beloved Bears lost in the Super Bowl, it's now only 10 days until pitchers and catchers report for the Cubs (and 13 days for the Twins). Sure, spring training doesn't really get going until March, but the talk can begin. And I think the afterglow of the Super Bowl can get me through the next week or two pretty easily.

On that note, I'm surprised I'm not more disappointed by the Bears basically getting shellacked. I can't say it wasn't expected, and that might be part of it. I'm just happy they made it this far, and it was a fun ride. I had a brief moment of crankiness right around Rex's first series of mishaps late in the first half, but resignation set in fully by the time his interception got returned for a TD early in the fourth. I can't say I'd be dissapointed if they traded him for a draft pick. If someone like Philip Rivers can be productive in his first full season, why can't Rex? But he's their guy, I'd bet, at least for next year.

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I love my Bears. And my brother-in-law Travis and I have conspired to get a projector set up for this Sunday's Super Bowl. But today's wire story about the run on plasma TVs is pretty crazy. I just don't see how the difference between our modest 20" TV and the 42" plasma could be worth a full $2,000. For the first week, I bet it's great. But doesn't the novelty wear off?

One of my fondest memories is watching the '03 Cubs playoffs on our living room wall (again, with a projector from work set up). It was great. But for everyday use, it feels too much like the increasing privitzation of our private lives that Robert Putnam and others have written about. Rather than going out to a bar, movie theater, etc, we want the spectacle right in our own homes. Is it more convenient? Yes. (I'm staying home for the Super Bowl, for example). But it also sucks up a lot of financial resources--not just the TV, but the cable package to get the HD and sports programming to make it worth the money. In our neighborhood, I'd be scared of a break-in the moment someone saw the thing through our window.

The quote here about "keeping up with the Jonses" is interesting as well. In this case, it seems more like keeping ahead of them. In my classes, one concept we've talked about is the "taste community"--how the tastes and purchases of those around us normalize certain consumer choices. I notice this everytime I see someone carting a big screen out of Costco--I get that "everyone's buying one" feeling. Yet that's not true--most people aren't yet. And for those of us who aspire to simple lives, I'm not sure it matters.

Anyway, this is my rant of the day, but thought it was worth sharing.

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Spring training is not far away. The Twins blog Batgirl had this video on its site. Micah's not quite to this point yet, but here's branding in another form I just can't bring myself to dislike...

Posted by Jerry Shannon at 9:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Looking back, I knew the relationship was headed south when Justin Morneau hit his 30th. It was an important one--lifting them to a victory over division leading Detroit. Micah was taking his bath at the time, and I had the radio on to pass the time and keep track of the game. When Jon Gordon gave his signature, "Touch 'Em All" home run call, I let out an involuntary scream of joy. It had been almost 20 years since a Minnesota Twin had reached this mark, and this was a pivotal moment in a long season. Most significantly, it was the first moment I felt that visceral, almost familial link to the Minnesota Twins. There had been moments of courtship, yes, but this was the first kiss, a magical moment.

There's a Raymond Chandler novel called The Long Goodbye. That's an apt metaphor for what's happened to my baseball loyalties this season. The Cubs are, and probably always will be, my first love. I lived through the '89, '98, and '03 playoff years with ecstacy and despair. But the bloom has fallen off the rose. My beloved Cubbies are vying for the worst records in baseball--with a $100 million dollar budget. Ever since that fateful 8th inning (see Bartman, Steve and Choke, Cubs), it's been a slow steady decline. A late season collapse in '04. Below .500 in '05. And this year, not one of the imagined starting rotation back in March remains there. Management has no clue how to develop players, and aside from Derrek Lee and perhaps Aramis Ramirez, there seems little left to build around.

And so, as May moved to July, I felt my loyalties shifting. The Cubs became the long distance romance that fades away. We're moving on to find other interests, other loves. The Twins (with a payroll half that of the northsiders) might have the best record in baseball when all is said and done. As the song goes, "Love the one you're with." Instead of a fuzzy WGN signal at night, I flip to WCCO here in the Cities to hear another dominating Santana performance.

Not all farewells are final, but in this case, I think it's good that the Cubs and I have some time apart. Maybe see some other people. Who knows? Maybe we'll come back to one another for a second honeymoon, a more mature romance. But for now, I'll just drink Chandler's proverbial gimlet in memories of good times past. I've got a new girl waiting.

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It's opening day, and hopes always run high. Will the Cubs' pitching recover from injury problems? Will an offense with two rookies be able to score runs? It's easy to be optimistic, but there's plenty of doubt to be had as the Cubs championship drought draws close to a century.

http://chicago.cubs.mlb.com/NASApp/mlb/news/article.jsp?ymd=20060329&content_id=1366230&vkey=news_chc&fext=.jsp&c_id=chc

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Sad to see, but I think it's for the best: Jim Zalesky has been fired as Iowa Wrestling coach. We were pretty hardcore fans in Iowa, during the Dan Gable glory years (25 straight Big Ten championships, seven straight national titles). The team finished sixth at the Big Ten meet this year, and it was obvious that the program was slowly declining. We actually tuned in more this year than any time since we moved up to Minnesota (I've had several Gopher wrestlers as students). In any case, here's hoping they're able to lure a top name to their school. Cael Sanderson, anyone?

EDIT: Iowa State (maybe in reaction to Iowa's move?) fired its long time coach Bobby Douglass and replaced him with Sanderson--possibly its best wrestler ever, with the exception of Gable. So looks like it's other pastures, maybe Tom Brands, for the next coach.

Here's the story.

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