Author Archives: Jim Crikket

Game of Thrones – A DeadPOLL

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SPOILER ALERT! If you’re a fan of HBO’s Game of Thrones, but you aren’t caught up on what’s going on and don’t want SPOILERS, stop reading right now! (There, I warned you. What happens next is your own fault!)

If you’re here looking for my latest baseball articles, well, sorry. This isn’t related to baseball at all.

(Of course, if you really WANT to read my latest pieces on the Cedar Rapids Kernels you can click here to read my piece on outfielder Trey Cabbage and here to read my interview with pitching coach Virgil Vasquez. Both were posted at TwinsDaily.com.)

But THIS post is all Game of Thrones. If you’re one of those people tired of everyone talking about the HBO series, you should probably just move on now.

If you’re a GoT watcher, like I am, then you know that Episode 3 of Season 8 (the final season of the series) is scheduled for airing this Sunday and it’s gonna be brutal!

By now, we’re all used to seeing our favorite characters meet surprising, untimely, and usually vicious demises and with the battle on deck for this Sunday night, it’s clear we’re going to lose a few… or many… more of them. There are only three more episodes left to air after this week’s ultimate clash with the Night King’s legions of walking dead at Winterfell.

So, I say let’s have a little fun with their misery.

No, I’m not going to do a Deadpool. There are plenty of those out there, but I’m putting up a DeadPOLL!

Simply click the name of each GoT character that you believe will perish before the end of Episode 3 when, presumably after dispensing with the Night King, whoever remains turns their attention on Cersei Lannister. (And, perhaps, one another?)

This episode is scheduled to run an hour and twenty minutes and the word coming out is that it is the largest scale battle ever presented on TV or in any film.

So who’s going to buy the farm this week? (Sorry, that’s a Midwest term for what Jersey folk might call, “getting whacked,” if you didn’t know.)

Will it be Jon Snow (ne: Aegon Targaryen)? Just when he finds out he’s the rightful heir to the Iron Throne, will author George R. R. Martin and the show’s writers do him in?

Fans of GoT have believed for years that Martin secretly has it in for the popular Stark clan. Of course, Jon isn’t really a Stark now (or is he?), so maybe it will be the not-as-young-as-some-thought Arya. Would be a shame to kill off Sansa now that she’s found her inner Starkness. Hard for me to imagine Bran goes down right now, but never trust Martin to spare your favorite Stark!

Seems unlikely Daenerys Targaryen falls before she gets to go up against Cersei, doesn’t it? But you never know. And what about her dragons? Will either/both of the surviving not-undead dragons survive this battle?

Have either of the Lannister men, Tyrion or Jaime, run through their luck? I’m guessing at least one will need to deal with their sister before this is over, but both? Hmmmm. I’m not so sure.

Similarly, it would seem that Sandor Clegane (The Hound) has a confrontation with his brother, the Mountain, to get to before we’re done, so one would think he comes through this week’s carnage.

Now that Samwell Tarly has broken the news about Jon’s true identity, is there anything left for his character to do? What about Gilly and young Sam?

Other characters that you could argue have seen their character’s arc pretty much completed might be Bronn (though he has already survived longer than he had any right to), newly knighted Brienne of Tarth (not to mention her protégé Podrick Payne), the Mormonts (Joran and Lyanna), Grey Worm (though I’m suspecting Missandei will move on, for now), Theon Greyjoy (seriously, is anyone else shocked that this guy has survived this long?), Davos Seaworth (his arc seemed to run out some time ago, to be honest), or how about Tormuno Giantsbane and Deric Dondarrion (don’t know who they are? Don’t feel bad, I had to look them up. I just know them as, ‘that crazy red-haired wildling guy’ and, ‘the guy with the eye patch who only has one life left’)?

It seems obvious that the characters not currently at Winterfell aren’t in danger of seeing their paychecks end after this episode, so Cersei Lannister, Gregor Clegane (The Mountain), as well as Yara and Euron Greyjoy still have breath in them after this week. Then again, beware of what’s “obvious” when it comes to Martin’s imagination. Still, I’m going to leave them out of the poll for this week.

Finally, what about the Night King? I mean he HAS to be defeated, right… right? But who is he, really, and can he truly be killed?

But enough of my speculations. Tell me who YOU think gets their fire snuffed out in Episode 3. Click on all the character names you think will fall this week.

Which Game of Thrones Character(s) will die in Season 8, Episode 3's Battle at Winterfell?

  • Brienne of Tarth (9%, 15 Votes)
  • Grey Worm (9%, 14 Votes)
  • Joran Mormont (9%, 14 Votes)
  • Theon Greyjoy (8%, 13 Votes)
  • Deric Dondarrion (8%, 13 Votes)
  • Tormuno Giantsbane (7%, 11 Votes)
  • Davos Seaworth (6%, 10 Votes)
  • Podrick Payne (5%, 9 Votes)
  • One or both dragons (5%, 8 Votes)
  • Gendry (5%, 8 Votes)
  • Lyanna Mormont (4%, 7 Votes)
  • Jaime Lannister (4%, 7 Votes)
  • Bronn (4%, 6 Votes)
  • Night King (2%, 4 Votes)
  • Sandor Clegane (The Hound) (2%, 4 Votes)
  • Arya Stark (2%, 4 Votes)
  • Samwell Tarly (2%, 4 Votes)
  • Varys (2%, 3 Votes)
  • Tyrion Lannister (1%, 2 Votes)
  • Sam (child) (1%, 2 Votes)
  • Bran Stark (1%, 2 Votes)
  • Missandei (1%, 2 Votes)
  • Gilly (1%, 1 Votes)
  • Daenerys Targaryen (1%, 1 Votes)
  • Sansa Stark (0%, 0 Votes)
  • Jon Snow (Aegon Targaryen) (0%, 0 Votes)

Total Voters: 21

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Minor League Pay – Some Progress At Last?

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When the Cedar Rapids Kernels host the Lansing Lugnuts in a three-game series beginning July 13 of this summer, Lugnuts players will have one significant advantage over their counterparts in the home team dugout.

They’ll be getting paid more than 50% more than the Kernels players.

It doesn’t mean the Jays’ farm hands necessarily win every contest against the Kernels on the field, nor will they be swimming in riches on their paydays, certainly, but it’s a baby step in the right direction and players in every organization can only hope it’s a trend that spreads across affiliated minor league baseball.

According to a story by The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal and Emily Waldon, Blue Jays executives told The Athletic that they are finalizing a plan to raise their minor leaguers’ pay by more than 50 percent across all levels from the Dominican Summer League through Triple A.

(The Athletic site has a paywall, but if there’s a single site that deserves your consideration for subscribing, it’s the Athletic, in my opinion.)

According to that article, Class A minimum salaries are rising from $1,100 to $1,160 per month this season, so players for Lansing, the Blue Jays’ Midwest League affiliate, will be north of $1,740, about $600 a month more than the Minnesota Twins are obligated to pay players assigned to Cedar Rapids.

Toronto vice president of baseball operations Ben Cherrington told The Athletic, “We hope that it allows our players to have the freedom and comfort to make some good choices, whether it’s where to live, where to eat, etc. We just feel like it’s consistent with our values of trying to be a player-centered organization and give them every resource possible to be at their best.”

We could debate whether $1,740 a month is enough money to provide much “freedom and comfort” but there’s no doubt it’s provides more of those things than $1,160 does.

Minor leaguers are not paid while attending spring training and extended spring training (MLB claims these are merely extended “try-outs”), receiving their meager pay only once assigned to an active minor league team’s roster.

A raise similar to what Toronto is offering would certainly benefit the Twins’ players in Cedar Rapids where players already benefit from a healthy and generous host-family program, which allows players to re-allocate money that would otherwise go toward rent.

Toronto’s move coincidentally (perhaps) came about roughly the same time that Waldon authored another article for which she interviewed over 30 people, many of them minor league players, concerning the plight of players trying to subsist on minor league pay.

The big question, now, is whether Toronto’s unilateral first volley on minor league pay will be answered by other MLB teams.

Certainly, there are 25 guys getting ready to fly to Cedar Rapids in April that hope so.

Pitchers and Catchers First Workout – Photos

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The Twins’ pitchers and catchers reported to spring training on Wednesday and held their first official workouts today. I confess that I did not make a point of getting over to their complex in Ft. Myers before they took the field, but I got there – eventually.

New banners above the ticket windows at Hammond Stadium

For the first time this week, I took the “real” camera with me to the ballpark this morning, rather than rely just on my camera phone for photos. That said, if you follow me on Twitter (@JimCrikket), you saw Tweets I sent out that included batting practice cuts from Max Kepler, Jorge Polanco, Alex Kirilloff and Nick Gordon.

So, just a few random photos here tonight. Yes, I tend to focus on former Cedar Rapids Kernels, probably because it’s those guys I generally enjoy watching go through their workouts, just to compare them to what I remember them looking like during their time as Kernels.

Jose Berrios was a popular guy with the autograph seekers after his workout. Kudos to him for spending a LOT of time with his fans.
Catcher Ben Rorrtvedt getting loosened up before doing a lot of squatting while catching bullpen sessions.
When you’re going to spend as much time squatting while catching bullpen sessions as Brian Navarreto is, stretching is important!

Note: I was glad to get an opportunity to have a quick chat with Rortvedt and Navarreto after they completed their work. Two outstanding guys… and among the best defensive catchers I’ve seen come through Cedar Rapids. Both received non-roster invitations to the Twins’ Major League camp this spring.

2013 Kernels alum and current Twins shortstop Jorge Polanco
2013 Kernels alum and current Twins right fielder Max Kepler

These photos were taken at about the same time the Twins were announcing that they have signed both Polanco and Kepler to multi-year contract extensions.

Max kepler in the batting cage, while Jorge Polanco chats with one of the Twins’ all-time greats, Tony Oliva.
Tony Oliva is in uniform as a spring training coach every year.
Two more former Kernels. Outfielder Alex Kirilloff (CR 2018) and shortstop Nick Gordon (CR 2015)

Finally, yes, I got a little “artsy” with this one, with the shadows. Can’t really expect me to just take a bunch of pictures without trying to find SOMETHING different to do with them!

Zack Littell getting in his first official bullpen session of the spring

The Day the Music Died – 60 Years Ago

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It was February 2, 1959, and the Winter Dance Party tour had been one long cold disaster for the performers.

It was so cold on the tour bus that drummer Carl Brunch had a case of frostbite in his feet so bad that he was hospitalized in Clear Lake.

Rock & roll pioneer Buddy Holly didn’t really want to be on the tour but he also didn’t want to file for bankruptcy. Even so, after their bus broke down in sub-zero temperatures following a performance in Wisconsin, he’d had enough of the frigid bus trips and was not about to make another one up to Moorhead, Minnesota after the gig in Clear Lake. Instead, he hired a 21-year old pilot to fly him to Moorhead in a 4-passenger plane after the show that night at The Surf.

That flight ended around 1 a.m. on February 3, when the plane crashed just north of Clear Lake, killing the pilot and all three passengers aboard.

It seems bizarre to us now, perhaps. After all, many of us who have had to travel in bad weather over the years have stories of how we took a pass on flying in extreme winter weather in favor of taking a bus or renting a car. Not in a million years would we get on a small prop plane and take off in a blizzard, rather than travel on a road. That Holly, Ritchie Valens and J.P. (The Big Bopper) Richardson got on that plane instead of the tour bus says about all we need to know about the tour.

Then again, the refurbished school buses that the promoters were using for the tour weren’t exactly safe, either. Reports were that, by the time the tour reached Clear Lake, the tour had gone through four different buses and were then on bus number five.

To top it all off, there never should have been a Surf Ballroom stop on the Winter Dance Party tour. February 2 was supposed to be a day off for the performers, but the promoters added the Clear Lake stop at the last minute. They had a gig scheduled for the very next night in Moorhead, nearly 400 miles north Clear Lake.

Notwithstanding the famous refrain from Don McLean’s 1971 anthem “American Pie,” the music didn’t really die along with the victims of that crash 60 years ago. In fact, other performers on that tour went on to do their parts in keeping the music alive. Not only did Dion and the Belmonts do their part, but the guy who was playing bass in Holly’s backup band (his original Crickets were no longer touring with their front man) was Waylon Jennings.

Jennings, of course, went on to have a pretty successful career for himself, though not so much known as a rock & roller. It’s a career that almost never was.

Originally, Holly was supposed to be joined on the ill-fated flight by Jennings and Holly’s backup band guitarist, Tommy Allsup. But the Big Bopper hadn’t been feeling well and Jennings gave up his spot on the plane. Then Allsup and Valens decided to flip a coin for the last seat on the plane. 17-year-old Southern Californian Valens “won” the coin toss and the rest is rock & roll history.

According to Jennings, after Holly was told his bassist had given up his plane seat, Holly grinned and said, “Well, I hope your damned bus freezes up again.”

Jennings response, which he claimed haunted him the rest of his life: “Well, I hope your ol’ plane crashes.”

If you’ve never been to the Surf Ballroom in Clear Lake, I highly recommend it. I admit that I haven’t been there since I was a high school kid and went to a concert/dance at the Surf during the summer of 1973, but from everything I’ve heard, they’ve done a remarkable job of keeping the place up. You can take tours most days and they still schedule concerts throughout the year, including an annual Winter Dance Party, honoring Holly, Valens and the Big Bopper.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Will Players Be Willing to Stand Up For Themselves?

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So much is being written and debated concerning MLB ownership’s unwillingness to spend on free agency, whether the big ticket guys like Machado and Harper, or more middle of the pack veterans.

The players’ union obviously got completely dominated in the last couple of rounds of negotiations over the Collective Bargaining Agreement. Limits on amatuer player signing bonuses, limits on international player bonuses and a completely ineffective policy on artificially restricting service time are all evidence of just how impotent the MLBPA has been.

Now, everyone talks about how baseball is broken, because clubs “tank” and justify it with fans as an effective way to “rebuild.”

But can anyone really expect things to change? Given the history of players failing to agree to act in a unified manner, can we really expect to see much change in the next round of CBA negotiations? In fact, it may already be too late for players to get their acts together by the time the current agreement expires following the 2021 season. Players can’t just wait until parties are sitting at the negotiating table. If they do, they’ve already lost.

There’s a terrific article by Michael Baumann over at The Ringer that describes just how difficult it will be for the players to make any progress in the next CBA and why a work stoppage might be their only recourse. He argues that players need to immediately start publicly calling out their ownerships for non-competititve practices. Putting their case in front of the fans, however, is just the start.

“But it’s not enough for players to win over the fans—they have to present a united front within the union as well. Whether deliberately or through extremely fortuitous coincidence, MLB teams have put financial solidarity above the desire to compete. But players are routinely encouraged to go above and beyond the strict call of duty in order to gain an edge over their competitors. Being the self-motivated, hypercompetitive folks that they are, athletes usually oblige, by accepting team-friendly contracts, putting in extra hours training, or agreeing to wear biometric monitors and trading privacy for a perceived competitive edge.”

Similarly, ESPN’s Buster Olney published a New Years Eve article (behind ESPN paywall) that disclosed content of a memo that Buster Posey’s agent, Jeff Berry, has been distributing that outlines some actions that players should consider taking to bring attention to the players’ issues and prepare themselves (and fans) for the upcoming labor battle.

Among the suggestions are what are known as “work to rule” actions, including:

  • Players refusing to report earlier for Spring Training than the contractually mandated day of February 23.
  • Players refusing to participate in non-contractually mandated team events such as fan fests.
  • Players and agents not attending MLB’s Winter Meetings.
  • Players boycotting MLB-owned media outlets, such as MLB.com and the MLB Network.

Berry’s memo also proposes that players take a page out of the front offices’ playbook, by funding, “a comprehensive study that analytically supports recommended guidelines for player usage for the stated purpose of maximizing health and performance, maintaining/improving tools and athleticism, and mitigating age- and usage-related decline. Basically, a reverse-engineering of the aging curves and usage rates that teams are currently weaponizing against the players.”

In other words, stop letting teams get all the benefit of statistical analysis, especially when the result includes practices detrimental to the players, such as the service time maninpulation that the Minnesota Twins did with Byron Buxton in September when they decided not to promote him, thereby assuring they would benefit from an extra year of his services before he becomes a free agent.

Berry argued that, “Front offices are praised as ‘smart’ when working within the rules to extract maximum performance value for minimal monetary cost. Shouldn’t players also be ‘smart’ and likewise make calculated decisions within the rules to maintain and extend their maximum performance levels at maximum monetary values?”

Obviously Berry and the authors of these articles are right. The only way the owners and front offices will discontinue the offending practices will be if they are forced to. And they won’t be forced to by the players politely asking for change at the negotiating table in 2021.

The question is, will players unify enough between now and then to take actions such as those being suggested?

Would players ever follow one agent’s suggest to avoid events like off-season fan fests and caravans? (Photo by Steve Buhr)

Can you imagine your favorite Twins players staying away from Twins Fest? The established players already no longer participate in the Twins Caravan, but what happens to the caravans if NO players agree to participate?

Would minor league players also agree to stand with their MLB counterparts and not participate in Twins Fest and the Caravans… even though the union they’d be asked to support has done absolutely nothing to improve the plight of minor leaguers (in fact, often giving away concessions on minor league pay and bonuses in order to get more favorable terms for big league players)?

In the past, it has been almost impossible to get superstars making $20 million a year, veterans trying to get a couple extra million dollars and young players still under club control to agree on any unified strategy. They fight amonst themselves and, even when they can agree, they’ve failed miserably at getting the fans behind them. (Hard to imagine boycotting fan fests would help in that area unless, as Berry suggests, they get together to hold similar player-organized events.)

If players can’t – or won’t – do what’s necessary between now and 2021 to lay the groundwork for a more balanced negotiation with owners, it’s difficult to imagine the next CBA being anything significantly more competition-encouraging than the current version.

But if the players won’t do what’s obviously necessary to improve their situations, it will be hard to feel too sorry for them when they end up stuck with another half-decade or more of similarly one-sided business practices by owners.

The players have themselves to blame for the ownership practices they find offensive because they allowed their union to be steamrolled. If they allow it again, it will just reinforce how individually selfish and short-sighted they are and they’ll deserve exactly what they get.

Offseason Movies: “Without Limits”

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As I posted a couple days ago, I’m going to spend at least some of my winter working my way through some of the various sports movies that I own on DVD/Blu-Ray. You can find the entire list by clicking here.

So let’s start with a Donald Sutherland movie that is perhaps the most obscure title on the list.

Of course, the fact that Sutherland was in it doesn’t really narrow it down, I know. The guy has like 190 acting credits on his IMDB page, after all.

In 1998, Sutherland played Bill Bowerman, the famous track coach at the University of Oregon and a co-founder of Nike, in the film Without Limits.

Bowerman trained 31 Olympic athletes, 16 sub-four minute milers and his Oregon track team won four NCAA championships. Oh, he also achieved the rank of Major in the US Army and was awarded a Silver Star and four Bronze Stars during World War II. Throw in the whole co-founding Nike thing and one could make an argument that a movie about Bowerman’s career would be well worth making.

Maybe it would, but Without Limits is not that movie and Sutherland’s role is merely that of a supporting actor.

You may also recognize Monica Potter (Parenthood, Saw) in the primary supporting actress role in the movie.

On top of that, you’ll also see Matthew Lillard in this movie as one of the runners that Sutherland’s character is coaching. If you’ve watched every sports movie ever made, then you saw Lillard as Billy Brubaker opposite Freddie Prinze, Jr. as Ryan Dunne in 2001’s Summer Catch. Fortunately for Lillard, he didn’t have to rely on that movie to kick his acting career into gear for long. A year later, he starred as Shaggy in Scooby Doo and he’s ridden that wave ever since, acting in a sequel or two and doing voice work for pretty much every animated Scooby project, including video games.

It’s Billy Crudup, though, that has the starring role of Steve Prefontaine in Without Limits. Prefontaine was one of Bowerman’s star runners at Oregon and an Olympic runner at the infamous 1972 Munich Olympic Games. At one time or another, “Pre” held US records in seven distance events, from 2,000 meters to 10,000 meters.

Billy Crudup as Steve Prefontaine in “Without Limits” (1998)

Prefontaine was a bit of a cult hero when I was in high school, at least among my friends who ran track or were at least interested in Track & Field events in the Olympics. I was not such a person, but I had one particular friend that I can still remember going on and on about the guy.

Not only was Prefontaine one of the premier competitive runners in the world during the early 1970s, but he also was one of the most outspoken critics of the Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) and has been often credited with being a pioneer of improved American athletes’ rights.

After competing in Munich, where he had a disappointing performance, Pre turned down $200,000 to turn professional and continued to train for the 1976 Montreal Olympics as a member of the Oregon Track Club. Two hundred grand may not sound like a lot, given what today’s athletes make, but in the early 1970s, that was a big chunk of change! For some perspective, Prefontaine and his teammates on the USA Track & Field team were reportedly getting nothing but a $3 per day food allowance.

Meanwhile, the fatcats running things for the AAU were taking deals from event promoters to assure that Prefontaine and others like fellow runner Frank Shorter only went head-to-head with their biggest international rivals in those competitions that paid the most money to the AAU and its executives.

Unfortunately (spoiler alert!), Pre would not make it to Montreal for the 1976 Olympics.

After a post-meet party in Eugene, Oregon, on May 29, 1975, Prefontaine’s MGB convertible crossed the center line on a winding stretch of road, hit a rock wall and flipped over, pinning him underneath. He was pronounced dead by the first medics on the scene of the accident.

Without Limits is not Oscar material. It’s certainly not Donald Sutherland’s most memorable role. Heck, for me it’s not even Billy Crudup’s most memorable role (When I see Crudup, his work as lead guitarist for the fictional band Stillwater in Cameron Crowe’s Almost Famous is what immediately comes to my mind), but if you’re into sports-related biopics about athletes that should never be forgotten, give Without Limits a look-see and let me know what you think.

Unsurprisingly, given how infrequently I’ve posted here lately, there was very little response to the question of which movie should be next in line. I’ll add the poll again here, just in case this gets a few more clicks.

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Offseason Sports Movies

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What do we do between the end of the World Series and the date pitchers and catchers report for Major League Baseball’s spring training in February?

Hall of Famer Rogers Hornsby was famously quoted as saying, “People ask me what I do in winter when there’s no baseball. I’ll tell you what I do. I stare out the window and wait for spring.”

That sounds pretty close to what I do, too, but certainly we must be able to do a little better than that.

I don’t like to look out the window. It looks too cold. Instead, I give my television a heck of a workout.

I’m not an outdoor sports person and never have been. I play the occasional poker tournament. I’ve gone to two Cedar Rapids Roughriders hockey games this season (which is two more than I’ve been to over the past 3-4 years combined). But I’m just not big on being cold.

I know I could be writing. After all, my posts here at Knuckleballs have become so infrequent that I’m not even sure anyone who used to come around here to read my wit and wisdom will even bother to read this. But I do enjoy writing, it’s just that I find very little of interest to write about during the offseason – at least until the Twins’ front office decides to do something to assure that 2019 is not a repeat of 2018.

So, it’s binging on Netflix or Hulu… or I start working my way through the couple hundred or so DVD/Blu-Ray movies I’ve got laying around.

It occurred to me, while I was watching the Vikings lay an egg in Chicago Sunday night, that I could combine sports, writing and movie watching by starting a series of posts concerning the sports movies in my collection.

I did a quick inventory and found that I have over 30 movies with at least some manner of sports theme. Some of them pretty much everyone is familiar with (Bull Durham, Sandlot, for example), some are more obscure.

Some of them, admittedly, you really have to stretch the definition of “sports movie” to include it. I’m going a bit broadly, I know. It’s not like I included EVERY movie in which anyone competed at anything, though. After all, I didn’t let a few Quidditch matches influence me into including Harry Potter movies, did I? No, I didn’t (though the thought obviously crossed my mind).

So, here’s what I’m going to do: I’ll watch one of these movies every few days or so and then write something about it. I’m not sure it will really be a review. After all, if I didn’t like all of these movies, I probably wouldn’t have bought them or at least would have gotten rid of it by now.

But I’ll give the premise, why I like it, maybe a bit about the actors. Let’s just give it a whirl and see how this goes.

Here’s the list of sports movies I found sitting around.

Friday Night Lights
Remember the Titans
Semi-Tough
The Replacements
We Are Marshall
Leatherheads
Radio
The Express
Bull Durham
Eight Men Out
The Sandlot
Moneyball
42
61* 
Major League
The Rookie
Trouble With the Curve
Finding Forrester
Glory Road
Coach Carter
The Legend of Bagger Vance
Tin Cup
Caddyshack
The Greatest Game Ever Played
Miracle
Rocky Balboa
Creed
Secretariat
Seabiscuit
Without Limits
Molly’s Game
Meatballs

Yeah, that last one is a real stretch, I know. But the grand finale is a camp-Olympics with Bill Murray running the show for his camp of misfits. That’s sports, right? Anyway, it’s my list so it’s there.

That’s 32 titles. By my count, nine are baseball-related and eight are football. Only three with hoops as a foundation and can you believe I don’t own Hoosiers? I’ve never been as big a fan of Hoosiers as most people. I really should find a couple more basketball movies to add to the collection, though, because having one more golf movie than basketball just doesn’t seem right. Maybe I’ll pick up White Men Can’t Jump sometime.

Two movies about horseracing. Again, not your traditional “sport,” but if you can bet on it, it must be a sport. That same philosophy would include poker, thus allowing me to include Molly’s Game on list and you can’t go wrong with adding an extra Aaron Sorkin-written film.

Hoosiers is clearly not the only title missing from among the generally accepted “best sports movies” lists that get bandied about frequently. You won’t find Rudy or The Natural. Both were fine, but never among my favorites. I’ve got two movies on the list from the Rocky lineage, but neither of them are the original Rocky. No Bad News Bears. And, while admitting this might get me kicked out of Iowa, I don’t own Field of Dreams.

There are a few that I really thought I did own, but it turns out I don’t. I really like Chariots of Fire and thought I had that one. Maybe it was on VHS. I’m pretty sure I had Slap Shot on VHS, as well. I really thought I had A League of Their Own around here somewhere, but maybe I just thought so because I can’t seem to NOT watch it whenever I come across it while channel surfing.

Some of those that are on my list are better than others. Honestly, a couple of them I barely remember watching once.

But I’m willing to watch any and all of them again, if you will. I guess I’m willing to even if you aren’t.

Rather than do the obvious and start off with one of the movies that everyone knows and has seen a dozen times, I’m going to take a look at the list and try to work through them in reverse order based roughly on level of obscurity.

To that end, I’m going to start with what I would guess is possibly the most obscure movie on the list.

In a couple of days, I’ll post something on the movie Without Limits, which chronicles the too-brief career of runner Steve Prefontaine. Of some interest, perhaps, is that Without Limits is actually one of two separate movies made about “Pre’s” life within about a year of one another in the late 1990s.

If you want to express a preference for where I go from there, here’s your chance. The following five movies are likely among the next tier of “most obscure” titles on the list.

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Miracle & Twins Extend Agreement Thru 2022

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With the closing of the minor league baseball season on the field, we open up the biennial minor league affiliation-swap season and, to nobody’s surprise, the Twins have extended their affiliation with the Class High A Fort Myers Miracle.

Teams are allowed to sign agreements for either two or four years and the Twins/Miracle extension will run through the 2022 season.

With the current governing agreement between Major League Baseball and Minor League Baseball (aka MiLB) scheduled to run only through 2020, not many affiliation agreements between MLB teams and their minor league partners have been renewed beyond 2020.

The Twins and Mriacle, however, have become the tenth partnership to be renewed through 2022.

The others are Salt Lake City (LAA-AAA), Tacoma (SEA-AAA), Altoona (PIT-AA), Mobile (LAA-AA), Trenton (NYY-AA), West Michigan (DET-A), Wisconsin (MIL-A), Eugene (CHC-Short A) and Vancouver (TOR-Short A).

Of course, there are also about 40 minor league teams that are now owned in whole or in part by their MLB parents, so those agreements are virtually locked in place in perpetuity, though those teams can (and sometimes do) change cities. For example, the Twins own their Rookie level club in Elizabethton, but that doesn’t mean they couldn’t elect to move that club’s operation to another city.

The Twins are signed with their AAA affiliate in Rochester and their A affiliate in Cedar Rapids through 2020, but their AA agreement with the Chattanooga Lookouts expired with the end of the 2018 season.

The Twins have been in Chattanooga only four years, but the facilities there are widely known not to measure up to most newer modern AA level sites. The fact that the Twins and Lookouts did not sign an extension before the season came to a close indicates that one or both parties was interested in exploring other options.

If the Twins do want to look for a new host for their AA level club, their options are apparently limited.

The website BallparkDigest.com does a great job of keeping up with affiliate agreements and hosts a very helpful page where they keep tabls on the status of all MLB/MiLB affiliations. According to the Ballpark Digest list, only four other AA affiliation agreements have expired in 2018.

Those cities (and current MLB affiiliate) are Midland TX (OAK), Pensacola FL (CIN), Amarillo  TX (SD) (moving from San Antonio) and Knoxville TN (CHC).

2020 could potentially see an avalanche of affiliation agreements expiring, so it wouldn’t be surprising to see the Twins and Chattanooga decide to sign a two-year extension, but it certainly wouldn’t be a shock to see the Twins announce a move to one of the other four locations, either.

Unrelated to anything having to do directly with the Twins is the interesting way that some minor league relocations are affecting the landscape.

Colorado Springs has been a long-time member of the AAA Pacific Coast League, but their ownership is moving the club to San Antonio, which had previously been home to a AA Texas League club.

The former AA San Antonio team is moving to Amarillo, where they will open a new $45+ million ballpark, which I have to believe the Twins (and others) would love to call home.

Colorado Springs, meanwhile, will have to settle for hosting a Rookie level short season club, relocating there from Helena MT.

 

 

The Baddoo Philosophy: “Just Score Runs”

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Ask Akil Baddoo about his mentality as the Cedar Rapids Kernels’ leadoff hitter and the young centerfielder keeps it pretty simple. “Just score runs. That’s the goal and that’s how you win games.”

Akil Baddoo (Photo by SD Buhr)

Of course, being a consistently productive leadoff hitter at any professional level, is really is a little more complicated than that.

“Just really getting on base,” Baddoo said in an interview late last week. “If I get a walk, I’ll be satisfied with a walk because I know I’ll turn a walk into a double when I end up stealing second base. I’m just trying to find a way to get into scoring position so my third hitter and fourth hitter, which we have studs in the third hole and the fourth hole, just can knock me in.”

You also won’t see Baddoo swinging at the first pitch often. His aversion to first-pitch cuts may not be quite as severe as the current leadoff hitter for the parent club Minnesota Twins, but at least in his first at-bat of the game, his approach does appear more than a little bit Joe Mauer-ish.

“I’m just seeing what the pitcher has, how his curveball is, what the fastball’s doing,” Baddoo explained. “Then, if I get a base hit, then that’s a good thing, it’s a positive. But mostly it’s like a sacrifice, I’m just trying to figure out what he has, so I’m prepared in my next at-bat and third at-bat and going on. Then I can translate that to my other players. I can tell them, ‘Hey the breaking ball is 12 and 6,’ or ‘it’s side-to-side and the fastball has a little run to it.’ That’s what I kind of do my first at-bat. And then, if I get a hit, that’s good, that’s positive. But I know what he has.”

Baddoo’s “just score runs” philosophy has translated to results on the field.

Akil Baddoo (Photo by SD Buhr)

Through Sunday’s 3-2 win at Wisconsin, Baddoo had crossed the plate a team-high 77 times for the Kernels in 2018. That’s 25 more than any of his Kernels teammates and only two players in the Midwest League have scored more runs than Baddoo this season.

So how does a guy sporting a modest .238 batting average score so many runs?

“Akil is an athlete and a good baseball player,” Kernels hitting coach Brian Dinkelman explained. “ He goes through stretches where he’s really good and he goes through stretches where he has tough times. I think he’s still learning the game and learning himself, to be a consistent ballplayer all the time. But if you look at his numbers, I mean, double digits in homers, doubles, triples, stolen bases. So he can do a little bit of everything.”

Indeed, Baddoo’s 10 home runs tie him with Ben Rodriguez for third most among Kernels this season and since both of the guys ahead of them on the list are now playing for the Ft. Myers Miracle, you could say they are the active team co-leaders.

His 20 doubles also make him the “active” team leader in that category, tied with Alex Kirilloff and trailing only Royce Lewis and Jose Miranda – all three of which have been promoted to Ft. Myers.

Baddoo isn’t looking up at anyone on the triples list as his 10 three-baggers not only leads the Kernels, but the entire Midwest League.

He’s stolen 21 bases, good enough for second among Kernels this season, and he would look to be in position to claim the team lead soon as he trails the departed Lewis by a single stolen base.

And don’t forget the walks.

With 69 walks on the season, Baddoo leads his team and ranks fourth on the MWL leaderboard.

Not too bad for a guy that just celebrated his 20th birthday last week and is in his first year of full-season professional baseball.

Baddoo was a Lottery Round B (74th overall) draft selection by the Twins in 2016 out of Salem High School in Conyers, Georgia – about 20 miles east of Atlanta.

Unsurprisingly, perhaps, it took a while for a Georgia kid to adjust to the chilly Midwest as the season got underway, but as the weather warmed up, so did Baddoo.

After hitting just .196 in April, he nudged that average up to .240 in May and his .245 batting average in June was accompanied by an OPS of .820. He followed that up by hitting .280 in July, again with an OPS north of .800 for the month.

August has not been particularly kind to Baddoo, so it’s possible that the long season is catching up to him. His 105 games played is also a team-high number.

Akil Baddoo (Photo by SD Buhr)

“He’s going through a little rough spell where he’s striking out a little bit more, missing pitches,” Dinkelman observed. “We’re getting late in the season. I don’t know if maybe he’s getting a little bit tired, he’s been playing a lot of games for us. I’m sure fatigue probably is a little bit of a factor. Hopefully, he can find some extra energy the last couple of weeks.”

Energy isn’t something the casual observer would ever think the dynamic Baddoo runs low on, but he’s also not all that concerned about his stat line.

“I don’t really go too much on stats,” he said. “I know some people do, but it’s mostly about development and I feel myself getting better defensively and offensively. I’ve drawn a lot of walks, I’m getting on base, I’m scoring runs. I’m stealing bases. That’s really the goal and that’s what I’m trying to accomplish. I’m satisfied with what I’m doing, so far.”

One thing we know for sure is that it’s not the Iowa summer, with temperatures through most of the past month running consistently in the upper 80s and into the 90s, that’s worn him down.

“Exactly like Georgia, I love this weather right now,” Baddoo said. “They told me that, too, they said, ‘Once it dies down and not cold anymore, it’s going to get hot and it’s perfect.’ And they were right. This is amazing. I love it. Great baseball weather!”

With just two weeks left in the Midwest League’s regular season, Baddoo said he’s looking forward to the drive toward the postseason, but doesn’t want to change his approach down the stretch.

“No, not really, just keep getting after it,” he said. “Just going 110% and that’s what I do. I continue to work hard.”

Under the MWL playoff format, teams that finish first and second in each of the league’s two division during the first half of the season already have postseason spots locked up, while the remaining 14 teams battle for the four second-half qualifying spots.

With two weeks left, the Kernels hold the top spot in the MWL West Division, but need to hold off at least two of Beloit (3 games back), Kane County (4 games back) and Wisconsin (6 games back) to earn a playoff spot.

Baddoo’s smile lights up when the subject of potential for postseason play is the topic and he likes his team’s chances of making a deep postseason run.

“Now we’re in a race. We’re in a race for the playoffs,” he said. “I kind of like it though. We have a great team, coaches that have prepared us for this moment and we’ve been playing great baseball lately.

“You’ve got to realize that the teams that qualified in the first half, some of those guys aren’t there.”

Akil Baddoo with the stolen base (Photo by SD Buhr)

It’s the second straight season that Baddoo has been a part of a playoff contender, after playing for Appalachian League champion Elizabethton in 2017.

“E-town was great, I enjoyed E-town,” he said, smiling big. “We won it all, that was pretty cool.”

Of course, that’s a pretty familiar refrain to Cedar Rapids fans who have heard about Rookie level championship rosters before, only to see many of the same players fall short of a Midwest League title the following year. Cedar Rapids hasn’t won the MWL since 1992.

Baddoo hopes this is the year that trend changes.

“Maybe this year we’ll pull it off! We’re trying. We’ll try our best.”

Dear Twins: Don’t Sell!

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Like a lot of Twins fans, I think, I’ve been coasting a bit with my fandom. The results on the field have been disappointing.

Byron Buxton (photo by SD Buhr)

Ervin Santana, Miguel Sano, Byron Buxton and Jorge Polanco hadn’t even been on the field much, if at all, during most of the first half of the season.

The expected two-team competition for the American League Central Division title quickly became no race at all, with Cleveland outpacing the pack.

So, I fell in line with the expectation that the Minnesota front office should and would be sellers at the July non-waiver trade deadline.

But a funny thing happens to me when I start to hear so many voices saying, “Sell!” in unison. I start looking for reasons to buy.

Yeah, my portfolio took a hit Thursday when Facebook shares dropped almost 20%. But I didn’t sell. I’m holding onto my Facebook stock. In fact, I’m probably going to add to my existing position after letting the dust settle for a few days.

I think that’s what the Twins should do, too.

No, I don’t mean they should invest in Facebook (though it wouldn’t be the worst investment the Twins have made over the years), I mean they should hold and maybe even buy.

When the chorus grew so loud in support of the Twins being a seller at the deadline that there was support for not only trading players with expiring contracts and/or little expectation that they’d be part of the 2019 roster, but also for sending Kyle Gibson and Ryan Pressly packing, I took a step back from the cliff.

If so many people were that convinced it was time to not only trade spare parts, but important 2019 cogs in the machinery, I wondered if maybe it’s time to do the opposite.

After all, a year ago, the front office gave up and started selling about this time (though it turned out they didn’t have a ton of guys that other teams were interested in buying). As we all know, the Twins overcame that lack of faith, forcing their way into the one-and-done AL Wild Card game.

But this is not 2017, obviously.

At the end of July a year ago, Minnesota trailed Cleveland by 6 ½ games in AL Central. This year, they trail by 7 after Thursday night’s win over Boston.

Jorge Polanco (Photo by SD Buhr)

Last year, the Royals also stood between the Twins and the top of the Division. Not so this year. If Minnesota doesn’t mount a challenge, Cleveland will stroll to the Division title.

A year ago, not only were the Twins well off the pace being set by Cleveland, they were going the wrong direction. They had started the month of July three games above .500, tied for the second AL Wild Card spot and just two games behind the Indians in the Division race. They finished the month tied with Baltimore, 4 ½ games behind the Royals in the race for the second Wild Card and two games behind Seattle and Tampa.

Whatever momentum they had was moving them in the wrong direction so, of course, you sell.

But this is not 2017.

First of all, unlike a season ago, Minnesota will not be contending for an AL Wild Card spot.

A year ago, there was one very good AL team in Houston and a lot of mediocrity after that. This year, there are a pair of teams in the East and three in the West that are leaving pretty much everyone else, including the Twins (and Cleveland, for that matter), in the dust.

Entering July this season, the Twins at 35-44, were nine games under .500, eight games behind Cleveland in the standings and 15 ½ games back of the second WC spot.

That’s not ideal, I grant. They’ve gone 13-9 this month and only managed to trim one game off their deficit to the Division leaders. That being the case, nobody can be blamed for advocating that the Twins replace player surnames with “FOR SALE” on back of most players’ jerseys.

Unlike a year ago, however, Minnesota doesn’t need to claw their way through a crowded field in the hopes of earning a single play-in game at Yankee Stadium. They’re chasing one team and, if they should catch them, the reward is at least one full postseason series.

And, unlike a year ago, their momentum is moving them in the right direction, notwithstanding last weekend’s debacle in Kansas City.

The Twins also will face Cleveland ten times between now and the end of August. And it’s not like Minnesota has been beaten up by the Tribe this season, either. On the contrary. The Twins have won six of the nine games the two teams have completed this year.

Everyone seems to think this is the same Cleveland team that went to the World Series a couple years ago. It isn’t. Yes, they have three guys at the top of their batting order that are very good. You want to include Edwin Encarnacion, I’ll let you. But after that? Who are you really afraid of?

They have some pitching, yes. But that pitching hasn’t translated into as many wins in July as the Twins have notched and the Twins just added Ervin Santana, who didn’t look too rusty in his season debut this week.

Yes, the Minnesota front office could throw in the towel now. It appears that not a lot of fans would blame them. It has been a disappointing year, to this point.

They could get what they can for the guys with expiring contracts. Discard Lance Lynn, Brian Dozier, Eduardo Escobar, Zach Duke, even Joe Mauer if he’s inclined to approve of a deal to a contender. Probably add Jake Odorizzi to the list if you’re not of a mind to offer him arbitration for 2019. Likewise, maybe get someone interested in Santana if you don’t think you’ll pick up his $14 million club option for 2019.

Make way for the next round of young talent that’s stewing in Rochester and Chattanooga. Let them get their feet wet in August and September, then be ready to re-engage the battle for AL Central supremacy in 2019.

But is this really what we’ve come to? Baseball seasons are just four months long? If you’re a few games out of the top spot in your Division at the end of July, you pack it in and, “wait ‘til next year?”

I’m sure the folks running Cleveland’s club are hoping that’s what the Twins will do. If so, they can virtually coast through the final two months and prepare for the postseason.

I get that trading some (or all) of those players would potentially add a few pretty decent young prospects. And if the Twins’ farm system was in dire straights without much talent in the pipeline, maybe I’d go along with a fire sale right now. But that is not the case.

The Twins have some really good talent at every level of their minor league organization right now. Sure, you always want more because some guys with high ceilings just don’t pan out, but as much as I enjoy watching minor league baseball, let’s not lose sight of the fact that the purpose in all of this is to win at the Major League level.

As things stand, the Twins have a rotation of Santana, Berrios, Gibson, Lynn and Odorizzi. It may not be the equal of Cleveland’s, but it ain’t bad.

If you think Fernando Romero, Aaron Slegers or Stephen Gonsalves would perform better in the fifth spot than Odorizzi, then make that move. But do it because you think it not only will make your team better in 2019 but will also improve their chances to catch and pass Cleveland this year.

Or, here’s a thought – if you think you could improve your rotation, maybe trade FOR a better pitcher (ideally, one with at least another year of control left after this season), rather than selling off the ones you’ve got.

And please, just stop the talk about trading Kyle Gibson already. This is not a rebuild. If you really have given up on 2018, fine, but don’t give up on 2019, too.

With all of the problems this organization has had finding really good starting pitching, why would you trade a guy just when it looks like he’s becoming a really good starting pitcher and still has a year of team control left?

Just because you could get somewhat better prospects in return? They’re still prospects and you’re probably just going to hope that one of them ends up developing into a pitcher as good as Gibson.

As a fan base, we’ve been lulled into this never-ending routine that emphasizes acquisition and development of quality minor league talent. That’s all well and good until it takes over the organization’s mentality to the extent that they let a few games’ deficit in the standings in July keep them from even bothering to try to compete through the rest of the season.

I say let’s go for it!

What are you afraid of? If it doesn’t work out, you still have all the quality young talent waiting to fill in where needed next season and so much payroll money coming off the books that you won’t be able to figure out how to spend it all.

If you don’t take advantage of those 10 head-to-head meetings with Cleveland, there are still likely to be waiver deals to be made before the end of August. No, the returns may not be as good as they would be right now, but I’m pretty satisfied with where the Twins’ farm system sits now. I don’t need more.

I don’t want my baseball season to keep being four months long. I want the full six months.

I want to see if Santana, Buxton and Sano can overcome their personal setbacks and help turn the Twins into the kind of team nobody wants to have to face in September.

I want to see if this team, that was supposed to be a contender, can get some traction and do something to make Cleveland sweat a little bit. Don’t just hand them the Division. Let’s make things interesting for them.

That’s what competing is all about, isn’t it?