Lee Lowenfish

I'm glad that there will be a full season of MLB ahead of us although as an Oriole fan I'm not looking forward to another season of losing.  

 

I just hope that the possible salary arbitration hearings of Trey Mancini and John Means (not Cedric Mullins as I mispoke in earlier edition) don't lead to bitter feelings and the departure from Baltimore of two of our more likable players.

 

Talented but inconsistent reliever Tanner Scott also is up for arbitration and if they trade him, i wouldn't mind.  The Mets don't have a left-handed reliever as of the morning of March 15.  I'd be glad to trade him for let's see - Jeff McNeil. LOL

 

**Mancini is a survivor of colon cancer who plays with super intensity. Probably beats up on himself more than he should, but he truly cares which is more than I can say for a lot of

players and certainly owners.  

 

**Mullins is not eligible for arbitration until after 2022.  He had a breakout offensive year in 2021 and has always been a top-notch center fielder.  We also recently learned that before last season he had surgery to alleviate the worst symptoms of the intestinal disorder known as Crohn's disease. 

 

**Southpaw John Means, the only somewhat proven starter on the Birds staff, is eligible for arbitration.  Hard to see how they could let him go but in an age where starters rarely go more than five innings, some genius in the front office might pitch an idea that we don't need starters at all.

 

Makers of the T-shirt JOHN MEANS WELL would be disappointed. So would I and my ideal T-shirt MEANS FINDS WAYS.  He did throw a no-hitter last May though the rest of his season was marred by injury and mediocrity. 

 

In the new Basic Agreement, the Rule 5 draft of bargain basement players discarded by other teams - the specialty of the house with the current Oriole front office crew - has been canceled for at least 2022. So maybe the Orioles won't be tempted to trade these good contributors and good citizens.

 

I've heard only good things about our rookie switch-hitting catcher Adley Rutschman so I certainly wish him well. But we still have no reliable infield defense (or offense) up the middle, a giant hole at third base, and no reliable starting pitching.

 

Just heard the news that Cincinnati traded two of its best offensive players, outfielder Jesse Winker and third baseman Eugenio Suarez, to Seattle for mediocre major leaguers and

the ever-popular "prospects".  

 

Very sad to see that before the pitch is thrown in the delayed but full 2022 season, Baltimore, Cincinnati, and Pittsburgh have no chnce of competing. Oakland is starting a fire sale by trading Matt Olson to Atlanta for "prospects", although the players Billy Beane got seem to have more upside than those the Reds received.  

 

I've always said that every season produces a surprise team and it may happen in 2022 with the rebuilding Royals and Tigers and perhaps the Mariners.  But it is not a good situation for MLB when there is a permanent underclass. The addition of 12 teams to the playoffs will likely mean very little to baseball's have-nots.

 

I remind folks again - there is plenty of affordable minor league, high school, and college baseball to see in the coming months.  In the NYC metro area, Columbia, Rutgers, St. John's, and Seton Hall always have competitive programs.

 

The new Staten Island Ferry Hawks open their home schedule on Tu May 3, and the Yankees' Double A farm club Somerset Patriots and the Mets' High-Single A Brooklyn Cyclones farm club both open on Tu Apr 12 for a slate of six games through Easter Sunday Apr 17. 

 

Turning to basketball and the upcoming "March Madness",  Columbia's women basketball will start its first-ever post-season play with a home matchup in the WNIT (Women's NIT) against Holy Cross at 7p on Wed Mar 16.

 

The Lions routed Yale last weekend in the semi-final of the Ivy League tournament, but after battling Princeton to a tie in the first quarter of the final, they fell behind by 12 at the half.  They briefly cut the lead to 8 points with about 7 minutes to go, but a Princeton timeout stopped the surge.

 

Wisconsin's Cinderella men's team is in danger of turning into a pumpkin.  They have lost two in a row for the first time all season.  They enter the first round of March Madness on Fri March 18 at 950p EDT on TBS against Colgate in Milwaukee. 

 

It's virtually a home game for Wisconsin, but if newly named Big Ten Player of the Year Johnny Davis has another mediocre game as he did in the Big Ten tournament against Michigan State, this dream season will end abruptly.  

 

Davis is dealing with a chronic ankle injury that may be affecting his play.  It says here that the biggest factor is the pressure of being voted Big Ten Player of the Year and an expected NBA lottery pick is getting to him mentally.  

 

The Badgers were picked for 10th in pre-season polls. They don't have a deep roster so everyone in addition to Davis must step up.

 

The Film Forum on Houston Street in lower Manhattan is one of my favorite movie theaters.

Now open again for customers (fully-masked!), I saw yesterday the documentary about the late radio personality Steve Post.  

 

"Playing In The FM Band" is a definite must-see. The film, produced and directed by former WBAI station manager Rosemarie Reed, will go down as a memorable and indispensable tribute to one of the founders of free form radio in the 1960s. 

 

 

I came to WBAI to host and produce a sports show in November 1982 just after Post left to become a morning host and classical music jockey at the more sedate WNYC.  

 

We learn in the film that Post dealt with colon cancer from the age of 38,  the same age his mother got the disease.  He survived more than 30 years but his mother left this vale of tears when he was only 10.  

 

This calamity - and his father's unusual cooking habits that I'll only tease you with - undoubtedly contributed to Post's acerbic cynicism. The strength of the movie is its focus on his achievement as a pioneer in radio in NYC in the tumultuous age of the 1960s and beyond.

 

I was really impressed with the pacing of the film, which is the challenge in films that rely

on talking heads. I only wish that the credits at the end of the film moved more slowly - they rarely do, one of my pet peeves.  

 

Andy Lanset, director of WNYC archives, has dug up remarkable material, especially Bayard Rustin, the underappreciated civil rights leader, singing movement songs in a haunting high tenor voice.

 

Kudos to the original music of David Amram that augment some great irreverent songs from the 1960s and beyond. And the artists whose animations keep the story flowing with humor.  

 

What else can I say about the film except see it while it lasts at Film Forum through at least

Thursday March 24.  Any film that makes Post's first mentor at station, Larry Josephson, come across as avuncular and benign is a true work of art. 

 

That's all for now. Here's to the extra hour of sunlight that Daylight Saving Time has brought us, and let it brighten our spirits as spring happily looms on the horizon.  May it shine on the beleaguered people of Ukraine facing the awful scourge of Putin's unprovoked invasion. 

 

Always remember:  Take it easy but take it!

 

 

 

 

 

The end of the regular baseball season is always a bittersweet time. There are playoffs ahead but October baseball is national not local (except for radio if your team is in the hunt.). I already miss the daily flow of games from all over the country and the amassing of steady incremental statistics.

The National League Wild Card game was historic in that two divisions ended in dead heats. That meant two one-game playoffs this past Monday Oct 1 to determine the division winner and automatic entry into the playoffs.

The Dodgers won at home over the Colorado Rockies and the Milwaukee Brewers won at Chicago to assure their places in the tournament. That meant the Wild Card game would pit Colorado at the Cubs’ Wrigley Field on Tuesday night Oct 2.

In a 2-1 13-inning thriller, the Rockies eliminated the Cubs. (I’m a New Yorker and have never called them the Cubbies and never will.) It was a wonderful ending for those of us who like to see the unheralded player - almost the last man on the 25-man roster - become the unlikely hero.

Around the bewitching bell of midnight CDT, it was third-string catcher Tony Wolters who drove in the winning run with a single up the middle. It was a tough experience for Chicago to lose two post-season games in a row at home but I think they’ll be back in future post-seasons.

A fully healthy Kris Bryant should help a lot. Maybe they’ll be able to get some wins and innings from the very expensive free agent bust Yu Darvish. Most of all, the team cohesion will have to return.

When the Cubs were in command of the division for most of the second half of the season, team leader Anthony Rizzo was quoted as saying that the team was made up of number one draft choices who don’t act like them. That grinding quality needs to return.

The American League Wild Card game the following night - Bobby Thomson Day October 3 - provided no such excitement. A now-healthy Aaron Judge slugged a two-run homer in the first inning and the Yankees were rarely threatened on their way to a 7-2 romp over the Oakland A’s.

Predictably, Billy Beane, the widely-hailed genius of the A’s, said that a playoff never tests the true value of a team, and usually effective manager Bob Melvin agreed. But like the Twins last year the A’s did not seem ready to play in such a high-pressured situation. A low payroll is no excuse for uninspired play though the Yankees are certainly formidable and peaking at the right time.

I grew up watching too many Yankees-Dodgers World Series in the 1940s and 1950s but we may be heading in that direction again. We’ll find out more in the next couple of weeks as the Yankees-Red Sox and Houston-Cleveland meet in the ALDS and the Dodgers-Atlanta Braves and Colorado-Milwaukee go head-to-head in the NLDS.

I'd like to see a rematch of the 1948 and 1995 with the Indians and Braves - Ryan Braun's arrogant unrepentant PED-abusing past makes it impossible for me to root hard for the Brewers though I have Wisconsin roots from the 1960s.

I'd like to see Indians win in seven though they too have a poster boy for PED abuse, Melky Cabrera. (Maybe he won't make the post-season roster.) But I know very well you can't always get what you want.

Meanwhile the baseball managerial firing season is in full flower. Cubs honcho Theo Epstein has assured the world that Joe Maddon will return in 2019 but not with an extension to the contract so he could well be considered a lame duck. Not likely given his innovative approach to life and managing.

Some people were surprised that Paul Molitor was fired in Minnesota but not me. I could see a look of near-resignation on his face in the latter stages of the season. In a very weak AL Central, the Twins finished second at 78-84 but only because they won a lot of relatively meaningless games at the end of the year.

The decision to not renew Buck Showalter’s contract in Baltimore was no surprise to anybody. A 47-115 season doesn’t look good on anyone’s resume.

It may mean the end of his managerial career though at 62 he still looks good on the surface. He certainly should be saluted for his many great achievements at turning around moribund teams - starting out with the New York Yankees in 1992 who had just come through their worst non-championship period after the 1981 World Series.

Buck left the Yankees after they lost a thrilling ALCS to the Seattle Mariners in 1995. He then became the first manager of the Arizona Diamondbacks, starting with the team and setting the tone of the organization two years before they played their first game in 1998.

Just as in New York though, where Joe Torre took over essentially Buck’s team plus Derek Jeter and won the 1996 World Series, the Diamondbacks only went all the way in 2001 after Buck yielded the reins to former catcher (and now announcer) Bob Brenly. The addition of aces Randy Johnson and Curt Schilling didn’t hurt.

After managing the Texas Rangers for a few years earlier this century, he came to the Orioles late in the 2010 season. He turned the team around quickly and by 2012 the Orioles were back in the playoffs for the first time since 1997.

They won the AL East in 2014 and I’ll never forget the last great euphoric moment at Camden Yards. After beating the Tigers two in a row - a bases-clearing double by Delmon Young the deciding hit - a joyous Orioles fan carried a sign into the happy milling crowd: KATE UPTON IS HOT, VERLANDER IS NOT. (Justin of course now has the last laugh appearing again in the playoffs for the second year in a row.)

Buck’s last playoff game with the Orioles can be marked in 20-20 hindsight as the beginning of the end - when he chose not to use ace closer Zach Britton in the Wild Card game at Toronto in 2016. In fairness to Buck, every other bullpen choice in that game had worked like a charm.

But to channel George Costanza to George Steinbrenner in a classic Seinfeld episode, “How could you trade Jay Buhner for Ken Phelps?” I asked in wonderment sitting at the bar at Foley’s that night: “How could you choose Ubaldo Jimenez over Zach Britton in a double-play situation in a tied game on the road?!”

Buck’s last two seasons were not good in Baltimore and 2018 defied belief in its horror. He is moving back to Texas, this native of the Florida Panhandle who went and played at Mississippi State but owes a lot of his inspiration to meeting his father’s friend Bear Bryant at Alabama.

From his earliest moments in Baltimore - when he finished 34-23 in 2010 winning more games than the team had won before he arrived - he made all of us Oriole addicts proud and created lasting memories.

It is almost fitting though equally sad that Adam Jones has probably also played his last game in Baltimore. This effervescent modern player and the old school manager formed a unique bond during the Orioles’s good years.

Jones’s free spirit but obvious desire to win allowed Buck to loosen up some of his old-school rules. So on hot days Buck allowed the Orioles to take batting practice in shorts. It was Jones who insisted that Buck take a bow out of the dugout when he won his 1000th game as a manager.

It’s sad that this year from hell lowered Showalter’s lifetime record to under .500 with the Orioles. The road up will be a hard one and the Orioles are also looking for a new general manager with the decision to not rehire Dan Duquette.

Ownership remains in flux with the Angelos sons in charge now with patriarch Peter ailing. It can’t be worse than 47-115, can it?

So let me close with a big thank you to Nathaniel “Buck” Showalter for the pride and joy he brought to the Orioles and their fans for many years.

That’s all for now - always remember: take it easy but take it!
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