Lee Lowenfish

I've always felt that baseball fans are reborn with the slowly increasing daylight in January that makes the wintry weather bearable - this too will pass, nature is telling us. And soon the rousing sounds of gloves catching balls and bats thwacking those spheroids will be heard on the diamonds all over our land and increasingly all over the world. 

 

Before I bring the good news of TCM's festival of huge baseball fan George Raft movies starting every Tuesday in January, let me admit that an Oriole fan cannot be too hopeful about what this offeseason has wrought so far.  We knew that Corbin Burnes was likely a one-year rental and not likely to return.  Reportedly we did offer more money to the gifted pitcher but the Arizona Diamondbacks worked successfully on Burnes' desire to be playing half his games near the home for his young family in Scottsdale.  Six years with an opt-out after two years is not as outrageous as the eight years the Yankees gave the equally gifted but more fragile southpaw Max Fried. 

 

I won't even mention the money because it staggers the imagination these days. (I understand the argument that all franchises now have money and team valuations are going through the roof, but I don't have to like this constant discussion of millions here for that player and millions there for that player.) 

 

To try to replace Burnes, the Orioles are bringing over from Japan Tomoyuki Sugano, 35, and just plucked 41-year-old Charlie Morton from the Braves.  So far in his career Morton has been healthier than his recent teammate Fried and has also pitched far more regularly than the young wunderkinds the Braves have developed - Ian Anderson, Spencer Strider, among them - who have been wracked with injury. I repeat though - Morton is 41 and all the analytical geniuses in the world cannot come up with a new algorithm to deny that fact. 

 

Oriole fans have been braced for a while with the realization that Anthony Santander will not return to Birdland. He only turned 30 in October and we have watched the raw Venezuelan Rule 5 pick from the Cleveland organization develop into a power switch-hitter and decent defender.  Maybe right-handed-hitting free agents Tyler O'Neill and catcher-DH Gary Sanchez can deepen the offensive lineup that went into deep funks in the second half of 2024. Maybe the return from injury of closer Felix "The Mountain" Bautista and defensive and base-running wizard infielder Jorge Mateo can help restore true contention to Baltimore.  A return to productivity by catcher Adley Rutschman is a must but a top catching prospect Samuel Basallo is waiting in the wings. 

 

Enough of these early January speculations.  Yours truly The Prince of Paranoia is trying to pick his spots this year.  Too early, my friends, to wring my hands.     

 

Now . . . here's the shout-out to TCM's (Turner Classic Movies cable channel) salute to George Raft as Star of the Month every Tuesday in January.

He was born George Ranft in 1901 just south and west of Times Square in the tough Hell's Kitchen neighborhood of NYC.  Both George's father and grandfather had experience in operating carnival and other entertainment venues, and by the age of 12, George quit school and began earning a living in many trades in entertainment and sports.  He probably wasn't - as rumors claimed - a batboy for the NY Highlanders and I have my doubts that he even played minor league ball, but he was a lifelong baseball nut. 

 

He first genuine claim to fame came in the early 1920s as an expert dancer, ballroom, tango, whatever the situation called for.  He appeared at some of the same NYC venues where Rudolph Valentino made his name. Raft was considered the best Charleston dancer in NYC. I like to think that after he moved to Hollywood in 1927, he probably had a lot to share with Ginger Rogers because she won a Texas Charleston contest before she moved to tinsel town.

 

Raft would make southern California his home until his death in 1980.  He never lost his love of baseball and he had written into his contract a stipulation that he never had to work during the World Series.  Other stars like Joe E Brown and William "Future Fred Mertz" Frawley insisted on similar clauses.

One of my favorite fun facts about Raft's love of baseball is that Tigers outfielder Leon "Goose" Goslin gifted him with the broken bat that he used for his game-winning hit that won Game 7 of the 1935 World Series over the Cubs. Raft was a good friend of Leo Durocher who also loved the night life and made friends with top gamblers.  They even swapped apartments in New York and Hollywood - and reportedly clothes and girl friends - which became a huge blot on Leo's reputation and influenced baseball commissioner Happy Chandler to suspend Durocher for the entire 1947 season. 

 

There are no baseball themes in the Raft movies being shown this month but here is a partial list of the films.

M Jan 7 8P leads off with the classic "Scarface" (1932) with Paul Muni and Ann Dvorak, directed by Howard Hawks. Raft's flipping a coin in the air became

a signature gesture in his later films. 

 

Followed at 945P by "Night After Night" (1932) Hollywood's take on Texas Guinan's nightclub in the Prohibition era of NYC.  In her first movie role, Mae West portrays Texas.  In Jim Bishop's informative 1952 book, THE MARK HELLINGER STORY: A BIOGRAPHY OF BROADWAY AND HOLLYWOOD (New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1952), Bishop quotes Guinan's instruction near her death to have her body lie in Campbell's prestigious NYC funeral home: "I want the suckers to get a last look at me without a cover charge." (p208)  Bishop soon became famous as the author of a series of "One Day In The Life of ... " books that included Abe Lincoln and JFK. 

 

11:15P features the rarely seen "You And Me" (1938) directed by German exile Fritz Lang with Sylvia Sidney trying to keep Raft from returning to his wayward life. Great composer Kurt Weill evidently makes a cameo as a singer.  

 

M Jan 14 has a powerful double-bill starting with 8P "Each Dawn I Die" (1939) with James Cagney as a fellow prisoner.  Cagney and Raft were buddies in the dance world of NYC before they became friendly rivals in Hollywood, often fighting with management for higher pay than the other. In case you didn't know, dear readers, economic rivalry was not limited to athletes.

 

945P "They Drive By Night" Raft and Humphrey Bogart (longtime pal of Raft in real life and Mark Hellinger for that matter) play truckdrivers. Film is worth it for just the opening ripostes between amorous Raft and saucy Ann Sheridan fending off his advances.  Also with Ida Lupino. Directed by Raoul Walsh who really knew how to keep the action moving.  TCM highlighted Ann Sheridan as Star of the Month a couple of years ago.  She fought her own battles with management and the outspoken Texan detested the nickname "the Oomph girl".  "Oomph" reminded her of the sound a fat man makes when he sits down.   

 

1130P "Invisible Stripes" (1939) another prison-influenced film with up-and-coming William Holden and Bogart

 

1A "Manpower" (1941) another Raoul Walsh direction with Edward G. Robinson and Raft vying for Marlene Dietrich.  Things were not smooth on the set and former boxer Raft and the more cerebral Edward G  engaged in some off-screen fisticuffs.

  

More details at tcm.com/schedule.  Gotta mention though that "Some Like It Hot" (1959) will air on the last night of the Raft Festival

1230A Jan 28th.   And since I have to admit that I'm an armchair Walter Mitty type, dreaming of athletic glory but realistic enough to be thankful I can rise

from bed every day, on Fri Jan 17 at 9P Danny Kaye stars in "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty" (1947) based on James Thurber's classic story  

 

Here are some quick closing happy notes that my favorite non-baseball teams, Columbia women's basketball and Wisconsin men's basketball, did well in league play this weekend. Columbia knocked off competitive Penn this past Sat aft on the road, 74-59, with a balanced attack led by tri-captains, senior Kitty Henderson and junior Perri Page.  The first Ivy League home game will be against perennial champion Princeton on Sa Jan 20 at 7P (I erroneously reported it at 2P in an earlier blog).  Penn comes in for a rematch on Sa Jan 25, that game at 2P.  Columbia men open Ivy League season hosting Cornell Sat Jan 11 at 2P. 

 

After losing their first two close Big Ten games to Michigan at home and Illinois on the road, this past Friday Wisconsin hit a record-breaking 21 3-point shots to beat Iowa, 116-85. Graduate senior Steven Crowl and sophomore Nolan Winter are beginning to show some 7-foot muscle up front.  Graduate senior John Tonge has cooled off in scoring but he remains a top-notch foul shooter and hasn't lost confidence.  His name is pronounced Tahn-GAY, another correction I want to make from an earlier blog.  Sophomore swingman John Blackwell is beginning to emerge as a scorer and overall good player. 

 

So I conclude this blog as I started: On a note of cautious belief that sunnier days are ahead for me athletically if not politically.  And so as always I say: 

Stay positive test negative, Stay healthy stay sane, and Take it easy but take it!  

Time for a bit of a curveball to open this blog. It's short notice I know, but must tell you about TCM (Turner Classic Movies cable channel) hosting a day of baseball films on Thursday June 13.  So instead of putting the list at end of blog,here is the lineup with an * for something esp. worthy of watching, not necessarily for excellence but for its contribution to the era in which it was made. 

 

6A "The Great American Pastime" (1956)  David Wayne leaves his job to take over a Little League team to come closer to his son (he hopes).

 

730A "Ladies' Day" (1943)  The marriage of Eddie Albert will supposedly help his team win.  With Lupe Velez and Ann Miller.

 

*845A "Death on the Diamond" (1934)  I don't recall TCM ever airing this one. Robert Young plays a handsome young St. Louis Cardinals pitcher with the hots for team secretary Madge Evans. But there is a killer on the loose.  Who can it be? With fine character actors Nat Pendleton and Ted Healy (of producing "Three Stooges" fame).  Uncredited Gashouse Gang outfielder Ernie Orsatti has a cameo role getting killed between third and home.  I'm not saying it is a great film, but it is different and this was the era when many Americans were fascinated by gangsters.

 

*1000A "Fireman Save My Child" (1932)  The first of Joe E Brown's baseball trilogy.  Brown's character is more interested in selling his fire-preventing invention than playing but you get a good sample of both. Brown was a great athlete, a circus acrobat at an early age and almost a major league quality second baseman but he chose the right profession. 

 

*1130A  "Alibi Ike" (1935)  The third of Brown's baseball trilogy (the second and his personal favorite "Elmer The Great" - 1933 - is somehow not included today.)  Based loosely on Ring Lardner's story written before WW I, Brown's manager is William Frawley in his pre-Fred Mertz stage. (Both Brown and Frawley had clauses written into their Hollywood contracts that forbade them from working on movies during the World Series which they usually attended. So did George Raft.)  Brown's love interest is Olivia DeHavilland in her debut film.  Actually she completed "A Midsummer Night's Dream" also with Brown earlier in 1935 but this film was released first. 

 

*1P "Speedy" (1928) A Harold Lloyd classic with a memorable scene of awed taxi driver Harold driving Babe Ruth to a game at Yankee Stadium. Lou Gehrig can be briefly spotted as they scoot up Amsterdam Ave.

 

*230P "The Babe Ruth Story" (1948).  Hastily finished so Babe could see it before he passed away in August 1948.  William Bendix isn't very good as Babe - Jack Carson would have been better but was unavailable.  Claire Trevor could have played Claire Ruth as a noir character but she doesn't.  Charles Bickford doesn't age one bit as Brother Matthias at the beginning of film and near the end, but what I would give to have a voice and presence like Bickford whose Hollywood career started in the silent movies in 1924.  His fate has been to be forgotten like Vern Bickford who was a competent third banana to Spahn and Sain on Boston Braves.  If you want to see newscaster H. V. Kaltenborn playing himself, this is for you.  And as a document looking backward during increasingly nervous Cold War times, I think you should see it.  I plan to see it again because I have a weakness for corn about baseball. 

 

*430P "The Jackie Robinson Story" (1950) with JR playing himself, Ruby Dee as Rachel Robinson, and competent character actor Minor Watson as Branch Rickey.  Minor may not have been a major actor but he isn't bad though Harrison Ford in 2013's "42" was better.

 

*6p "The Stratton Story" (1949) the film that cemented Jimmy Stewart's ascent to stardom.  June Allyson plays the loving wife who encourages husband Monty Stratton back to the minor league game after a hunting accident ends his major league career.  Jimmie Dykes plays himself and in what I believe is his last role Frank Morgan, the Wizard in "The Wizard of Oz,"  plays the scout the originally signs him.  Screenplay by Guy Trosper who was nominated for an Oscar.  Trosper later wrote such notable films as "The Birdman of Alcatraz" and adapted "The Spy Who Came In From The Cold".

 

 

One more TCM sports note - 

Sa Jun 15 345P "The Winning Team" (1952) Ronald Reagan portrays Grover Cleveland Alexander with Doris Day as his wife. "The Stratton Story" serves as the template for this film - the loving helpmate-wife who helps a baseball-playing husband through his crises.  I've only seen this film once and want to look at it again. 

 

 AND NOW SOME NOTES ON BASEBALL ON MANY LEVELS AS THE SUMMER SOLSTICE LOOMS:

Congrats to the three winners of the NYC PSAL high school championships.

At the Triple A level, Grand Street Campus beat John Jay, 2-0, at Yankee Stadium on Monday afternoon June 10.  The two Brooklyn schools put on a memorable pitcher's battle. 

 

The prior weekend, the Double A title went to East Side Com. over Lafayette, 6-5.

The Single A title went to Brandeis over top-seeded American Studies, 15-0.  (The designations refer to the enrollment of the schools.)

 

Matchups for the College World Series in Omaha, Nebraska, are set. They will consist of 4 ACC teams and 4 SEC teams. With one exception, all games will be on the main ESPN channel. 

On Fri June 14 North Carolina meets Virginia at 2P

Top-seeded Tennessee meets Florida State, trying for first CWS title after many tries, at 7P 

 

On Sat June 15 second-seeded Kentucky, first time ever reaching this level, vs. NC State at 2P

Texas A & M vs. Florida, perennial contender but finished regular season only 1 game over .500, at 7P

 

The finals will be a best of three:

Sat June 22 730P

Sun June 23 2P - the one game on ABC

Mon June 24 7P (if necessary). 

  

As for MLB with under 100 games to play, the disparity between good teams and bad teams seems to be growing.  2022 was the

first season in MLB history when 4 teams won more than an hundred games and 4 teams lost more than a hundred.  It looks like we are headed that way in 2024 again. 

 

Too many ownerships don't really care about winning for a variety of reasons.  Among them are revenue-sharing that losing teams get anyway and also, probably the most important reason in my opinion, building a winning culture is very hard.  

 

As an Oriole fan that lived through a lot of dark years, I am enjoying this season and the last two actually as they emerged from darkness into contention.  How long they can stay up there with pitchers seemingly being injured every day is a concern.  But there is no doubt

that they have built a team of good players who really want to win and are increasingly showing that they know how to do it. 

 

There is one telltale sign that remains true - watch the teams that respond quickly to opponents scoring runs by putting up their own

runs on the scoreboard and you'll find strong evidence of that elusive winning culture.  The Yankees have that feeling this year too and the three game series in NYC June 18-19-20 will  be a good test for both teams.

 

That's all for this time.  Next time more details on the 35th Cooperstown Symposium on Baseball and American Culture that I attended last month.  I was glad to give a case that player-manager-scout Birdie Tebbetts needs to be remembered as Baseball's Last Idealist.

 

In my next blogs, I will also look forward to my class in mid-July at the blessed Chautauqua Institution in southwest NY State near

Jamestown and the home of the National Comedy Center.  My theme this year is Fandom in American Culture: From Early 20th Century Kranks to Modern BIRGers and CORFers (BIRG means Basking In Reflected Glory; CORF means Cancelling Over Repeated Failure.)

 

Always remember - take it easy but take it, and Stay Positive, Test Negative!