Lee Lowenfish

I'm posting a little before midnight on Sunday Oct. 17.  The Braves just went 2-0 up on the Dodgers in the NLCS with another dramatic walk-off bottom of the 9th win. 

 

Former Minnesota Twin Eddie Rosario started the tying rally in the 8th with some daring base-running encouraged by third base coach Ron Washington.  And then Rosario stroked the single past Dodgers shortstop Corey Seager that won the game in the 9th.

 

The Braves lost 2-0 and 3-1 leads to the Dodgers in last year's NLCS so this series is not over.  Yet there is nothing like the exhilaration of a comeback win for player and fan alike.  

 

Once the Yankees were convincingly eliminated by the Red Sox in the AL Wild Card game,

I had no team to viscerally root against. But the Dodgers with their huge payroll can be an easy target. 

 

I will say this - until these last two games in Atlanta, they were behaving admirably like a defending champion.  They chased the surprising Giants all season, losing their quest for their ninth straight NL West title on the last day of the regular season.

 

After winning the Wild Card game over the Cardinals, LAD ultimately caught SF in the final game of the best-of-five NL Division Series on Th night Oct 14.

 

For eight innings it was an extremely well-played taut game. Scoreless until the top of the 6th, LA drew first blood with a double down the left field line by free-agent-to-be Seager. It scored Mookie Betts, the former Red Sox star, who went four-for-four and demonstrated that he is probably healthy again. 

 

I had hoped that the Dodgers might get too cute by starting an "opener" in Corey Knebel, the former Brewers reliever and University of Texas Longhorn.  But Knebel and successor Brustar Graterol put up one zero each.  

 

Julio Urias, baseball's only 20-game winner in 2021, entered in the 3rd. Urias, the young Mexican who arrived in the majors at the age of 19, was virtually flawless until Giants journeyman outfielder Darin Ruf led off the bottom of 6th and homered deep to center field to tie the game.  

 

Answering runs is SO important in baseball and this was an immediate response. I love stories like Ruf's, a onetime Phillie who played in Korea for three years and returned in 2020 and this year has become a key member of this year's Giants' many platoons.

 

Not known as a good defensive player at either first base or outfield, Ruf also made two fine plays to keep singles from becoming doubles. He epitomized the kind of under-the-radar players that made the 2021 Giants so appealing.

 

Young Giants starter Logan Webb threw seven solid innings giving up only the one run. 

He hails from Rocklin, California near Sacramento, only 100 miles from SF's ballpark. Honored earlier in the week at the elementary school in his home town, he didn't let his new-found fame affect his concentration on the mound. 

 

As many people feared (including yours truly), the Giants bullpen was not as effective as the Dodgers' group. The Giants dodged a jam in top of 8th, but Camilo Doval, the Giants newly-anointed young closer, hit Justin Turner to start the top of the 9th.

 

After a single by rookie Gavin Lux moved Turner to second, the former NL MVP Cody Bellinger drove in Turner with a solid single to right-center with what proved to be the NLDS-winning RBI.

 

In my last blog, I said that Bellinger might make up for his injury-plagued poor regular season by filling the void left by injured Max Muncy.  His reawakening may be happening.

 

The Dodgers won the game, 2-1, when Max Scherzer got his first career save despite an error by third baseman Justin Turner that gave the Giants hope with one out.  But there would be no more amazing show of Giants' resilience.  

 

After a routine second out, the Giants' season ended when versatile journeyman Wilmer Flores was called out on strikes by first base ump Gabe Morales.  Replay confirmed what most of us watching at home already knew - Flores did not swing.  

 

Yet I find it highly unlikely that the Giants could have rallied against Scherzer.  He wasn't sharp pitching on two days rest, but his arsenal of pitches kept the Giant hitters off balance.  

 

Scherzer is a free agent after the World Series, and he and his agent Scott Boras are lobbying for another big contract for the 37-year-old winner of 3 Cy Young pitching awards with perhaps a 4th in 2021.  

 

I don't care what salary Scherzer will make, but I don't like players' economic demands rubbed in my face.   The Astros' Justin Verlander, out all year recovering from Tommy John surgery, tweeted the other day that Houston should give shortstop Carlos Correa anything he wants during his upcoming free agency.  

 

Verlander will be on the market himself after the Series with his full recovery uncertain but his competitiveness undoubtedly remaining very high.   But please don't rub all your salary and guaranteed year demands in my face. 

 

Given the long history of animosity between players and owners - see my three editions of THE IMPERFECT DIAMOND and works by many others - I'm not betting against a lockout after Dec. 1 when the current Basic Agreement has expired.  But not now for these tiresome discussions.

  

Turning to the ALCS, the series could well turn on the unavailability of Houston's ace Lance McCullers Jr.  Framber Valdez and Luis Garcia, the Astros starters used in the first two games, did not pitch well. 

 

Though Houston won Game One on timely home runs by their productive double play partners, Jose Altuve and Carlos Correa, the Red Sox rebounded in Game 2 with grand slams by J.D. Martinez and Rafael Devers in the first and second innings. Such a feat had never happened before in a post-season game.

 

I'd like to see manager Dusty Baker win his first World Series ring.  He has done an

excellent job of uniting his team after the sign-stealing scandal during the 2017 World Series, revealed two years later, cost general manager Jeff Luhnow his job and forced manager A.J. Hinch and bench coach Alex Cora to serve 2020 suspensions.

 

Yet the 2021 Red Sox are a likable team. Cora is back managing them (and Hinch led the Tigers to near-respectability this season).  Cora knows how to manage - he led the Red Sox to their 2018 World Series win over the Dodgers.

 

He understands how to encourage levity in the stressful world of major league baseball.

I've been getting a kick out of seeing a Bosox home run hitter get a ride on a laundry cart in the dugout.

 

The idea evidently was hatched last season when the Red Sox finished last in the shortened 60-game season, even behind the Orioles.  Coach Jason Varitek, and former Bosox star catcher, thought it might lighten the mood.  Now in a season of success, it continues to

be an amusing ritual.

 

It is hard to exaggerate the importance of genuine team-bonding activities.  The

Blue Jays, who just missed making October baseball, made a production of giving a glossy jacket with logos of the players' native countries to every home run hitter.  

  

Sometimes hijinks behind the scenes even help losing teams. The Orioles credited backup catcher Austin Wynn's buying of some sage on line for the end of their 19-game losing streak.  With the help of teammate Trey Mancini, the lighting of the incense in the clubhouse helped to lift the pall of defeat. 

 

The Dodgers will have to win four out of five now to return to the Series.  They could do that, but the Braves are pitching better than people expected, especially the bullpen.

 

The Red Sox have the next three games at Fenway so they have an edge on Houston even though the series is just tied at 1-1.  Maybe the off-day will cool off former Dodger Enrique "Kike" Hernandez who has been blasting homers and key hits at a record-breaking pace.

 

Houston must hope for that but the laundry cart rides will be ready for amazing Kike. He is starting to do to the Astros when he did to the eliminated 100-win Tampa Bay Rays. 

 

Whatever else happens in the next two weeks, I sure hope we continue to see stirring baseball. Because never forget - "the only reason to play baseball is to keep winter away."

 

Before I close, here are some sports and other movie tips from TCM for the rest of October, listed chronologically.  

 

Wed Oct 20  5:15A "This Sporting Life" (1963) - searing British drama about lower-class

rugby player with Richard Harris, Rachel Roberts, dir. Lindsay Anderson, writer David Storey

 

Th Oct 21 Rodgers and Hammerstein Day starting with "State Fair" (1945) at 1245a and resuming in prime time from 8p through Friday 1145a. 

 

Fri Oct 22 3p "Two Smart People" (1946) Jules Dassin directs Lucille Ball/Lloyd Nolan/John

Hodiak - "conniving people involved in art forgery," Leonard Maltin has described it. 

He doesn't rate it highly but Dassin was a fine director who left USA during blacklist.

 

Su Oct 24 10a Noir Alley presents North American debut of "The Beast Must Die" (1952)

   South American noir - (also on at 2a for the real night owls)

 

2p "Pat & Mike" (1952) Tracy & Hepburn in ladies golf scene with cameo by

Babe Didrikson and small key role for ex-first baseman future "Rifleman" Chuck Connors

 

345p "Sorry Wrong Number" (1948) really scary and well-done with Stanwyck 

 

530p Hitchcock's "North By Northwest" (1959) with Cary Grant/Eva Marie Saint

 

W Oct 27 930a "The Hard Way" (1942) Ida Lupino tries to protect younger sister Joan Leslie

 

4p "Shine On Harvest Moon" (1944) musical about Nora Bayes and Jack Norworth who wrote words to "Take Me Out To Ballgame".  Ann Sheridan/Dennis Morgan/Jack Carson are a good cast in undoubtedly a frothy film.

 

Th Oct 28 6:15a  "Woman of the Year" 6:15a (1942) the first Tracy-Hepburn collaboration with Tracy as sportswriter and Hepburn as influential world-traveling journalist/activist

 

Fri Oct 29  8a "Easy Living" (1949) Victor Mature (not Tyrone Power) as the football player with heart condition - some LA Rams play themselves incl. Kenny Washington

Dir. Jacques Tourneur - again, though, don't blame me for the ending.

(Audrey Young, wife of Billy Wilder, sings the title song by Leo Robin/Ralph Rainger.) 

 

12M "Invasion of Body Snatchers" (1978) 12M - the remake with Donald Sutherland/Brooke Adams directed by Philip Kaufman a few years before he directed "The Right Stuff"

 

Sat Oct 30 8p "Frankenstein" (1931) the original

930p "Young Frankenstein" (1974) Mel Brooks' take on it

 

Su Oct 31  12M & 10a "Cat People" 1942 - Jacques Tourneur directs Tom Conway (George Sanders' brother) and Simone Simon and Jane Randolph - this week's Noir Alley

 

330p "Pit and Pendulum" 1961 - Roger Corman directs Vincent Price

 

8p "Psycho" (1960) - not one of my favorite Hitchcock's esp. the preachy ending and

Janet Leigh's work was so much more varied than this, but still a classic film.

 

That's all for now - keeping remembering to Stay Positive, Test Negative, and

take it easy but take it! 

 

 

At a tumultuous time in American history, when such phrases as "the rule of law" seem so antiquated to men in power, it is nice to see that every now and then in the world of sports, good things happen to good people.  Dusty Baker's return to the managerial fold as Houston Astros manager and QB Patrick Mahomes's MVP performance in Kansas City's Super Bowl victory qualify for me as unquestionable good news items.

 
It will be most interesting to see how Baker leads the Astros after their off-season of disgrace. Both Houston GM Jeff Luhnow and manager AJ Hinch were suspended by commissioner Rob Manfred for a year for their roles in tolerating the sign-stealing scandal that evidently was concocted by players, led by Carlos Beltran and bench coach Alex Cora (both of whom lost their 2020 managerial jobs - Beltran with Mets, Cora with the Red Sox).

 
Astros owner Jim Crane felt that suspension was not severe enough punishment so he promptly fired both Luhnow and Hinch.  In hiring Baker as Hinch's successor, he has chosen a man who is old school in the best sense. In his 19-year MLB career as a hard-hitting solid left fielder - .278 BA, .432 .SA, 1981 H, 242 HR, 1013 RBI, and for the modern age an impressive BB-K ratio of 762-926 - Baker was never on the disabled list.

 
After establishing himself in 1972 as a four-year regular with the Atlanta Braves, Baker was traded to the Dodgers where he became a key contributor on the Dodgers 1977-78 NL champions and 1981 World Series winners.

 
Dusty has belied the old saw that good-to-great players don't make good managers.  His previous teams - Giants, Cubs, Reds, Nats - all made the playoffs, and he now  gets a chance to earn that elusive first World Series ring.  (His 2002 Giants lost in seven games to the Angels.)

 
At 70, Baker will be the oldest manager in the big leagues, but he certainly is young at heart. Houston's new GM, James Click, was just plucked from the Tampa Bay Rays front office where he had worked not long after his graduation from Yale in 2006.

 
The Click hiring shows that the craze for "analytic" information will not diminish in Houston. Tampa Bay has been in the forefront of the movement to bring so-called "better ball" information into baseball operations. 

 

Except for adding his longtime aide former major league infielder Chris Speier, Dusty will be keeping Hinch's coaching staff including bench coach Joe Espada, who was on Joe Girardi's Yankees staff, and veteran pitching coach Brent Strom who at 71 is a year older than Dusty. 

 
Mets fans may remember that Strom broke in with them in 1972, but he never won a game for them. He was 9-15 for other MLB teams before he started on his long trek to become one of the most respected pitching coaches in the game.  

 
I don't like making predictions, but it says here that Baker will keep the Astros in contention during what should be a spirited AL West race among the refurbished California Angels under Joe Maddon - himself a very lively 66 - and the perennial bridesmaid Oakland Athletics.

 

 

As for Patrick Mahomes leading the Kansas City Chiefs to a stirring come-from-behind Super Bowl victory over the San Francisco Forty-Niners, I was delighted that this son of former major league pitcher Pat Mahomes has reached the pinnacle of the gridiron sport.  

 

Who couldn't smile at the picture of 5-year-old Patrick shagging flies with his father before the Mets' home World Series games in 2000?  Papa Pat was actually ineligible for the Series, but he had been a big part of the 1999 Mets playoff team.

 

So from an early age, young Pat knew what it was like to be around pressure-filled games. He understood early on that "pressure is a privilege" (to quote the title of one of tennis great Billie Jean King's books - BTW, Billie Jean Moffitt King's older brother Randy was a standout relief pitcher primarily for the Giants.) 

 
Throughout his high school years young Mahomes used to call himself "a baseball player playing football."  Things changed when he excelled at Texas Tech and now he is atop the football world.  Here's hoping he has a good chance at repeating in 2021.

 
But N. B. (Note Well)! In this age of free agency and unremitting celebrity, it is harder than ever to repeat as champion.

 
Before I close, I want to salute the memory of the hard-working baseball scout Phil Rizzo, who passed away late last month at the age of 90.  A Korean War veteran, Phil never made the majors as a player, but he devoted himself afterwards to finding talent for many professional teams. 

 
He was working for the Arizona Diamondbacks in 2001 where Mike Rizzo was scouting director when the Dbacks won the World Series over the Yankees. In what I think was as a blessing from the baseball gods, Phil Rizzo lived to see his son Mike Rizzo, GM of the Washington Nationals, win the World Series last October.

 

AND NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT:
The current Metropolitan Opera production of Guiseppe Verdi's "La Traviata" is a memorable experience.  I saw the production, directed by stage veteran Michael Mayer, on Monday night Feb. 3 with an emergency Alfredo sung by Korean tenor Won Whi Choi. 

 
After an understandably tentative first act, he grew into the role in the final two acts. The rest of the cast was superb - soprano Aleksandra Kurzak from Poland and bassist Quinn Kelsey from Hawaii. The Met Orchestra, this night led by Londoner Karel Mark Chichon, and its chorus comprise one of the great ensembles in the world.   

 
I never appreciated until last night's performance the profundity of the gripping second act. The confrontation between Alfredo's father Germont who insists that courtesan Violetta give up Alfredo to save the Germont family name brought me to tears.

 
There are six more chances to see "La Traviata" ("The Fallen Woman"):

Wed Feb 26, Sat Feb 29, Th Mar 5, W Mar 9, F Mar 13, and Th Mar 19, all at 730p except for Sat Feb 29 at 830p.   

 
Rush seats at affordable prices are sometimes available on day of performances.   The casts may change but this is an evening not to be missed. Check out metopera.org

 

That's all for now as pitchers and catchers are poised to report before Valentine's Day.

Always remember:  Take it easy but take it.