Lee Lowenfish

The Kansas City Chiefs' gripping overtime victory over the Buffalo Bills this past Sunday night Jan 23 kept me from getting too involved with TCM's showing of Joseph Mankiewicz's Oscar-winning "A Letter To Three Wives" (1949).  I had seen it before and will see it again.

More on Douglas and TCM upcoming films in a moment.

 

I felt bad for Buffalo and the ardent fans of western New York State.  They were only 13 seconds from hosting an AFC championship game this coming Sunday against the surprising Cincinnati Bengals and their growing-before-our-very-eyes young quarterback Joe Burrow.  

 

Whatta duel Buffalo's young QB Josh Allen engaged in against Kansas City's equally youthful QB Patrick Mahomes. Time to forget about the forty-something QBs Tom Brady and the insufferable anti-vaxxer Aaron Rodgers. Time to give props to these youngsters still in their mid-twenties.  

 

And let's give a shoutout to the good parenting they received. Patrick Mahomes' father, Pat, pitched for the Mets in 1999 and 2000.  Hard not to believe that Patrick's poise and remarkable calm under pressure had its roots when he was only five years old and he shagged fly balls at Shea Stadium before the 2000 Subway World Series.

 

A quick Wikipedia perusal led me to a nice tidbit from Josh Allen's mother.  "You bloom closest to where you plant," she said in explaining why her son never switched high schools in their small home town 40 miles outside Fresno, Calif.  

 

Neither did Josh go to a fancy QB camp. He played all sports in high school that left him further off the radar of the modish top football recruiters.

 

After a year of junior college, only Eastern Michigan and Wyoming were interested in Allen, and he chose the latter.  Interestingly, EMU beat Allen's Wyoming team twice.  

 

In an interesting side note, now that the transfer portal is brimming with activity, EMU has lost its top two QBs and their ace kicker who helped them beat Illinois and Purdue in 2021. It is the Wild West in college recruiting now on so many levels. 

 

As for the big games this Sunday to decide the Super Bowl contestants on Feb 13, it is a rare if not unprecedented rematch with teams who met on the last day of the regular season.  

 

After all his years toiling for the woebegone Detroit Lions, Matthew Stafford might be a sentimental favorite leading the LA Rams.  I would guess that his Texas high school battery mate Clayton Kershaw will be rooting for him.  Love the story that Stafford not only caught Kershaw in baseball but Kershaw centered the ball for his classmate in football.

 

Stafford must cut down the needless turnovers because the San Francisco 49ers will be ready to capitalize.  As the home team the Rams are slight avorites.

 

In the other matchup, I would think the Chiefs and the magical Mahomes should end Cincinnati's surprise run.  But even in close football, youneverknow, youneverknow.  Just hope the refs don't needlessly decide the outcome.

 

Turning to baseball - and I'll believe spring training starts on time on Valentine's Day when

plaayers and owners truly work out their differences  - I thought David Ortiz's election into the Hall of Fame was a foregone conclusion when he became the powerful voice of Boston Proud after the bombing of the Boston Marathon in 2013.  

 

That Ortiz wrapped up the year with a third World Series triumph cemented his enshrinement in the hearts and minds of the 77% of the 400-plus writers who voted him in.

 

That Ortiz's life in the Dominican Republic has not been exemplary was not a concern to the American voters. He was almost shot to death a couple of years ago in some kind of drug dealing incident.  Only the finest medical treatment here in the States saved hs life.

 

I don't share the indignation that some sportswriters are spewing that Roger Clemens and Barry Bonds were not elected after ten years on the ballot.  Now only a veterans committee can elevate them.

 

Turning to the exciting college basketball season and my two favorite teams, Columbia's women's basketball team improved to 5-0 in the Ivy League and 14-3 overall with a stirring come-from-behind win on Jan 26 over a longtime nemesis Penn.  

 

There will be a rematch on the road against Penn on Sat Feb 5 at 6p preceded on Fri Feb 4 at Princeton at 5p against the other undefeated team in the league.  Both games will be on ESPN+ as will the 2p Sat Jan 29 game at Dartmouth.

 

As for the Wisconsin men's basketball Badgers, they lost at home to Michigan State last Friday.  The absence of junior forward Tyler Wahl really hurt, but there are signs that his injured ankle is healing.  

 

There's a big matchup at Illinois, last year's champion, on Tu Feb 2 at 9p EST, TV on the Big  Ten Network. Their star center Kofi Cockburn has been out for a few games but they

are still formidable.  

 

And Badgers can't overlook a game at Nebraska on Jan 27 at 5p. Then come two home battles - first against Minnesota on Su Jan 30 at 1p and another vs. Penn State on 

Sa Feb 5 at 6p.  Then a visit to Michigan State for a rematch on Tu Feb 8 at 7p.

 

No game in the brutally competitive Big Ten is a gimme and the Badgers are not deep. Johnny Davis, the emergent Player of the Year candidate, has to stay healthy himself.

 

FINALLY here are some TCM tips for the end of the month and into February: 

"Letter to Three Wives," noted earlier, was Paul Douglas's first big role. 1949 was a big year for the former radio announcer and baseball broadcaster who had a worthy run in Hollywood until his death by heart attack in September 1959.  

 

On Tu Feb 8 at 1245p, Douglas stars as a grumpy baseball manager in the original "Angels in the Outfield" (1951), much of it filmed at Pittsburgh's Forbes Field. The always-excellent

 

Janet Leigh plays a manners newspaper reporter who tries to smooth his rough edges. 

BTW Douglas was Ray Milland's catcher in Valentine Davies' marvelous baseball fable, "It  Happens Every Spring" (1949).  A year before, Davies created a classic Christmas fantasy, "Miracle on 34th Street," some of which actually was filmed at Macy's. With Edmund Gwenn as Santa Claus, Maureen O'Hara, and young Natalie Wood.

 

Also on Feb 8 at 6p the 1951 "Show Boat" with Ava Gardner/Joe E Brown as Capn Andy

followed by 8p Leon Gast's doc. "When We Were Kings" (1996) about Ali-Foreman fight in Zaire with a lot of great music

 

945p John Huston's "Fat City" with Jeff Bridges as a mediocre fighter and genuine welterweight Curtis Cokes (1972)

 

1130p "Raging Bull" (1980) - Scorsese directs DeNiro as Jake LaMotta - followed by:

 

115A Robert Rossen's grueling "The Set Up" (1949) with the magnificent Robert Ryan

 

F Feb 11 at 1p "Three Little Words" (1950) about the musical comedy team of Harry Ruby (Red Skelton) and Bert Kalmar (Fred Astaire).  Skelton doesn't do justice to Ruby and his genuine love of baseball.

 

But several ballplayers appear including George Metkovich as onetime pitcher-turned-

comic Al Schacht. Ruby himself makes a cameo as a player as do former Yankee Jerry

Priddy and Pacific Coast League legend Frank Kelleher.

 

On the serious film front on TCM, I'm curious to see the original "Dillinger" (1945)

Fri Jan 27  at 1015a - Mozart's birthday no less - with an all-star cast of gangsters including Lawrence Tierney in the title role and such classic gangsters as Eduardo Ciannelli, Elisha Cook Jr., and Marc Lawrence.

 

Sa Jan 29 245p Burt Lancaster, who did all his own stunts, in "Birdman of Alcatraz" (1962)

 

Tu Feb 1 Henry Fonda night including 8p John Ford's "Young Mr. Lincoln" (1939) 

 

10p William Wyler's "Jezebel" (1938) with Bette Davis

 

F Feb 4 at 6a worth at least taping "The Breaking Point" (1950) John Garfield's last Warner Brothers film and produced by his own company. With Phyllis Thaxter as the solid wife, Patricia Neal as the noirest of women, and the unjustly forgotten Juano Hernandez as Garfield's boat assistant.

 

Sa Feb 5 2p Fritz Lang's "Rancho Notorious" (1952) with Marlene Dietrich, Arthur Kennedy, and Mel Ferrer

 

 

Su Feb 6 12M, 10A "The Turning Point" (1952) - Noir Alley presents William Holden fighting

corruption with or without the help of Edmond O'Brien and Alexis Smith.  Don't get confused. This is the "Turning Point" not the "Breaking Point".

 

12N "Rhapsody" (1954) Elizabeth Taylor must choose between a violinist or a pianist.

Another one of TCM's odd juxtapositions but the classical music is very good in this film.

 

That's all for now.  Always remember:  Take it easy but take it, and stay positive test negative.

 

 

 

  

 

 

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.