Santo Revisited, Revisited

Nice going guys! I guess you 25 who didn't vote for Ron Santo feel much better about yourselves now. You must be much prouder of your Hall membership for keeping Santo waiting. Shame on each of you!

Vote Santo into the Hall...NOW!

Tomorrow the ballot of the Veterans' Committee of the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum will be announced. The odds are overwhelming that if anyone is elected it will be Ron Santo and/or Gil Hodges. I'm not a Dodger guy, but honesty compels me to say that Hodges doesn't cut it among first basemen in the Hall. There are 18 players identified as first basemen in the Hall's accounting-leaving out those such as Aaron, Banks and Musial who spent time there, but are pricipally identified with other positions. There are three others who played in the Negro Leagues, which, tragically, means that their statistical records are incomplete, and therefore cannot be used in a comparison like this. Hodges doesn't stack up. Sorry. Good man, great leader, pretty good manager. Not a Hall of Famer.
But then there is Ron Santo.
Santo is said to fail the Hall test due to his .277 lifetime batting average. Let's take a look at the numbers. There are 10 players in the Hall identified as Major League third basemen. It's a pretty darned impressive group: (in no particular order) Brooks Robinson, George Brett, Wade Boggs, Mike Schmidt, Eddie Mathews, Pie Traynor, George Kell, Jimmy Collins, Frank "Home Run" Baker, and Freddie Lindstrom. (For the sake of brevity, I will speak as though Ron is in.)
Games Played: Ron comes in sixth of the eleven;
At Bats: again, sixth of eleven;
Runs Scored: Ron lands seventh;
Hits: sixth;
Doubles: seventh;
Triples: eighth;
Home Runs: Ron is third-and most of his hit during the best pitching years of the modern era;
RBI: fifth-see the previous comment about the 1960's;
Batting Average: eighth;
Slugging Percentage: fourth;
OPS: fifth;
Ron, not surprisingly, trails Mike Schmidt, Eddie Mathews, George Brett and Wade Boggs in most offensive categories, although Ron leaves Boggs in the dust in the power categories. Santo is comparable, offensively, to Brooks Robinson, and bests Robinson by ten batting average points. In fact, Ron's BA is better than Brooks', Schmidt's and Mathews'. And, again, batting average is the primary issue cited against voting him in. Once more, Santo was batting against Bob Gibson's 1.12 ERA, Sandy Koufax' no-hitters, Don Drysdale's brushbacks, Juan Marichal's kick and toughness, and all of them and more throwing from the higher mound. None of the third basemen in the Hall had to take most of their career ABs between 1960 and 1968, and Santo STILL put up those numbers! Remember, Yaz won the AL batting title in 1968 with a .301 average.
Santo beats Kell, Traynor, Collins, Baker and Lindstrom in most all of the categories.
Oh yeah, there's one more measure: defense.
The Gold Glove award isn't perfect, but it certainly is one standard. Only four of these eleven men won multiple Gold Gloves. Brooks Robinson, of course, is the gold standard with 16. Michael Jack Schmidt claimed 10. But then it's Ron Santo next, with 5. (Wade Boggs won 2).
Ron says that he doesn't want to be elected to the Hall of Fame because he's a great guy and a legitimate inspiration, having played his entire career as an insulin dependent diabetic, who has now lost the lower portions of both legs to this vicious disease. My wife has been an insulin dependent diabetic from about the same age as Ron. It is a challenge for diabetics to make it through each day with the balancing of food, exercise and insulin, much less perform as a top-flight professional athlete while doing all of that. And this isn't even to mention that Santo is one of the genuinely tremendous human beings on the planet. He routinely, without cameras and microphones, make calls and visits to children who are newly diagnosed with diabetes, and hosts them and their families in the WGN radio booth at Wrigley. Because he wants those strangers to know they are not alone in their fight, and that they can persevere and realize their dreams, because he did.
Ron Santo doesn't need a sympathy vote to get into the Hall. He doesn't need a hero's respect to get in. Ron DESERVES, on the merits of his career, to be voted into the Hall of Fame. The problem with the new Veterans' Committee procedure is that giving the vote to the living HOFers encourages them to see themselves above anyone not elected by the BBWAA. They want Cooperstown to be exclusive, because the more exclusive the club is, the better they must have been to have gotten in. To quote the legendary Col. Sherman Potter, "Horse Hockey!" It doesn't demean George Kell or Frank Baker or even Mike Schmidt to give Ron Santo what he earned on the field.
And I have no doubt that Ron Santo will one day be elected. If his disease and personality play any role in this consideration, it is that it would be a crime to wait until Ron has passed from the scene to induct him. The Hall of Fame is poorer for Ron's absence. And that should be corrected when the vote is announced on Tuesday. Don't take the chance of leaving it to the next Veterans' ballot in 2009. Take care of this injustice now!

For the Musically Uneducated: Essential Information

If you live in/near Memphis, TN, and don't care about music, I have just one question: Why?
Why are you here? Why are you wasting your life? Why don't you know what matters? Why don't you know you are living in the best place on earth? Why? Okay, that's six questions.
Mini-rant completed, here's a little hope/help for you.
Two words: DiAnne Price. That's all you need to know. She's all you need to hear to change your bereft existence and your apparently meaningless meandering through your alleged life. DiAnne plays at the downtown Huey's periodically on Sunday nights, she plays at the Vault on the Highland Strip on Wednesdays, and a Crosstown club called Sessions on Thursdays. More often than not, she is accompanied by some combination of Tim Goodwin on bass, Tom Lonardo on drums and Jim Spake on saxes. DiAnne's forte is barrelhouse blues piano with the appropriately smoky, incredible voice that goes with it. She knows every song every written, and no two shows are alike. DiAnne won the Memphis Magazine poll for Best Female Vocalist so many times in a row in the late 80's and 90's that they retired the category. Understand?
Her Boyfriends, as the gentlemen are known, are (not even arguably, really) the finest players on their instruments in this music rich city. Spake's discography is only surpassed by Jim Dickinson's (genuflection accomplished). Goodwin and Lonardo are everywhere with everyone of note, pun intended.
Full Disclosure: DiAnne has been my friend for 16 years, but don't assume any bias here. She is the best, she loves her audience, and by the end of an evening's performance, you will feel that you've known her forever, too.
Mack Orr is another treasure. The stage name is Daddy Mack. By day, hard-working mechanic. By night, a powerful singer and guitar player who decided as a middle-aged man that he needed to let the music out of his soul, and so began to study the guitar. The result is delightful. Mack fronts a band that includes local legends William Faulkner on drums and the brothers James (bass) and Harold Bonner (guitar). These guys have been participants in the fluid world of The Fieldstones over the years, and comprise the house band, as the Universal Blues Players, at the Blue Worm on Lamar on Friday and Saturday late nights. Mack plays all over, and is a warm, gracious man who puts on a great show. Look for him!
Venue: The Center for Southern Folklore, far and away. Judy Peyser maintains a little oasis a couple of blocks off of Beale that is much more authentic Memphis than just about anything you can find today on Beale. A daquiri bar, for crying out loud? Skip it. Go to the Center. No smoking in there, a great bowl of chili and hotwater cornbread, cold beer and real music. Daddy Mack plays there many Fridays. Judy puts on the best music festival in the city every Labor Day weekend (please-go back to including Mondays!). Everybody who's good performs, in every tradition, from the fun old pop of Smoochy and Hooch to the powerful harp of Big George Brock, from the inimitable Billy Gibson and David Bowen to the cool jazz of Renardo Ward's band The Promise, from the gospel of the Orange Mound Messengers to the country train songs of Roy Harper, to my pal DiAnne Price, there is absolutely something for everyone. The Beale Street Music Festival has the name; the Memphis Music and Heritage Festival has the musicians!
For radio, no question, it's WEVL, FM 89.9. My favorite is Cap'n Pete's Blues Cruise, 9 to midnite on Fridays. Delta to Chicago, oldest to newest, with just the right host. This is an education and joy every single week.
I still am waiting for Tater Red to get back on the radio. For years, the Beale Street Blues Show on Rock 103 was my Sunday night wind-down. But then Satanic media destroyers Clear Channel bought the station and wrecked everything good about it, Tater first. He moved over to 107.5, the Pig, an eclectic format, doomed for failure. We Memphians, as a group, don't like our own music. I can only surmise that we're too dumb to see (hear) what we consider a birthright. The Pig put Tater on mornings. Tater isn't a morning, sunshine, stupid cute banter guy. He's a late night, real blues, smokey room kind of guy. No body better at that. Come back, Leo! We need you!
Now, a bit of a left turn: on the internet, check out KALW out of San Francisco late on Monday nights. At 11 pm our time, they play Beale Street Caravan. They follow the Caravan with Mark Naftalin's Blues Power Hour. Then comes Fog City Blues, a really good show hosted by the improbably named Devon Strolovich. Go on Ebay, buy a pMarq stream recorder, set it for 180 minutes at 11 pm at cd quality. Thank me later! (any good audio converter will let you make the .wav file into an mp3, ready to be carried on your personal choice in players--just don't get anything in the abominable ipod line! Creative Vision:M, Creative Zen Micro or Zen MicroPhoto are all excellent, as are the iRiver iFP 799 or 899-I have them all, and recommend them all unreservedly-just stay away from the spawn of Satan ipod! Much like Andre Agassi, all style and marketing, no substance whatsoever!)
Now, take this information to heart, and go grow a soul!

Evangelism

We had a district preacher's meeting today. One of the issues on the agenda was evangelism. More specifically, the issue is the loss of membership in our district. The bulk of our district is the northern half of Memphis and Shelby County. We are a white, middle-class church. Memphis is an increasingly black, poor city. Our church has black congregations. For the most part, at least in our city, those congregations are very small. With the exception of a couple, their pastor's salaries have to be subsidized by the conference to provide something resembling a living wage. The couple that are larger and self-sufficient worship much more in the style of the white churches than the COGIC churches that dominate Memphis' black community.
With the exception of our one megachurch, our congregations in the city limits are old and shrinking. Most of our pastors, and I was one of them at two different churches, spend the majority of their time visiting hospitals and nursing homes, and holding funerals. Our people are good people. They have tried to live good lives. But the vast majority of them have turned the corner of life. I believe that our lives are shaped like diamonds. We spend a long period from the start with our world getting bigger and bigger. But at some point, we turn the corner, and our world starts to draw down again. As we age, deal with infirmity, and move toward the end, the world gets smaller and smaller. It is just not realistic to expect those whose world has become very small to find a way to change worship styles, change the identity of their church, and lay aside whatever biases have burdened their existence for 70, 80 or 90 years.
We predominantly white United Methodists don't relate well to African-Americans in worship. We don't relate well to hispanics in worship. Hell, we don't even speak their language. And the white people in the city of Memphis are moving out, if they are concerned about the school system or personal safety, or dying out if they feel that they are too old to move and start over. And our churches will continue to decline until all of them except for three or four wind up closed. And it has nothing to do with anyone's desire to do evangelism. It has everything to do with the cultural expressions of worship.
All this is frustrating.
What infuriates me is that I have been the same guy for the last 8 years. For the first six of those I was seen as a failure because my churches shrank and we did not pay our conference and general church apportionments. For the last two years I have been seen as stunningly effective and successful! My church is growing by leaps and bounds, and the finances are growing accordingly. We pay everything, and even turned a profit of $11,000 last year. I'm the same guy. I didn't have any sudden epiphanies that turned my performance around. I was just moved from a city neighborhood where there are very few options for the white church, to a bedroom community outside Shelby County where people-most all of them families with children-are flooding in to avoid putting their kids in the Memphis City Schools. Now I'm an evangelism expert!
One promise: I will never, ever, forget that so much of this is contextual. I have sat in workshops and presentations by colleagues who never did anything but get appointed to the communities that the white folks were running away to. They get so impressed with themselves for all their accomplishments. I was as good in 1999 as I am in 2007. No matter what the numbers said.
And shuffling the white folks from city to county and county to outlying area isn't evangelism.

Leave The Hammer Out Of It!

Henry Louis Aaron turned 73 a week ago. There is nothing that I can add to the reporting that has been done so ably on everything that Hank had to deal with in the run-up to April 8, 1974. That was the night that Al Downing grooved one, and the aging but still effective master pulled it over the left field fence in Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium. It was the 715th time The Hammer had parked one in the seats, and with it, the man from Mobile surpassed the greatest name in the history of American sport, seizing the most renowned record of all those held by athletes.
An awful lot of awful people did not want Hank to reach Babe Ruth's record, much less pass it. They were loud, profane and threatening in making their point. And in the face of all of it, Hank persevered.
Mr. Aaron has been a man of great dignity, grace and honesty for all of the years that his name has been known to the public. He has spoken truth to power on the opportunities for African-Americans in baseball, beyond the players' roster. He speaks with great credibility because Hank Aaron is not today, and never was, exaggerated. Hank didn't wear caps that were too small, so they would fly off in pursuit of fly balls. He is so smart that he positioned himself on defense so that he didn't need to dive for balls that were easily within his reach. He didn't swing so violently that he corkscrewed himself into the ground to ensure that everyone in the park would know how hard he was swinging. He knew that he could trust his magnificent wrists, and that maintaining control of the bat allowed him the best chance to hit the ball. Hank never struck out 100 times in a season. Reggie Jackson never had a season of 340 at bats without striking out more than 100 times. Hank never got the press that Willie Mays did; he just outplayed him in every facet of the game: 95 more home runs, almost 500 more hits, 101 more doubles, almost 400 more RBI, 112 more runs scored, 3 points higher in lifetime batting average, and 143 fewer strikeouts. Mays holds more Gold Gloves (12-3), but Hank played the bulk of his career up against the hot dog Mays, the manic Clemente and the elegant Curt Flood. Remarkable that the Home Run King won 3.
All of this matters because Hank Aaron is news again. If two creaky knees hold up, and the US Attorney's office holds off, Barry Bonds will break Hank's total of 755 homers this season. Bud Selig made news a few days ago when he let slip that he may not attend the games when Barry gets within a couple. I don't like Bud Selig, but Bud is a close and loyal friend to Hank Aaron, and has been since he brought Hank home to Milwaukee to end his brilliant career where it began in 1954. I appreciate Bud's feelings on the matter. I actually appreciate and respect his feelings on this matter. But I hope he goes. Otherwise, it will recall those days in 1973-1974 when former commissioner Bowie Kuhn had better things to do than respect Hank Aaron's accomplishment with his presence. Barry doesn't deserve to be cast in the role of victim.
Hank's presence, however, is a different story.
Ruth was long-since dead in 1974. There is no precedent in place, and that matters in baseball.
Charlie Steiner told on his marvelous XM Radio program, The Baseball Beat (channel 175, noon-2 cdt weekdays--plenty of reason enough to subscribe right there), of recently attending a dinner with Mr. Aaron. He posed the question, "Will you go?" Steiner reported that Hank sat quiet for a few moments, then responded that he expected he would be hounded with questions about whether or not Barry deserved the record, and that those questions would come whether he was in a succession of ballparks or at home. "I think I'll be more comfortable answering the questions at home," was the Hammer's final word.
And for all of us who wonder about Barry Bonds' place in the history of the game, Henry Louis Aaron's word is good enough for me. He earned the right to decide a long time ago.

Letterman and Me: 25 Years Together

I was 21 years old and almost exactly half of the way through college (yes, that's the 5 year plan) when one night Johnny Carson's genius was revealed to a new generation. I, well ok, all of us, met Dave and Paul. Actually we had some awareness of Paul. He had been on Saturday Night Live. The good version. But Dave was news. He spoke our language. He had our sense of humor.
Dave's favorite guest was Andy Kaufman. Andy may have been the strangest man who ever lived. And the funniest. Andy, like Dave, knew the world is full of crap, and deserves to be laughed at. It's the only way to get through without crying constantly.
Dave hired the ubiquitous Bill Wendell as his announcer. Wendell was old school TV. His voice, along with Don Pardo's (employed by Saturday Night Live) had introduced many, many shows for decades. He was reliable and predictable. He was a smokescreen for the mayhem to follow.
Pee Wee Herman, Harvey Pekar, Kaufman, Sandra Bernhart, Howard Stern-they were Dave's version of Carson's Benny, Hope and Groucho. Respect for traditions? I give you Larry "Bud" Melman!
One of my high moments was the night that the Andy Kaufman-Jerry Lawler feud found its way onto network television, with Jerry slapping the taste out of Andy's mouth after a run of classic wrestling promo insults. Andy responded with a totally bleeped diatribe, from behind Dave, where, theoretically, Lawler couldn't get at him. The classic Dave response followed Andy's rant: "I think you can say some of those words on tv."
Carson was rightly eulogized as the patron saint of three generations of comedians. Pryor, Carlin, Williams, Martin, and Letterman were all among those whose best early exposure was with Johnny. Now Dave has equalled if not exceeded Johnny's generosity. Dave still has Tom Dreesen on regularly. When did you last see Dreeson on any other show? Dave boosted Paula Poundstone, Jeff Altman, George Wallace, George Miller, Larry Miller, Steven Wright, Jake Johanson, Ray Romano, and a rat named Jay Leno.
When NBC betrayed Johnny Carson and David Letterman and promised the Tonight Show to the now spectacularly bland and unfunny Leno, Dave went to CBS and never missed a beat. He populated our world with Sirajul and Mujiber, Rupert Gee, Joe G from the pizza place and Grinder Girl and Hula Hoop Girl. He kept the brilliantly creepy Chris Elliot. Jay Thomas and Darlene Love make Christmas for me every year, with the quarterback challenge and "Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)" respectively. Who else could decorate a Christmas tree with a pizza, meatball, and miniature Empire State Building without drawing protests from the Ridiculous Right? And then knock the meatball off with a football the last show before Christmas?
We all hit middle age right behind Dave. His bypass surgery shook us all up. His hair changed color, and a lot of it departed, and we're all right there with him. He talks sometimes about the bad behavior of younger years, and we remember our own, thankful we survived it all. But still, he's funny.
Tonight, his 25th anniversary in late night tv, he again welcomed Bill Murray as his guest. Bill was the first guest on Late Night with David Letterman in 1982, the first guest on the Late Show with David Letterman in 1993, and many times in between. Bill's the perfect partner for Dave--same generation, same comic sensibilities, same staying power. Tonight they did a bit with CBS stuffed shirt Leslie Moonves. The masters even made that load funny.
Dave just re-upped through 2010. Interesting that NBC announced last year that Conan O'Brian will take over Tonight in 2009. Dave will continue beyond the man who owes his entire career to the best friend he stabbed in the back in 1992. Yes, Leno's ratings are higher than Dave's. But this is in the same country where Richard Nixon got more votes than Hubert Humphrey, Ronald Reagan beat Jimmy Carter, and George II was allowed to steal two elections from obviously superior men. Those voted Most Popular in High School often have difficult lives. Popularity means nothing in this country. Paris Hilton and Kevin Federline are, apparently, popular.
David Letterman is funny. My kind of funny. Has been for 25 years on late night tv. And my life has been better for his work. Through a divorce, work ups and downs, issues with teenagers, deaths of dear ones and all the other stuff that makes up the journey, I've been able to have a laugh before going to sleep. Thanks, Dave! Can I have another 25?

Sammy's Back!

Not very exciting, huh?
Can you believe that Sammy Sosa signing a new contract isn't exciting? Hard for me to imagine. If you've been under the sea for the last ten years, Sammy is the former Cubs' right fielder who has exceeded 60 home runs more than any other player in MLB history. He was the fan favorite who ran hard to rightfield every day. The guy who carried an American flag with him after 9-11. Who helped Mark McGwire through his grumpy days in 1998, and carried him to the most fun and most dramatic baseball duel in my lifetime.
But he's also the guy who used a corked bat. And is roundly suspected, if not presumed, to have used steroids to get to those heights. And, like McGwire, he wasn't helped by that day on Capitol Hill when Sammy forgot how to speak English. And that happened after he fell out with the Cubs and left the last game of 2004 while the game was just starting. Then there was the pitiful 2005 season in Baltimore.
Sammy is 38 now. He disappeared for a year. He has just signed a minor league deal with the Rangers. He's going home. The Rangers were his original organization. You may recall that a bone-headed owner in Texas once traded Sammy to the White Sox for a worn out, over the hill Harold Baines. That guy moved on to make bad decisions for the whole state of Texas, and is now responsible for the needless deaths of over 3,000 American men and women in a totally unjustifiable war in Iraq. It's a real, genuine shame that the people of our nation couldn't recognize that that buffoon couldn't run a baseball team, or any of several oil companies that he rode into the ground; why did anyone ever think this idiot could run a country? But I digress.
Sammy's gone home.
I hope he makes it.
I sat in the stands in Wrigley and watched Sammy charge out to right field. You can't fake that kind of hustle. I watched his reaction from the stands in Busch when Big Mac tied Maris, and then had the TV on the next night when Mac hit #62. You can't fake that kind of decency. I treasure that smile, bright enough to light a small city. You can't fake that kind of enthusiasm. Sammy was everything that's good about baseball.
I hope he can be again.
We Americans like to build people up. And then tear them down. But, perhaps most of all, we like to see them rise again. If people like Paris Hilton, who have never done anything but take up space in this world, can be forgiven to rise to great heights (she still ain't done nothing worth the air she uses up), then surely we can root for Sammy Sosa, the shoe polishing kid from the streets of the Dominican, who brought so much joy to so many people during his brilliant run with the Cubs. After all, Harry Caray defended Sammy relentlessly. And Harry's word was always good enough for me.
Good luck, Sammy. Here's one fan who's rooting for you, big time!

What Makes a Hall of Famer?

Apart from the time qualification-five years retired, no more than 15 years on the Baseball Writers' ballot-there is only one line in the Hall of Fame's guidelines on how to judge candidates who are not on Baseball's ineligible list:
"Voting shall be based upon the player's record, playing ability, integrity, sportsmanship, character, and contributions to the team(s) on which the player played."
That's it. No more, no less.
Pete Rose is on the ineligible list. He won't be part of this discussion.
Mark McGwire is not on the ineligible list. He is the point of this discussion.
Big Mac used Andro. Everybody knows it. It was found in his locker during the Summer of 1998. He answered questions about it. It wasn't against Baseball's rules. Mac is suspected of using other substances. He has been accused by Jose Canseco of using anabolic steroids. His physical appearance changed significantly from his days as a skinny pitcher at USC to the years of The Great Home Run Chase. My appearance has changed significantly since college days, too, although not as impressively as McGwire's.
Mark McGwire never failed a drug test. He wasn't given one. Because whatever he and Sammy Sosa were doing in 1998, Baseball loved it. Cal Ripken had done a remarkable job rescuing Baseball after the 1994 debacle. Big Mac and Sammy took it to new heights in 1998. Attendance soared, merchandise sales went berserk, tickets just disappeared wherever the two sluggers showed up. And we showed up early. 15,000, 20,000, 25,000 were going to the parks for batting practice every day that the Cardinals were playing. Do the math: when crowds show up in those numbers at 5 pm, you've got them for the night. Concessions, souvenirs, t shirts, jerseys, bats, games for the kids, everything for sale at the ball park did land-office business.
Nobody wanted to ask any questions.
It was too much fun, so we fans didn't want to know.
It was too good for business, so management didn't want to know.
It was making all of his bone-headed decisions recede in everyone's memory, so Bud Selig sure didn't want to know.
And the Baseball Writers had the best story of their generation, so they didn't report on the whispers, the accusations, what they all claim to have known in retrospect.
Mac retired after the 2001 season because he could no longer play every day, rather than collect what I believe was another $30 Million in guaranteed money that would have been paid to him if he had been an everyday player, an infrequent pinch-hitter, or a name on the Disabled List. That's what I call integrity.
Mark and Sammy exulted in sharing the stage in 1998. The reactions of one to the other's exploits were amazing. The Cubs', The Cubs', reaction to Mark's 62nd, and his sharing it with Roger Maris' family were moments indelibly imprinted in my mind. That's what I call sportsmanship.
Mark gave and gives his money and his time on behalf of abused children. That's what I call character.
He single-handedly kept the Cardinals' attendance at World Series year levels when they were a very average team. And while a very private man, he endured the endless media demands at every stop. That's what I call contributing to your team.
His 586 Home Runs rank 7th all-time. His .982 OPS ranks 11th all-time. That's performance, by any standard.
Does the question of steroid use so influence the character issue so as to keep McGwire out of the Hall of Fame? That's the only question. That's the only argument. And don't give me his lifetime batting average. When Mac retired in 2001, everybody-that's EVERYBODY-assumed that three first ballot inductees would be announced this January. Is the character of a man who was never tested for steroids so sullied by an albeit poor performance before a congressional committee that he can't be included with those already in the Hall of Fame?
Assume Mac used steroids. Does that make him worse than Cap Anson, the man universally credited/blamed with instituting Baseball's color line that would stand from the 1800's until Jackie Robinson and Branch Rickey started the process of erasing it in 1947?
Assume Mac used steroids. Does that make him worse than Ty Cobb? Cobb went into the stands and beat a heckler who had been born without arms. Cobb slapped a black elevator operator, and when the hotel's black nightwatchman tried to intervene, Cobb stabbed him for his efforts.
Assume Mac used steroids. Does that make him worse than committed alcoholics Jimmie Foxx, Hack Wilson and Grover Cleveland Alexander? Worse than suspended gambler Leo Durocher? Worse than the skirt-chasing, beer-swilling, gorging to the point of being unable to play Babe Ruth? Worse than any number of amphetamine-popping players from the 60's and 70's who also never tested positive because they weren't tested either?
Rafael Palmeiro changed the terms of his debate when he tested positive. If Bonds tested positive for amphetamines, that changes his position. But Mark McGwire retired before testing came in. And one of our leading principles as Americans has always been that a person cannot be prosecuted with laws that were enacted after the fact.
Mark McGwire may well have used steroids. In fact, he probably did. But even if he did, there are far, far worse characters already enshrined in Cooperstown, and I haven't heard the Defenders of Purity in the Baseball Writers' Association of America calling for a purge of all the bad actors in Baseball's history.
Big Mac belongs in Cooperstown. And all the writers, executives and fans who now say otherwise are nothing but hypocrites.

Cal and Tony: All That's Good About Baseball

Cal Ripken, Jr. and Tony Gwynn were elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame on Tuesday. Their vote percentages were among the highest ever, Cal's 98.53% coming in 3rd behind Tom Seaver and the absurd vote for the fair-to-middling Nolan Ryan, while Tony placed 7th with 97.6%, following the above and Ty Cobb, George Brett and Hank Aaron. Nice company to be in.
Both players gave their entire careers to a single team. Cal was a product of The Oriole Way in the days when that meant something great. His dad was, of course, a baseball and Oriole lifer, and Cal followed closely in his footsteps. He changed the conception of shortstops. In the early days of my fandom, Ed Brinkman, Mark Belanger and Bud Harrelson were the exemplars. Great gloves all, they couldn't hit a lick. Cal changed that. He made shortstop an offensive position, too. But he never forgot his glove, either. The Streak is all the more remarkable because it was achieved by such a big shortstop. Cal saved the game. When owners and players and Idiot for Life Selig had done all they could to kill the game in 1994, Cal brought it back. On the night he broke Lou Gehrig's record, Cal's lap around Camden Yards might as well have been a lap around America, as he reminded the whole country what was good and right about baseball.
Tony Gwynn is the Ernie Banks of the San Diego Padres. Best player ever, best person ever, best face of a franchise ever. My personal experience of Tony Gwynn was at AutoZone Park (as I recall it, the first game ever played there, an exhibition between the Cardinals and the Padres). While the evil, arrogant, pathetic Rickey Henderson stood maybe two feet from the retaining wall separating the fans from the field and the players, ignoring every plea from every kid that dreamed of being the next stolen base king, a genuine baseball god, Tony Gwynn, stood at that wall, smiling, speaking and signing autographs for everyone even into the player introductions. When they called his name and he had to go line up, he apologized for having to go. That's Tony Gwynn.
These guys did it right. When Ryne Sandberg gave his powerful induction speech at Cooperstown, he talked about the value of honoring the game and doing things the right way. Ryno, and baseball fans everywhere, were proud on Tuesday when two good men, two great baseball players, two guys who always did it right, were elected for induction. It will be a great day in July when Cal and Tony join their fellow immortals in the only Hall of Fame that matters.

He Gets It! He Doesn't Get It!

To conclude the previous post...Sunday's cantata went very well. The choir provided an exceptional worship experience for our largest attendance since Easter. Well done, good and faithful servants!
The President of the United States made a ground-breaking revelation today: the US is not winning in Iraq! In other scoops provided by George II, the sun will rise in the east tomorrow, Santa visits on Christmas Eve and athletes often behave badly. He then moved on to reassure us that his tangential connection to reality isn't completely repaired. He claimed we're not losing. I've never seen anyone toss a coin and have it land on edge; apparently Dubya has.
He wants to fix the problem by dramatically increasing the size of Army and Marine Corps troop levels in Iraq.
HEY GENIUS, it's a bad war, we should never have been there in the first place, and there is no reason to kill and maim more of ours and theirs trying to save face at this late date.
This will be the first test of the newly-elected Democratic majorities in the House and Senate. Will we continue to see a lapdog Congress that cowers before the Fool down from the Hill, or will we see some intelligent, reasonable governance for the first time since January 21, 2001?
Note to Reid and Pelosi: Iraq wasn't behind 9-11. They didn't have weapons of mass destruction. They hadn't bought yellow cake uranium from Nigerians or anybody else. Stop Bush's War, and stop it now! Hitler didn't win his war of aggression, Tojo didn't win his, Mussolini didn't win his, neither we nor the French won in Viet Nam, Saddam didn't win in 1991, and we won't win this war of aggression, either.
It's almost enough to make one believe in divine intervention and justice.

7 Hours, 50 minutes and Counting

It's cantata day. I dread cantata day. Maybe that's why I'm still awake at 12:41 am in middle America. I just don't want to mess the thing up. The rest of the choir has worked too hard for me to goof this deal up. I'm a preacher. Darned good one, too, if I do run the risk of boasting. (I do relish the gift; I grew up listening to the best, and God has graciously/maliciously filled in the rest-me up in front of people on a daily basis is still hysterical, 22 years in) I'm a tolerable supporting bass. The only problem is that in our operation I'm the only bass.
Or maybe it's bigger.
Maybe I'm playing insomniac theater due to what we're doing to the world, still. Sure, Rummy's gone, and that's not a bad step. But the longer I think about it, Gates had a hard time in a previous confirmation due to his part in Iran-Contra. So this guy is going to stand up to this president? Not holding the breath on that one. Just in the last few minutes, we have, in all likelihood guaranteed that some child in Iraq will always hold us responsible for the death of Mom/Dad/Grandparent in the latest car bombing or kidnapping/murder or whatever. And some American child may have just lost a Dad or Mom to a mortar round or IED, but at least they won't have to know it until tomorrow. They can have this last good night's sleep.
Just like George. George tells People magazine (he has time to give interviews to People magazine?) that he sleeps very well.
I'm divorced enough from reality that I can laugh weeknights when Letterman shows "Great Moments in Presidential Speeches," leading off with the eloquence of FDR and JFK, then following with the latest malapropism, Porky Pig sign-off or completely incoherent rambling of the dear leader. But this newest item just isn't funny.
How does he ever sleep? We're closing in on 3,000 of ours dead, and, according to the Johns-Hopkins study, three quarters of a million of theirs dead. That doesn't count the wounded, who have been very carefully and skillfully hidden by the administration. Out of sight, out of mind, don't you know? A crowd greater than the population of Memphis wiped out in this stupid, unjust, badly fought, lie driven war and the subsequent peace that has been anything but. And they're all God's!
I wish that I could talk to him. I wish that I could haunt his dreams with the faces of all the dead, all the wounded, all the orphaned. I wish that I could tell this jackass that nobody cares how he looks compared to his dad. And we didn't think that much of his dad, anyway. I wish that someone, anyone, could get it through his head that lying to the nation is bad, lying to the world is worse, and lying to yourself may be worst of all, and that he should stop all of it. I wish that he could have some of the sleepless nights of the parents who have children over there. Or those of the woman whose husband is at Gitmo, or somewhere, even thought he may have never done anything wrong to anyone. Or those of the little boys and girls who are on the street because one of those damned bombs wasn't as smart as it was cracked up to be, and it killed mom and dad-liberated them right out of their lives.
He sleeps very well? I have thought that those on my side who want to impeach him should just calm down, because they'd only be accused of trying to get even for Clinton. (Then again, as the lapel pin says, "No one died when Clinton lied") They should impeach this horrible, horrible man just for saying that he sleeps well while he's responsible, everyday, for the pointless and needless deaths of Americans and Iraqis in a war that should never have been fought in the first place.
I once had a lesson from Andre Braugher's magnificent Frank Pembleton on Homicide: Life on the Streets. Once, when they observed a suspect who'd been left in the interrogation room (The Box, for fans of the show) snoring like a chainsaw, Frank told Kyle Secor's Tim Bayliss, "The guilty ones go right to sleep. It's the innocent who stay awake all night." Amen, Frank. Amen.
Shame on you, sir! Shame on you! And God help us all.
7 hours, 18 minutes and counting. Pray for this non-singer!

Heroic Republicans

I will pause momentarily to allow my family and friends to wake up following their fainting from the title above..........Now then. The Iraq study group has released its report. Its conclusions were a foregone conclusion, if they were going to be honest. And with Lee Hamilton, a bulwark of integrity for 35 years in the House of Representatives, as the Democrats' co-chair, I believed they would be honest. The presence on the panel of Vernon Jordan, Leon Panetta, Chuck Robb and William Perry further raised my hopes. The Democrats performed as I expected.
This space is for an appreciation of the Republicans involved. Former Secretary James Baker has been a Bush family retainer for about 50 years. Whenever Bushes have found themselves in trouble, Baker has been there to quiet the waters. Not this time. Lawrence Eagleberger has been a member of several Republican administrations. He's as inside as inside gets. But this time he stepped out. Justice O'Connor was an honorable member of the United States Supreme Court throughout her tenure, and the nation is poorer, much much poorer, for her retirement. That leaves the final two members: former Senator Alan Simpson and former Attorney General Edwin Meese. I have had no respect for this pair whatsoever. Simpson is caustic and vicious. He has been one of the leading attack dogs for the transition of the Republican party from the honorable institution of Everett Dirkson, Dwight Eisenhower and Nelson Rockefeller to the despicable snake pit of Newt Gingrich, Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson. Ed Meese was an unmitigated disaster as Ronald Reagan's chief law enforcement officer. In days gone by, it was a close contest to count whether Meese had enforced more laws or broken more. But even Alan Simpson and Ed Meese put their country ahead of politics and power this time.
These Republicans have participated in this study, and agreed to the committee's report, in spite of the fact that the report is bluntly critical of a Republican president's performance. They have told the truth that staying this course in Iraq can only result in disaster, if we're not already there. They have called for change now, and withrawal within 15 months. They have made these calls in spite of the fact that this particular Republican president is openly vengeful. He punishes anyone and everyone who challenges him, who criticizes him, who points out his mistakes. In short, this group of Republicans have risked their reputations and legacies within their party to serve their country.
We should all be grateful to the whole membership of the Iraq study group. But we are all particularly indebted to the Republican members for their courage and honesty. Viewing their performance, and having listened to newly confirmed Secretary of Defense Robert Gates as he told the truth in his Senate hearing yesterday, perhaps there is some opportunity left for the Republican party to reclaim its honorable heritage. We would be a better nation if they did.

Our Own Opinions, Not Our Own Facts

I believe that I heard it said on Countdown by Keith Olbermann, so I'll go with that credit. If I'm mistaken, I apologize to the wonderful person who did say it. It was, plain and simple, a response to one of those mindless statements that we live in America and everyone is entitled to their opinion. That is certainly true. But the brilliance was thus: everyone may be entitled to their own opinion, but no one is entitled to their own facts. Or words very close to that. It's a great statement. It acknowledges that every American is guaranteed the right to be as stupid as we want to be. But it also points out that if we choose to live in an alternate reality, we just aren't free to reinvent the facts any way that we want them to be. Sort of like the day that Frazier asked Cliff, "What color is the sky in your world?"
Relevance? Here goes. I wrote my monthly newsletter article last midweek, and it was distributed yesterday morning by the two generous ladies who volunteer and put the thing together for us. I began the piece by sharing that I am not among the "War on Christmas" crowd, and expressing my disdain for the work of those who know that they are lying when they use the notion (one more made up piece of crap that these evil actors use) to distract the portion of the populace who can be so easily manipulated to look away from the latest malfeasance, incompetence, or just plain evil perpetrated by George II and his cabal. I called by name the first person I ever heard propound the preposterous theory, Bill O'Reilly. If anything, I was far too mild in my description of what he and his compatriots are up to.
I was stunned during the shaking hands after the service portion of the day when I was approached by one of my favorite people in the congregation. A strong leader, and just really fine person. "When" I was asked, "do we get time for a rebuttal?" I am one of those people who gets so locked into what I've got in front of me at any given moment that I can't think about anything else, and that is never more the case than right before or right after a worship service. I had no idea what the reference was, as I was still in preaching mode. I asked; my question was answered: "To defend Bill O'Reilly!" I thought it was a joke at first. I was wrong.
I knew that my friend is conservative. I'm ok with that. I recognize very well that well-intentioned people can see the world in differing ways, and I respect those differences. But there are lines.
Bill O'Reilly crossed a line a long time ago. The man lies about his upbringing. He lies about his military service. He lies about his professional accomplishments. And he bullies. I have sat through the hilariously name No Spin Zone on enough occasions to have a working knowledge of his act. He screams at people he disagrees with to "Shut Up!" He threatens. The inevitable prank caller is told that they can expect a visit from Fox Security because "We have your telephone number." Can't imagine the horror of Rupert's jack-booted thugs showing up at the door to...what? Rip out the phone line? Might be time to recall G. Gordon Liddy's renowned instructions for answering the door? O'Reilly attacked the 9-11 widows, for crying out loud. Yeah, if there is any hotbed of insurrectionist thought and action, it's the 9-11 widows! Not unlike blaming the Jewish people for the Holocaust, or African-Americans for slavery.
How dare you women-folk have opinions on the War On Terror, and the Assault On The Other Country That Had Nothing To Do With 9-11 And A Dictator No Worse Than 30 Other Countries. Where do you get off asking questions and taking positions? Your husbands were murdered? Oh, surely you can do better than that!
Friends, Bill O'Reilly just isn't the place to make your stand.
My church's policy is that unless I violate the teachings of the church (and, so far, we're still against lying and bullying and threatening people-radical, ain't we?) what I say in my pulpit is between God and me. No one, not even my appointing bishop, can tell me what to preach or not preach. And the church's publications are part of my pulpit. There will be no rebuttal to defend Mr. O'Reilly's honor, and not just because he doesn't have any. My friend won't be happy with me about that. OK. Most of us clergy types don't have the anatomy these days to take the risks of being prophetic. We tend to like our middle-class (or what passes for it) lives too much. But this one's a no-brainer, to borrow Mr. Cheney's term.
So here's the big risk-taking prophetic proclamation of the day: Bill O'Reilly behaves badly, and should stop it! Ooh, I feel just like Amos or Hosea!

Signings, or, Why Baseball Teams Are Who They Are

St. Louis Cardinals, 2006 World Series Champions, 10 World Series Titles, 17 National League Pennants, 22 appearances in baseball's postseason
Chicago Cubs, Loveable Losers, They of the Friendly Confines, 2 World Series Titles, 10 National League Pennants, 14 appearances in baseball's postseason, no World Series Title since 1908, no National League Pennant since 1945.
The Cardinals have added these players since winning the World Series: Gary Bennett, 1 year; Jim Edmonds, 2 years, $19 million; Randy Keisler; Adam Kennedy, 3 years, $10 million; Scott Spiezio, 2 year deal, $4.5 million; Kip Wells, 1 year, $4 million; Eli Marrero, Minor League contract.
The Cubs have added these players since the Cardinals won the World Series: Henry Blanco, 2 year deal with team option; Mark DeRosa, 3 year deal, $13 million; Wade Miller, 1 year, $1.5 million; Aramis Ramirez, 5 year deal with mutual option, $73 million; Alfonso Soriano, 8 year contract, $136 million; Kerry Wood, 1 year deal, $1.75 million.
Cards: Bennett is a journeyman who responded well to St. Louis last year. Edmonds is in decline, but agreed to rework a deal that makes him far more attractive than under the earlier deal. Adam Kennedy is an old Cards hand, having gone to the Angels in the Edmonds deal. He is not sensational, but he is steady, and will be reunited with his double play partner from the 2002 World Champions, David Eckstein. Speizio proved to be a very valuable bench player, filling in just about everywhere last season, and showing some good pop at the plate. Kip Wells is a season past surgery, and seems a very reasonable bet to return to what he was in 2002-2003 (38 RSAA for a pitiable Pirates team). Eli Marrero is returning to the Cards as a much more versatile player than the backup catcher he was when he left St. Louis previously. On the whole, reasonable money for reliable players and a couple of reasonable risks. Nice job, so far.
Cubs: Soriano is already past 30, but was given the longest, largest contract in club history. His speed makes him special; do his legs hold up to age 40? If so, he'll be the first. Ramirez doesn't play hard every day. He doesn't play hard a lot of days. He sulked under Dusty Baker; how will he respond to Lou Piniella? But, in Hendry Land, that gets you the second richest deal in team history. Mark DeRosa had a career year at the optimal moment. He has never done anything to suggest that last year's performance was anything but a fluke, and he will prove that this season. DeRo is not as good as Adam Kennedy, but the Cubs are paying him a million dollars a year more than the Cards are paying Kennedy. Wade Miller isn't a bad bet for a million and a half; he just hasn't pitched in forever. Which brings us to Kerry Wood. Stop it! Just stop it now!
To date, the 2006 Hot Stove season clearly demonstrates why the Cardinals are the Cardinals, and the Cubs are the Cubs. But, hey, they still have Wrigley Field, and this year, Mt. Piniella, just waiting to explode.

Hell Froze Over

Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. has shown evidence of a conscience! No, regretably, they haven't spayed or neutered Bill O'Reilly or Sean Hannity. I didn't say that they had joined the human race. They've just sprouted a little leaf of a small amount of decency. O.J. Simpson has been denied his forum for...what? His memoir of that night? The only means open to him to make some real money? I don't even know what to call it.
Mr. Simpson was to give an interview, in anticipation of the publication of a book, that would tell how he murdered his ex-wife and a neighborhood waiter. If he had done it. I've already heard this story. It was called the trial of the century. Which proved only two things: if your prosecutors went to the Three Stooges' Law School, and if you have enough money, then in the good old U.S. of A. you can get away with absolutely anything.
Perhaps that pricipal has changed just a bit. Someone at Fox apparently decided that all of Rupert's billions couldn't buy them an excuse for putting an unconvicted, but nonetheless guilty, murderer on television to, again, torture the families of his victims.
Good taste from the Brit Hume and Greta Van Susteren crowd? Witness, friends, my proof for the existence of God!

Still Trying to Wind Down on Sunday Night/Monday Morning

Why is it that Ted Koppel can examine Iran and its place in the world in reasonable ways, but no one in our government seems to be able to do so? (Do yourselves a favor-watch Koppel on Discovery; this program is Iran: The Most Dangerous Nation)
The only thing better than baptizing one person in morning worship is baptizing two, which we did this morning. And the best part is, in our church that's a fairly frequent occurence!
So it seems that the Cubs are about to win the Soriano sweepstakes. After the last three years (Red Sox in '04, White Sox in '05 and Cardinals in '06) about the last remaining mountain-top experience for a baseball fan is seeing the Cubs win the World Series. Alfonso is a good step in that direction. But the Cubs are still the Cubs, and there are reasons why they are approaching a full century since winning a World Series. Three years at $13 million for Mark DeRosa? Mark's a good guy-he came up with the Braves-but one good year (and that in the Ballpark at Arlington!) makes anybody a $4.3 million a year player? And signing Kerry Wood again, at any price, even for one year? Memo to the Tribune Company: the fantasy is over; Wood and Prior aren't going to win you anything but Workman's Compensation claims. I can see a Derrek Lee-Aramis Ramirez-Soriano order going nuts with 81 games in Wrigley, but somebody's still got to get the other side out. After Zambrano, who ya got?
While my interest in football is minimal-a severe handicap for a southern guy-I do think that there is a baseball parallel: just as baseball is better when the Yankees are good, so do I think that the NFL is more interesting when the Chicago Bears are good. And this year, they are very good. The Colts' loss today leaves them even with the Bears for the best record in the league. The Colts are all offense, and the worst run defense in the NFL. The Bears, however, are passable on offense and tremendous on defense. That formula has won an awful lot of the Super Bowls that I have seen.
If I know little of pro football, I know less of college. Heck, my school didn't even have football with I was there. That said, if the NCAA wants a great game for their pretend championship, I can't see them doing better than a repeat of the Ohio State-Michigan game. And by the way, if Ohio State is number 1, shouldn't they beat the number 2 team by just a little bit when the game is played at #1's home field? I don't get the polls; I prefer a game where you have earn the championship on the field every year. You know, "There's no voting in Baseball!" But if you play number 1 tight at their place, your ranking shouldn't take a beating. I am no Michigan fan. I thought Woody Hayes and Bo Schembechler were both awful people with all their tough guy posturing and football-as-war talk. What nonsense! But Michigan deserves a rematch, especially if the football muckety-mucks want a competitive game for their joke of a title.
Is there anything better than satellite radio? I have both brands, courtesy of the family's Christmas generosity over the last few years. XM has the baseball package. Sirius has basketball, and, yes, Howard. XM could make their service indispensible if only they understood baseball. They do pick up every game. But only the home broadcast. They clearly don't understand or care that in the free agent era, the baseball fan's connection to their team is through the announcers. I feel like Jack Buck was another beloved uncle; Skip Caray and Pete Van Wieren, life-long friends; Joe Castiglione and Jerry Trupiano, daily companions. Cardinal baseball is as much about Mike Shannon's peculiarities as it is about who's batting or on the mound. Having to listen to the loathsome Jerry Coleman when the Cards are out west, or the wretched John Sterling when the Sox visit The Stadium should be chargeable offenses under the Constitution's cruel and inhuman punishment clause. Even more than Papi and Manny, Albert and Chris, Chipper and Smoltz, the guys behind the microphones make the game, every day, for six months a year. Give us our guys! Play both broadcasts of each game! Or, actually, all three with the Spanish announcers.
Which leads, finally, to one more question: just what the hell is wrong with posting signs in English and Spanish? Are we so jingoistic that we won't lift a finger to help those new to our country make their way? The obvious stupidity of this attitude is that we ALL came from somewhere else. By the last anthropological studies I saw, even the Native Americans are actually Native Asians. I am grateful that when the first Pierces or Pearses or whatever it was originally were busy having their names misunderstood and misspelled like everybody else upon entering this country, there was opportunity for them to figure out life in this new place. How big an ass must one be to deny that opportunity to others whose only sin is getting here a little later? As shared before, recipients of grace must be very, very careful when considering whether to extend grace to others!

Managers of the Year

The Baseball Writers of America today named Jim Leyland and Joe Girardi the American and National League Managers of the Year. Well done! They are both deserving. Leyland returned just as the pathetic wreckage of one of the great franchises in the history of the game was set up to reclaim their position. The Detroit Tigers had spent way too many years as a laughingstock. Now, it's a "they who laugh last" situation. Their post-postseason addition of Gary Sheffield means that they should now have the opportunity to finish the job that ended one step short of completion last year. And getting Shef without having to give up any of their Major League pitching just underlines why Dave Dombrowski should be American League Executive of the Year. And Detroiters should feel tremendously encouraged that Shef's coming in confirms that Mike Ilitch has no intention of playing Wayne Huizenga in a 2007 version of the 1998 Marlins, with Dombrowski and Leyland having to relive that nightmare.
Joe Girardi won the National League vote. And he's out of a job. What's wrong with this picture? Jeffrey Loria. Loria spent a summer afternoon at the park playing Mark Cuban with the umpires. Girardi, to his eternal credit, told Loria to shut up. He was making life harder for Joe G's players. And from there, the relationship between manager and owner soured. And, predictably, the GM, Larry Beinfest, adopted a CYA position alongside the owner. So the brilliant-on the order of those cartoon idiots in the Guinness ads-billionaire Loria, who presided over the destruction of the Montreal Expos and was rewarded with the Marlins franchise, exercised his deep pockets prerogative and axed his manager.
This action was perfectly understandable. After all, Girardi had been handed a great team. The Marlins would have a record six players who received votes in the 2006 Rookie of the Year balloting. But back in the spring, they were just a bunch of children. And they played like it. The Marlins started 11-31. Twenty games under .500 in only 42 games played. Horrible! And they ended the season winning only 5 of their final 18 games. Wretched!
The rest of the story, however, is that in between the bad beginning and ending the Marlins became the only team in Major League history to reach .500 after having been 20 games under. Their season record: 78-84. Take out the start, and they went 67-53. Take out the bad finish, and it's 62-40. And before anybody starts telling me that if you take out the three losing streaks that the Cardinals had then their record improves, too, please remember a couple of things. Girardi had 22 rookies on his roster at one time or another last season. He had to teach them to play. And the finish came after Loria had made it clear that Joe wouldn't be back for 2007. Tell the kids that the guy who taught them to be Major Leaguers isn't going to be with them for their sophomore campaigns, and expect them to play as well as before? I just don't see that as a legitimate possibility.
Girardi will be fine. He'll spend this season back in the YES broadcast booth. And when the right job comes open, he'll continue his managerial career. And if he's fortunate enough to get his next job with a good owner, the rest of MLB better watch out!
The Marlins? Well, they hired Fredi Gonzalez to manage next year, and off of Fredi's tenure as the Braves' third base coach, I can't wish him ill. But he's working for Jeffrey Loria. I don't think Fredi's problems will come from my bad wishes on his organization.

You're Invited

The mail brought an interesting moment this afternoon, which is more than can be said most days. One of my previous stops is marking an anniversary that they apparently take to be significant, and must be asking everyone who was ever associated with them to go back for the occasion. In my final spring with them, they concluded that my presence was no longer required. I was hurt at the time, in spite of the fact that I already wanted to leave. There's something of that spurned lover stuff to the way we do things in our church. It was perfectly alright for me to want out, but when they said it first, I was wounded.
The particular issue on their part was the pushing of an individual who had been seated on the pertinent committee in spite of the fact that he never showed up at church unless he just couldn't find anything else to do. He pushed because he seemed to feel that I should have moved in with his terminally ill mother to be there every moment, and I hadn't done so. One of the joys of our existence is that our working lives are routinely in the hands of people who have no personnel experience whatsoever. They haven't dealt with hiring and firing, setting salaries, knowing what kinds of performance are appropriate or inappropriate and so on. A long-retired colleague says that the church is the last place left where average people can shake their fists, raise their voices, and get results. Well, long story short, my pal got results.
I hadn't thought about him or the congregation in question for several years prior to the arrival of the invitation. I got past the injury and resultant anger (hey, I am a guy!) a long time ago. But I have no interest in going back. When we clergy folk leave a place, we are supposed to be gone. I believe in that. We are to respect our successor(s) and leave them to attend to those now appointed to their care. Most of my stops have left me with fond memories. Two, not so much. But I have never gone back to any of them but one, and that, once. Everything was different. They had moved on, and so had I. It wasn't a comfortable day.
People often try to empathize with our weekend work schedules. And, sure, I'd like to stay out on Beale Street all Saturday night every now and then. But sometimes that Sunday schedule sure comes in handy. And this is one of those times.
Sorry, but I just can't get away on a Sunday morning. Thank goodness!

Moving in a Better Direction

I am, every day of my life, more thankful than I can put into words for the accident of birth that put me in the United States of America. As with all grace, I did nothing to earn this blessing, and neither did you. A simple change of a last name, a religion, and a DNA cell here or there, and I am in China or Iraq or Darfur or...you get the idea. No, it is nothing but a stunning blessing to have been born into this country. That said, I am not proud of my country every day. We are often greedy. We are frequently arrogant. We regularly expect people in other countries to behave as though they have had all of the advantages of life that we have had, and seek to punish them when they don't.
Today is different. I am proud of my country. Nationally, we have declared that we are fed up with arrogant leadership that plows ahead with bad policies no matter what anyone thinks. We have told our President who can't recall ever making a mistake that he has made several, and bad ones, too. And to his minimal credit, he took a short step toward doing better today by allowing Mr. Rumsfeld to go back to bullying business people rather than killing our men and women in uniform. Bush's The Donald maintained his posture, even in humiliation, lecturing us all that the only reason that he was going was that Iraq is a war that is "little understood." Yeah, if only we were as smart as the Neo-Cons, we'd want Rummy to keep this crap up until George II leaves at noon on January 20, 2009.
Other great human beings dismissed yesterday: Rick Santorum, Mr. "Gays are worse than people who practice bestiality" was excused by the apparently sobering up Pennsylvanians, who also turned out Curt "What do you mean I can't force companies that want my ear to throw contracts to my daughter? Weldon; the loathsome Ken Blackwell, architect of the theft of the 2004 Presidential Election, was thrashed by Ohioans fed up with the corruption of the Republican party; many others, from Bush lapdogs to just plain criminals were given permanent vacations.
I only have one regret: Harold Ford, Jr. lost in my state. Bob Corker is a joke; my thoughts on him are in a previous post. But Harold's defeat carried with it some measure of encouragement. In this southern, Republican state, against an opponent who was way too comfortable using race as an issue, a black man lost by fewer than 50,000 votes. Harold polled almost 900,000 votes. Even if we must still be ashamed that the better candidate was defeated by his skin color, we are making progress. Just think, if only 50k bigots had stayed home, Tennessee would have elected the first African-American Senator from the south since Senators have been elected by the popular vote. We almost did something great! I am a United Methodist Democrat. That means, by definition, that I am an optimist. I fully expect that in two years, we will have an opportunity to take the step we didn't quite make this year. Harold is far too fine a political leader to end his career at age 36. He will be back, and we should elect him when he runs next.
There are many difficult days still ahead. But we will now have the checks and balances system constructed by our Constitutional founders in place to prevent this President from racing, solo, into all of the quicksand that Mr. Bush has found in his 6 years in office. We will have the opportunity to look into all of the questionable dealings leading up to war, in conducting the war, and in botching this time since that is so obviously breaking down into civil war in Iraq. Questions will now be asked, and answers will be required. It's about time!
There will also be a great deal less of this "God prefers us" and "God wants us to do this" garbage from the American extremists. Those who have claimed mandates to "do the will of God" in our country have been put in their place. Because anyone who has ever had a serious encounter with the Bible knows that God loves all of this human creation. We are all God's children, those who know it and try to live accordingly, and those who don't get it yet. And the single group with whom Jesus Christ is constantly, invariably harsh is that group that continually presented themselves as knowing God, but demonstrating none of the grace, mercy and love that God embodies. My right-wing sisters and brothers, pharaseeism is not of Christ. Give it up! We are still all sinners who have fallen short of the glory of God! You didn't get yourself saved, and you don't get extra credit for getting there earlier in the day. Stop acting like you did.
Instead of screaming "Murderer" at young women who are so desperate in their circumstances that they have decided that abortion is the only way out, use your energy and resources to provide prenatal care and make the adoption process less costly. Instead of blaming gays for threatening the sanctity of marriage, use your commitment to Christ to establish mentoring programs for young couples who desperately need to be educated that the marriage contract isn't a "let's just try this for a while, and if it doesn't work out, so what?" type of thing. Instead of trying to kill all the terrorists, why not advocate for programs to provide food, education and opportunity for the children of the poorest and most repressive nations of the world. Osama bin Laden is the exception; most terrorists aren't rich and powerful. They are, for the most part, disaffected, isolated people who feel no connection to other human beings, and see no opportunity for their lives. How might any of us react if we had been born in the Gaza Strip, Ethiopia or North Korea? It is too easy to impose our expectations on people who have never known a good day, heard one encouraging word, or been told that they matter to anyone for any reason. Why not try to live out that old "Love one another" thing before we lower ourselves to that "kill them all and let God sort them out" mentality. Because we can't kill in God's name any more than the bin Ladens of the world can. Because God's word is life. And that's not debatable.

Almost Done

The election is upon us. We should be free of political advertising by bed time tomorrow. Hallelujah! But first...
I am a native Tennessean. Born here, lived all my life here except for the four years as a kid, and three as an adult, that bishops exiled us to Kentucky. The majority of my life has been spent in Memphis, or the Memphis metropolitan area. I know all about the Fords. I don't think much of many of them. But I have had the privilege of being in the presence of Harold Ford, Jr. on multiple occasions, and I think a great deal of him. I have seen him in a worship service honor the 90th birthday of Dr. Cecil Humphreys, one of the pillars of Memphis State University/University of Memphis. I watched him express to an elderly man the genuine appreciation of the community for work done largely before Harold was born. And he knew his material in acknowledging Dr. Humphreys' accomplishments. No notes, no script. I have seen the Congressman in my daughters' schools, not for photo ops, but to talk to the kids and tell them that they could do great things if they stayed in school and studied hard. How do I know several of those occasions weren't photo ops? Only one aide accompanied Harold, to move him along to keep his schedule. You see, he liked talking to the children so much that he would have stayed all day on his own. I have seen him in the dining rooms of retirement homes run by our church-related ministry to the aging, responding to every question seriously and graciously. I have seen his work to respond to VA problems, Medicare issues and Social Security concerns. I have friends who have called on him when they needed someone to put in a word with the Small Business Administration, and gotten the help they needed.
Corker's advertising has been shameful. Harold Ford, Jr. is not John Ford. Nor is he his father. He is his own man who has served the Ninth District honorably and well. Desperate to find some way to label Harold liberal, they ran an ad that told how he had outdone Ted Kennedy and Hillary Clinton...in junkets. Did Corker bother to mention that the vast majority of Congressional junkets are privately funded? No, he just wanted to link Harold's name to the northeastern senators. Harold is no liberal. His values are far more conservative than mine. Worst of all, Corker has told the voters of Tennessee that Harold is after white women. After all, he attended a function at the Playboy Mansion. How proud the citizens of Chattanooga must be: the best thing that their former mayor has to recommend him is that his mom, his wife and his daughters think well of him, and his opponent is a black man that, Corker says, chases white women.
Harold Ford, Jr. is a young, single man. I would think that an interest in women would make him a thoroughly acceptable candidate to the buffoons who continue to fight this absurd battle over the rights of non-traditional couples to marry. Friends, be very careful in your condemnations. As the pathetic plight of Rev. Haggard reminds us AGAIN, that judging others thing will come around to bite you every time. I would think that a bachelor might be a refreshing change from all of those hypocrites who condemned Bill Clinton's (absolutely condemnable) behavior, all the while carrying on their own affairs not of state. I will personally guarantee that Harold will not cheat on his wife!
Bob Corker has even criticized Harold Ford, Jr. for being articulate and intelligent. This aspect of the campaign smacks of the 1940s when Rep. Claude Pepper (later Senator Pepper) was attacked by his opponent in rural areas of Florida. The charge: "Claude Pepper is a heterosexual!" There is no more space in our state for an educated man with some polish about him to be attacked for kowing something. Must we always expect to be near the bottom in our educational performance? Mr. Corker would, from the images in his advertising, say yes! "Being glad that Mississippi is still in the union to keep us off the bottom" is no more an education policy than Bush's "YEE-HAW" is a foreign policy.
The truth of the matter is that there is no reason whatsoever to vote for Mr. Corker. He is, pure and simple, more of the same crap from the same party that has sought to destroy our nation for the last six years. Bush does not deserve, and we cannot afford, one more day of a compliant Congress.
Surely in 2006 we Tennesseans have grown enough to be able to evaluate these two men on their merits. I cannot comprehend that we will defeat the better candidate, and encourage the performance of the President, because that better candidate's shell is just a shade too dark. God help us!