Cup of Coffee: July 8, 2024
Praising José Miranda and Ben Rice, shaking my head at Colten Brewer, baseball microfiction, the French send the fascists a message, Costner, and HBO
Good morning!
Today we praise José Miranda and Ben Rice, we bury Colten Brewer, we worry about Julio Rodríguez, we prepare to bid farewell to Kevin Pillar, and I share a bit of baseball-related short fiction from a Cup of Coffee subscriber and fellow Ohioan.
In Other Stuff I’m happy to report that the fascists underperformed in the French elections, I laugh at a review of a Kevin Costner movie, and I get mildly irked at the recency bias involved with the assessment of HBO original TV series.
And That Happened
Here are the scores. Here are the highlights:
Atlanta 6, Phillies 0: Reynaldo López tossed six shutout innings and three relievers finished the five-hitter. All of Atlanta’s runs came via the longball, with Adam Duvall, Jarred Kelenic, Matt Olson, and Eli White going deep. Kelenic’s was a three-run job. Atlanta takes two of three from Philly, but Philly still leads the division by eight games and may get both Kyle Schwarber and Bryce Harper back tomorrow so, yeah.
Tigers 5, Reds 1: Tarik Skubal was fantastic, striking out 13 Redlegs batters in seven innings while allowing just one run on three hits. Zach McKinstry hit a two-run shot and singled in a run as the Tigers complete the sweep in which they scored five runs in each of the three games. This is important. This means something.
Guardians 5, Giants 4: San Francisco led 3-2 in the sixth when Bo Naylor hit a pinch-hit, three-run homer to give the Guardians the lead for good. Brother Josh singled in Cleveland’s first run in the fourth inning. Daniel Schneemann had an RBI double. The Guardians win the series. Indeed, they haven’t lost a single home series all year, winning 11 of them and splitting one of them. Cleveland rocks, man.
Cardinals 8, Nationals 3: Willson Contreras knocked in three via an RBI single and a two-run homer and even stole a base while Nolans Arrenado and Gorman each drove in a couple to give the Cards the win. I almost said “give the Cards the series” but I see they’re playing again today. Wraparound series are an affront unto God.
Mets 3, Pirates 2: It was scoreless through seven as Mets starter Sean Manaea and Pirates starter Luis Ortiz both blanked the opposition for six. The Mets’ one run in the top of the eight was met with two runs from Pittsburgh in the bottom half but Francisco Lindor singled in two runs in the top of the ninth. Edwin Díaz bent but didn’t break in the bottom half and closed it out. These guys also play today, which is further evidence of how far we have strayed from The Light.
Marlins 7, White Sox 4: The White Sox took the lead in the fourth and held it until the bottom of the ninth when the Fish rallied for four. The leadoff batter walked, advanced to third and Josh Bell doubled him in. After an intentional walk to set up some force outs, Jake Burger hit a three-run walkoff homer and that was that. The Marlins take two of three in the battle of baseball’s two worst teams. Which means that the White Sox are TOTALLY baseball’s worst team, but I suppose we knew that already.
Cubs 5, Angels 0: Chicago starter Hayden Wesneski allowed just one hit while pitching shutout ball into the seventh in what ended up being a three-hitter. Two of the Cubs runs came on a two-run shot from Michael Busch. The other three came on a single, a sac fly, and a run-scoring double play. The Cubbies take two of three.
Twins 3, Astros 2: It was tied at two from the fourth into the ninth but Christian Vázquez put and end to things with a walkoff solo homer. Scary for the Twins: Carlos Correa left the game after being hit by a pitch to his right hand. The good news: X-rays were negative. He just has a bruised finger.
Rangers 13, Rays 2: Nate Eovaldi allowed two runs over seven but he sure as hell didn’t need to be that good what with how the Rangers knocked the snot out of Rays pitchers on this day. Corey Seager, Jonah Heim, and Robbie Grossman all went deep. Seager’s was a three-run shot. Travis Jankowski knocked in three without the aid of a homer, but a couple of singles work too. Texas completes the three-game sweep.
Royals 10, Rockies 1: As was the case with Eovaldi, Brady Singer did not need to be as good as he was (7 IP, 6H, 1 ER, 7K). That’s because the Royals offense went off, with Maikel García, MJ Melendez and Bobby Witt Jr. homering. García’s and Witt’s were three-run shots. The win averts a three-game sweep at the hands of the lowly Rockies and ends a three-game losing streak.
Orioles 6, Athletics 3: Anthony Santander kicked off the scoring with a solo shot and then Heston Kjerstad hit a three-run homer to put this one out of reach in the first inning. Grayson Rodriguez wasn’t fantastic — he gave up three runs in six innings — but he struck out eight and picked up the W. Sort of a Jack Morris special. If he gets 237 more of those along with a lights-out performance in one World Series game someday he’s in the Hall of Fame.
Diamondbacks 9, Padres 1: Eugenio Suárez homered, doubled and had five RBI. The homer was a tie-breaking job in the seventh and then he hit a bases-loaded double in the ninth, so yeah, the Snakes poured it on late. Corbin Carroll hit a leadoff homer. It was his first homer in two months, as our dude here has been struggling like mad this season. Ryne Nelson and three relievers combined on a four-hitter. The Dbacks take two of three.
Brewers 9, Dodgers 2: Christian Yelich and Blake Perkins both homered, had three hits and drove in three runs and Eric Haase had a two-run homer, all of which is enough to make this one cream cheese for Milwaukee. Los Angeles took two of three in the series. Now they head to Philadelphia for a three-game series beginning tomorrow. The Dodgers are three and a half back of Philly for the best record in both the NL and all of baseball. Maybe an NLCS preview.
Blue Jays 5, Mariners 4: The M’s had a late 4-1 lead but George Springer tied it up in the seventh with a three-run homer and then Daulton Varsho singled home the Manfred Man in the top of the tenth to put the Jays over and give them the series, two games to three.
Red Sox 3, Yankees 0: Rafael Devers homered in the seventh and the ninth but, really, he could’ve just done the one in the seventh and the Sox woulda been good. That’s because Kutter Crawford (7 IP, 4 H, 0 ER) and a couple of relievers shut the Bomber bats down. Crawford only threw 68 pitches in those seven innings too. Dude could’ve completed the game.
The Daily Briefing
Complete All-Star Game rosters announced
We got our All-Star starters last week but yesterday the league announced the full rosters. This includes players selected by player voting and ouija boards and drawn straws and whatever the hell other process they use these days. So:
AL Starters
- C Adley Rutschman, Orioles
- 1B Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Blue Jays
- 2B Jose Altuve, Astros
- SS Gunnar Henderson, Orioles
- 3B José Ramírez, Guardians
- OF Aaron Judge, Yankees
- OF Steven Kwan, Guardians
- OF Juan Soto, Yankees
- DH Yordan Álvarez, Astros
AL Reserves
- SS Carlos Correa, Twins
- 3B Rafael Devers, Red Sox
- OF Jarren Duran, Red Sox
- UTL David Fry, Guardians
- OF Riley Greene, Tigers
- 1B Josh Naylor, Guardians
- 3B Isaac Parades, Rays
- C Salvador Perez, Royals.
- 2B Marcus Semien, Rangers
- SS Bobby Witt Jr., Royals
- OF Kyle Tucker, Astros
AL Pitchers
- Tyler Anderson, Angels
- Corbin Burnes, Orioles
- Emmanuel Clase, Guardians
- Garrett Crochet, White Sox
- Logan Gilbert, Mariners
- Clay Holmes, Yankees
- Tanner Houck, Red Sox
- Seth Lugo, Royals
- Mason Miller, A's
- Cole Ragans, Royals
- Tarik Skubal, Tigers
- Kirby Yates, Rangers
NL Starters
- C William Contreras, Brewers
- 1B Bryce Harper, Phillies
- 2B Ketel Marte, Diamondbacks
- SS Trea Turner, Phillies
- 3B Alex Bohm, Phillies
- OF Jurickson Profar, Padres
- OF Fernando Tatis Jr., Padres (injured)
- OF Christian Yelich, Brewers
- DH Shohei Ohtani, Dodgers
NL Reserves
- SS CJ Abrams, Nationals
- 1B Pete Alonso, Mets
- 1B Luis Arraez, Padres
- 3B Alec Bohm, Phillies
- SS Elly De La Cruz, Reds
- 1B Freddie Freeman, Dodgers
- OF Teoscar Hernández, Dodgers
- 3B Ryan McMahon, Rockies
- OF Jackson Merrill, Padres
- DH Marcell Ozuna, Atlanta
- OF Heliot Ramos, Giants
- OF Bryan Reynolds, Pirates
- C Will Smith, Dodgers
NL Pitchers
- Tyler Glasnow, Dodgers
- Ryan Helsley, Cardinals
- Jeff Hoffman, Phillies
- Shota Imanaga, Cubs
- Reynaldo López, Atlanta
- Chris Sale, Atlanta
- Tanner Scott, Marlins
- Paul Skenes, Pirates
- Matt Strahm, Phillies
- Ranger Suárez, Phillies
- Robert Suárez, Padres
- Logan Webb, Giants
- Zack Wheeler, Phillies
José Miranda reached base 12 straight times
José Miranda of the Twins tied an MLB record over the weekend when he reached base in 12 straight at bats. The only other players to do it were joins Johnny Kling of the Cubs (1902), Pinky Higgins of the Red Sox (1938), and Walt Dropo of the Tigers (1952).
Miranda’s streak began in the eighth inning of Wednesday’s game against the Tigers when he singled. It continued through a 5-for-5 outing on Thursday against Detroit, a 4-for-4 game against Houston on Friday, and Saturday’s 2-for-3 performance. The streak:
- Single;
- Double;
- Single;
- two-RBI Double;
- Single;
- RBI Double;
- Single;
- Solo Homer;
- RBI Double;
- Single;
- HBP;
- RBI Single
The streak finally ended in the sixth inning during Saturday’s game when Hunter Brown of the Astros retired Miranda on a flyout to left. He got most of a day off yesterday, but came in as a pinch hitter and hit a single in his only at bat, so the man remains hot.
Nice going, José!
Have a game Ben Rice
New York Yankees first baseman Ben Rice didn’t make his big league debut until June 18, but he has made a name for himself already. Most of that was made on Saturday when he homered three times and drove in seven runs in New York’s 14-4 win over the Red Sox.
Rice, 25, was the Yankees’ 12th round draft pick in 2021. He was called up to fill in for the injured Anthony Rizzo, but he has been more than just a fill-in in that time. Entering play on Sunday he was hitting .294/.383/.588 (168 OPS+) with four homers, 12 RBI, and eight walks in 60 plate appearances.
I’d say Rizzo is getting Wally Pipp’d, but (a) Wally Pipp still had three seasons left in him after Lou Gehrig took over and I don’t feel like Rizzo does; and (b) I think it’s a fairly safe bet that for whatever kind of player Rice may become, he won’t be the next Lou Gehrig. Nice Saturday, though, kid.
Oh, no Colten Brewer
Cubs reliever Colten Brewer came into Saturday’s game against the Angels in the top of the third inning with Chicago down 2-0. He walked the first batter he faced, then fielded a comebacker but threw the ball away into center field which put two runners in scoring position with nobody out. Then he gave up an RBI single, recorded an out, gave up another RBI single, another run scored on a throwing error by the catcher, he walked another guy, allowed two base runners to steal, recorded a second out, and then hit a guy. He was then mercifully lifted after having turned a 2-0 game into a 5-0 game.
Then things got worse for him:
Yep, he punched the dugout wall. Yep, he broke his hand. And yep, he’s been placed on the 60-day injured list.
I will never understand the level of anger that causes dudes to punch walls to begin with, but for a guy who makes his living with his hand to do it takes things to a whole other incomprehensible level. And for it to happen to a different pitcher, basically every year, is simply crazy.
Julio Rodríguez had an MRI on his quad
Mariners center fielder Julio Rodriguez was removed from Saturday's game against the Blue Jays because of discomfort in his right quadriceps. Manager Scott Servais said Rodríguez was going to undergo an MRI. Which he did and which game back generally positive, but he still sat out yesterday’s game and is considered day-to-day.
It wasn’t clear when Rodríguez actually got injured. Servais said on Saturday that his center fielder felt discomfort in the quad while going through his pregame warmup. He tried to play through it but he was pretty gimpy in the early going and was taken out of the game by the second inning.
Rodríguez has had a hell of a time lately. He fouled a pitch off his left knee during Friday's game and jammed his thumb in Thursday's game while making a tumbling catch. It’s also been a struggle of a season for the young star, who is hitting just .247/.295/.335 (85 OPS+) with only eight homers.
Kevin Pillar is going to retire after this season
Kevin Pillar told USA Today’s Bob Nightengale that he is planning to retire following the 2024 season.
Pillar, 35, has played in parts of 12 big league campaigns. He spent seven of them with the Blue Jays and has also played for the Mets, Rockies, Giants, White Sox, Dodgers, Red Sox, and Atlanta in addition to his current stint with the Angels.
Defense has, obviously, been Pillar’s calling card and raison d'etre over the course of his career, and almost all of his post-Blue Jays days have featured him as a fourth outfielder type. Entering play yesterday he has a career line of .258/.296/.412 (89 OPS+). This year he is enjoying one of his finest offensive seasons, however, posting a line of .299/.355//512 (140 OPS+) in part-time play. It’s the sort of performance which could see him flipped to a contender for the stretch run.
Whether that happens or not, congratulations to Pillar for going out while he’s still a productive player on what are obviously his own terms.
The Ghost Runner
On Friday night Allison and I went down to Cincinnati to watch the Tigers play the Reds. It was steamy as hell before the first pitch and, while there was a brief, temporarily refreshing rain delay in the top of the fourth, the hot, wet air soon descended again.
In the fifth inning Spencer Steer of the Reds smacked a solo home run for Cincinnati’s first hit of the game. As always happens with a Reds home run, fireworks shot out of the fake riverboat smokestacks which sit behind the right center field wall at Great American Ballpark. Coincidentally, Friday night was also the night the Reds planned their big Fourth of July postgame fireworks show. In the moment, the smaller home run fireworks made me imagine what would happen if someone accidentally set off the whole postgame fireworks show just for the home run. I laughed to myself about the chaos it would cause and the delay in the ballgame that would ensue.
During a lull in the action not long after the home run I looked at my phone. Checking Twitter, I saw a tweet from a woman I follow named Vic Nogay. Vic, a Cup of Coffee subscriber, is a poet, writer, and editor from my neck of the woods. At 8:50pm that evening — not long after Steer’s home run — she just so happened to post a link to a short story about baseball, fireworks, and ghosts that she wrote last year:
You can read the story here. It’s great, but I can tell you with 100% certainty that it will not hit you anywhere near as perfectly as it hit me while sitting in a hot ballpark with the smoky smell of fireworks in the air and the idea of misfiring fireworks on my mind.
Thanks for that lovely moment of baseball synchronicity, Vic!
Other Stuff
The fascists underperform in French elections
France has been holding its elections in recent days. It was a two-step process, with the preliminary voting taking place on June 30 and runoffs taking place this past weekend. France’s far-right/fascist party, the National Rally, had been perceived to be surging of late. It performed well ahead of expectations last weekend and, as a result, all of the pollsters and pundits had been predicting the party that was long considered to be incapable of winning a national election would gain a majority in the National Assembly, ushering in a new, frightening era in French politics.
As you may have guessed by that photo above of fascist ass-wipe Marine Le Pen crying, that did not happen. This past weekend’s runoffs saw a surge for the left-wing coalition known as the New Popular Front that caused the National Rally to fall short of a majority. It would appear, in fact, that the New Popular Front would have the most seats of any party, even if no party can claim an outright majority. One suspects that a coalition between Emmanuel Macron’s centrist Renaissance party and the left wing groups is in order to keep the right wingers from gaining control. Of course, my knowledge and insight with respect to French politics is vanishingly small so take that for what it’s worth.
The key here, however, is that the right wingers, who were considered to be ascendent in France, and who were promising to usher in all manner of hateful and disastrous policies in the name of advancing a fascist ideology, fell short of expectations in the face of a big turnout from the electorate. Even amidst disarray and acrimony among the center and left, everyone showed up to tell the fascists to eat shit.
Simply stopping the fascists is not an end in and of itself — one has to have an affirmative vision for governing, not just one of disaster avoidance — but stopping them is a necessary precondition to achieving better things.
Here’s hoping we in this country can remember that in four months.
“Horizon” sounds great
For as much as I bash “Field of Dreams,” Kevin Costner is not a problem in it. He was actually pretty perfect in the role of Ray Kinsella, playing the character in a realistic and understated way that is needed to ground a work of magical realism. If the star of that movie was almost anyone else they’d probably have overplayed it and it probably would’ve been horrible beyond imagining.
And though Costner is usually not my cup of tea, he’s a quality actor. His turns in “Fandango,” “Silverado,” “Bull Durham,” “Tin Cup,” “No Way Out,” and “The Untouchables” ranged from solid to genuinely great. He has been good in some pretty flawed pictures as well, such as “JFK,” “A Perfect World,” “For the Love of the Game,” and “3000 Miles to Graceland,” among others. You can always do worse than hiring Coster to play your basically normal guy thrust into some circumstance not of his own devising.
Costner becomes a HUGE problem, however, when he gets ambitious. Sometimes that comes in the form of him taking roles he has no business taking like “Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves,” which he almost singlehandedly ruined. More often it’s less a matter of casting than it is his control over a project. Costner won a bunch of Oscars for “Dances with Wolves,” a movie that was wildly praised at the time but has aged so, so horribly and now comes off as both extraordinarily wrongheaded and impossibly self-indulgent. Its success led to Costner formally or effectively helming a number of big, ponderous misfires like “Waterworld,” “The Postman,” “Wyatt Earp,” and some other smaller-budget failures. The key takeaway is that you can hire Costner to act, but don’t let him have creative control, because he’s pretty tone deaf.
I had figured we were out of that era of Kevin Costner’s career, but his success as the lead in the wildly popular “Yellowstone” TV series has restored his old caché. That caused him to leave “Yellowstone” — probably not a great move! — and set off to make an ambitious four-part period Western epic film series named “Horizon: An American Saga” that he is co-writing, directing and starring in.
The first part came out last weekend. It underperformed at the box office and was largely panned by critics. Part 2 is already completed and is expected to be released next month. Part 3 is in production right now. Given the poor reception to the first movie, one wonders whether Part 4 will actually be made.
As I said before, Kevin Costner, while capable of excellence when properly cast, is not my cup of tea, so you may be wondering why I’m mentioning all of this, especially a week after the first movie in the series came out. I’m mentioning it because it gives me an excuse to share a review of Part 1 that ran in Variety last weekend but which I did not see until yesterday. The most relevant passage:
During the last hour of “Horizon,” a man sitting several rows behind me descended the steps in the dark theater, spilled his half-full bucket of popcorn midway down, reached to pick it up — but was interrupted when he let out an audible fart. At this point, he abandoned the bucket and hustled to the door. If only “Horizon” matched that level of compact storytelling and wit, featuring a memorable character facing challenging odds.
So you see, I had no choice but to provide all of that background.
In closing: don’t think, Kevin. It can only hurt the ballclub.
The 40 best HBO Series
HBO has been running original series and miniseries for decades, and there have been so many of them which were so good that it makes sense that someone has decided to rank them. That someone is Paste, which recently counted down the to-40 HBO series of all time.
I don’t have a super big problem with the top few choices, but there’s some recency bias afoot. Like, not putting “The Larry Sanders Show” in there anywhere is definitely an oversight. I’m surprised the slight-but-influential “Dream On” wasn’t in there. Most of all, not putting the 1980s football comedy/drama “1st & Ten” in there is a travesty.
OK, not putting “1st & Ten” in there is not exactly a travesty. It was not what one might call prestige TV. But (a) I liked it because I was 11 and loved football when it launched; and (b) it’s amazing how memory-holed that series has become. Like, even pages of series that have run on the network usually fail to include it. I mean, I get it: OJ Simpson had a pretty prominent role in it and the entire premise — what if a WOMAN owned a pro football team! — is misogynistic. But I don’t think that’s worth giving it the old Nikolai Yezhov treatment.
Then again, it’s been like 35 years since I’ve seen an episode of “1st & 10.” Given the time it aired and the whole “hey, we’re on HBO so we can say ANYTHING!” idea was so new, I’m guessing that 75% of the jokes were things no one would dare say today. So forget what I said about it. Maybe it is best to just let it lie.
Just my opinion, but “1st & Ten” did NOT need a theme song that went that goddamn hard. But they did it anyway. Hats off to ‘em.
Have a great day everyone.
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