Cup of Coffee: October 1, 2026

Good morning! And welcome to Free Thursday!

The Wild Card round continued wildin' yesterday, with some pretty fun baseball in between ads for politicians, that Liberty Biberty abomination, and the nutsack shaver. I honestly can't decide which of them I hate the worst but people at least have an arguable need for insurance and clean-shaven nutsacks.

[Editor: You still have a cold?]

Buddy, I am absolutely TWEAKED on cold medicine. How could you tell?

And That Happened

Here are the scores. Here are the highlights:

Phillies 4, Atlanta 3: Every year when we hit the NLCS/ALCS and the contenders have separated themselves from the pretenders I think back to the Wild Card round and it feels like a vague memory from a thousand years ago. But I feel like I'm gonna remember this shit show of a game for a long time. And when I say "shit show of a game" I mean "it was a mess in a lot of ways but it was wildly entertaining to a guy with a head full of industrial grade cold medicine, some of which he smuggled back from England in August because you can't get it here." It was one of those games where you can find joy even if your life is sorta goin' sideways at the moment, because, Jesus, what are these guys doing?

I haven't gotten a press credential in years, but often, while watching a game, I still think what kind of question I might ask a given player. Like asking Bryce Harper about the route he took to the Drake Baldwin fly ball in the seventh. Or asking Alec Bohm why, just before the Harper play, he threw to second when fielding Ha-Seong-Kim's bunt rather than taking the out that Walt Weiss was trying to give him. Or asking Atlanta reliever Dylan Lee to "talk about the pitches you threw to Schwarber and Harper" that were smacked a cumulative mile in the top of the eighth. Of course, like Harper with his game-tying moon shot, Bohm redeemed himself in the tenth with a dinger of his own.

The game, amusingly, ended on an ABS challenge, after J.T. Realmuto and Andrew Painter both tapped their heads following a two-out, 0-2, two-men-on pitch to Dominic Smith that home plate umpire Adam Beck called a ball. That's a postseason first.  

They never let you interview the broadcaster, but I'm on year 15 or 20 of wanting to ask Matt Vasgersian how he judges balls off the bat so poorly that he, invariably, screams in excitement at routine fly balls (e.g. Ozzie Albies' fly out to end the 9th) and finds himself somewhat surprised when a ball goes over the fence (Bohm's homer, which took Vasgersian completely by surprise). I guess that's what happen when you watch the monitor and not the field. A pro-tip, Matt: watch the fielder.

Basically, no one was really at their best here, except for Tyler Mahle, who allowed one run over seven just to see Lee blow it. But such is the nature of Wild Card games. These aren't perfect teams by damn sight or else they'd have a bye. But sometimes they give us three hours and three minutes of much needed distraction while we count down the hours until we can take NyQuil and say goodbye to our exploding faces for the day.

We'll see these two again at 8PM this evening.

White Sox 7, Astros 3: I spent two or three days bitching to anyone who would listen about how bullpen games and openers suck and then the Astros trot their Big Man Real Starter Hunter Brown out there in this one and he gets his ass handed to him in a four-run first inning that sent him to the showers after recording just two outs. Shows you what I know. The Astros bats helped dig out from that hole, with Jeremy Peña homering in the bottom of the first, Cam Smith homering in the second, and Jose Altuve going deep in the fourth. The only problem was that the guy who gave up those homers, Sox starter Sean Burke, didn't put anyone on in front of them so they were just solo jobs.

Flash forward to the top of the sixth and the Sox got runners on first and second for Chase Meidroth. He squared to bunt at the outset, which seemed like a bad move, but it helped cover a double steal by pulling third baseman Isaac Paredes off the bag so no play could be made. So, with two runners in scoring position Meidroth was freed from bunting responsibilities – if he really was bunting; now that I think about it he was probably just showing it to aid the steal – and he smacked a homer way the hell out to left off of Bryan Abreu to make it 7-3. Let the record show that the play-by-play guy here, Tom McCarthy, knows the difference between a fly ball and a homer and he called it off the bat.

And that was basically that, as Houston went quietly the rest of the way. After which they heard no small number of boos from the home faithful whom they yelled at for booing them on Tuesday.

The White Sox win a postseason series for the first time since they beat the Astros in the World Series 21 years ago and now head to Cleveland, with the chances of my dream scenario – an all-Midwestern World Series – closer today than they were yesterday.

In the meantime, Munetaka Murakami's champagne celebration interviews continue to be absolute appointment viewing.

Yankees 9, Red Sox 2: The Yankees, on the other hand, got a second straight night of great starting pitching with Max Fried allowing just one over six. It was a close one until the sixth, however, when the Bombers put up a six-spot, capped by a three-run homer from Cody Bellinger. He singled in a run as well. Every Yankees starter had a hit. And, for the second night in a row, they did much better against the Sox bullpen than the Sox starter. In related news, the starter in this one, Sonny Gray, (4.2 IP, 6 H, 2 ER, 5K) voiced his displeasure at his manager for pulling him after only 70 pitches, believing that he had a lot more in the tank. Not that it mattered much given that Boston scored only two runs and managed only four hits.

I'd say that the Red Sox postseason ended with a whimper, but it pretty much started with one and they remained whimpering for 18 straight innings. And because this one ended a little after 11pm, they can't even say they played October baseball in 2026. The Yankees, on the other hand, are on their way to Tampa Bay.

Padres 4, Cubs 1: The Cubs join the Red Sox in Club Whimper after having their bats shut down again by Padres pitching. This time it was Nick Pivetta allowing one run while working into the fourth and four relievers combining for five and two-thirds innings of scoreless relief. San Diego plated two in the second on a Xander Bogaerts RBI single and a sac fly from catcher Ethan Salas who, just by his mere presence in the lineup became, at age the youngest-ever catcher to appear in a postseason game. Once again he beats out since Pudge Rodríguez who set the old record in 1991. Gavin Sheets turned a 2-1 game into a 4-1 game with a pinch-hit three-run homer in the fourth.

Bye-bye Cubs. You have been outlasted in these playoffs by the White Sox. The Padres, meanwhile, now must fly to Milwaukee.

The Daily Briefing

Bennett Sousa apologizes after realizing how dumb he was

The Astros' season is over so this probably doesn't matter anymore but I wrote it before they were eliminated and who am I to throw out perfectly average words?

On Tuesday night Astros reliever Bennett Sousa ripped Houston fans for not selling out the game and for booing him after he spiked a couple of sliders, one of which allowed a run to score. His comments:

"The fans here are definitely spoiled with a lot of ALCS and World Series runs, and we have to earn that right to bring this team back to that position. That being said, when this team was in their first [playoff] series 10 years ago, Minute Maid Park was probably packed. It makes a big difference. If we were in Chicago, it'd probably be loud as shit."

I have no idea how a guy can make it to the major leagues and not understand how bleedin' stupid it is to say something like that. How he can't appreciate, even when he's smarting after a loss, that comments like that are never, ever going to play well. But I guess they pay him to pitch, not to think.

Anyway, someone in the Astros organization got to him after that and made him try to fix it. His apology from yesterday afternoon:

“I’m sorry for the comments I made about our fanbase. Anyone that knows me knows how much I care about this organization, this city and our fans. This team took me in four years ago when I was at my lowest, and they’ve seen me at my highest. I feel really bad about last night. One thing I would love for people to know is no matter how bad they feel about me or anything like that, that I’m feeling it 10 times worse.”

Not much else you can say, but sorry my man, you already killed the vibes and, as noted up in the recaps, the boo birds came out again as the Astros collected their gear in advance of their long winter's nap.

First baseman Christian Walker also had some comments on Tuesday:

“It’s extremely frustrating as a home player. We’re here, playing at home; we need cheers. We need energy. We don’t need boos. What purpose does that serve in that moment? Whatever fans are feeling, we’re feeling it tenfold. We’re the ones out there. We’re the ones in the fight. We worked our butts off this whole season to put ourselves in this spot, and for guys to get booed, it’s frustrating.”

I didn't see if he apologized, but again, it doesn't matter. Once you get into it with your own fans you're done. It takes an offseason – and a purposefully-placed feature story with a local beat writer, next February, just before his arbitration hearing in which Sousa talks about how much he learned from all of this and is a better person because of it – to fix that at best.

MLB attendance was up for the fourth straight year

I had an item on attendance being up this year a couple of weeks ago, but now that the season is over the official numbers are in we can officially say that Major League Baseball enjoyed its best attendance since 2017:

Teams averaged 29,589 for 2,425 dates, a 0.4% increase from the average of 29,471 last year, when attendance totaled 71.4 million. MLB attendance has risen in four straight seasons for the first time since 2004-07.

The raw numbers: 71,409,421 in 2025 and 71,752,722 in 2026.

The Rays had the biggest increase, going up by over 600,000. That, of course, was because they spent 2025 at Steinbrenner Field, the New York Yankees' spring training ballpark, due to damage to Tropicana Field from Hurricane Milton. Steinbrenner Field's max capacity for Rays games was 10,046. This year, back home, they drew an average of 17,469 per game.

Other big gainers included the White Sox, Blue Jays, and Mariners. Losers: the New York Mets, who dropped by 472,450 to 2,712,120. Houston fell by 255,759, Kansas City dropped by 221,703, while Arizona, Atlanta, Cincinnati, Colorado and Philadelphia all experienced decreases of 100,000 to 200,000.

So, but for the Rays anomaly, it was actually down a tad, but not in any crazy way. Things are still pretty strong on the attendance front. So its a perfect time, I figure, to lock out the players and piss off fans for a while. That's just smart business.

Other Stuff

Time Outs

Yesterday, at long last, I got the cortisone shot in my shoulder I'd been waiting for. It already feels better and it's supposed to be much improved within a day or two. Thank the maker. Go steroids.

When I got home I got the usual post-doctor's visit email from MyChart, logged on, and looked at the treatment notes because I always find them kinda interesting. On it I read something I hadn't seen before, probably because I've not had many medical procedures in my life:

Timeout: Immediately prior to procedure a time out was called to verify the correct patient, procedure, medication(s) and site/laterality as required.

After reading that I thought to myself, in Hubie Brown's voice, "that was a good time out right there . . . you gotta slow the game down a bit; can't inject the wrong shoulder, Verne." I'm oh so witty and clever when no one else is around.

Not an hour after that I read a horrible story about a woman who went in for surgery to have her cancerous lower right leg amputated but when she woke up it turned out that the surgical team had removed the left leg. She still had to have her right leg removed so now she's a double amputee who has filed a righteous damn lawsuit. From the story:

According to the complaint, the medical team had two surgical "time-outs" before Jacks’ procedure. The lawsuit notes that "time-outs" are conducted to confirm the patient’s identity, the planned operation and the correct surgical location before an incision is made.

I had never heard the phrase "time out" in connection with medical procedures until literally 12:45 yesterday afternoon and then I encountered it again before 2pm. It's weird when that happens.

Also, check out this crisis management communication from the hospital after everyone figured out that they amputated the wrong leg:

Selby General Hospital confirmed an "adverse surgical event" happened in September 2025, saying the surgical team "responded immediately to address the medical needs of the patient involved and provide support to their family."

I haven't seen ass-covering euphemisms like that since I watched "Chernobyl." Amazingly, however, the heartfelt words about how professionally everyone responded after they chopped off someone's healthy leg didn't smooth everything over. Weird.

I often wonder what I'd do with myself if the newsletter died tomorrow. As time goes on it's become more of a worry than a wonder seeing as though the only professional skills I have of any kind are now 17 years out of date and counting. But I bet I could do crisis communications.

Everyone is so bad at it! No one seems to realize that you can go all the way up to the line of admitting liability and still be in the clear, so the don't put enough faux compassion in their statements. There's way more wiggle room to approximate something approaching humanity in these things, and I bet I could do it good enough that smartasses who spend too much time online wouldn't mock me for it.

Anyhoo, my shoulder is feeling 1,000 times better this morning.

With friends like these . . .

Shot:

United States President Donald Trump has announced that he will spend 32 days travelling and campaigning for the midterm elections in November, which will decide which party controls Congress.

Chaser:

Ken Paxton, the Republican nominee for Senate in Texas, told a group of conservative donors and lobbyists last week that President Trump’s midterm convention in Dallas had hurt Mr. Paxton politically, according to an audio recording obtained by The New York Times.

The recording, which is muffled at times, captures Mr. Paxton being asked, “Do you feel like he’s a little bit of a drag?” It is not clear from the audio whom the questioner is referring to.

Mr. Paxton responds: “So to be honest with you, the numbers — when we did that convention — it dropped our numbers. Everybody’s numbers dropped. Right now, yeah, not good.”

Maybe it was "not clear from the question" in the mind of the New York Times reporter, but it was obvious in context that Paxton was saying that Trump's "help" is dragging him down.

I get a lot of solicitations for political donations, most of which I ignore, but I will heartily contribute to whatever fund will keep Trump out there on the campaign trail for the next month.

This will be in the documentary

One day there will be a wonderful in-depth documentary about just how deep the rot went in the AI bubble before it burst, and it will likely include the fact that the White House/technology industry accord on AI that was signed on September 29, 2026 misspelled United States as “Unites States”:

I screw up like that in this space fairly often but I'm a one-man operation doing nothing particularly important. Imagine how many eyes are available to review presidential decrees like this but which simply . . . aren't. Then ask yourself how many other sloppy and slapdash things are being done by this administration. Apart from the hundreds or maybe thousands we already know about.

The "Avengers: Doomsday" vibes are so bad

As a degenerate MCU guy I'm totally gonna go see "Avengers: Doomsday" when it comes out. And I want it to be good – I really do, because I've devoted so much of my pathetic goddamn life to these movies – but I gotta tell ya, I'm not expecting much.

It's a vibes thing, based primarily on the marketing. Mostly the soft marketing in the form of constant, obviously AI-generated Instagram content that is desperately attempting to make people feel like everyone is talking about "Avengers: Doomsday." Maybe they would've done this in 2016 with "Civil War" or back in 2008 with "Iron Man" as well, but the chatter surrounding the older movies seemed way more organic while this just seems like they're pressing, ya know?

Even the official stuff from the studio and the creative team seems kinda sweaty, though. Like, I keep seeing stuff like this:

Marvel fans need to prepare for "a very surprising ending" to Avengers: Doomsday, directors Joe and Anthony Russo have teased . . . "I think people are going to be surprised," Joe Russo teased. "It's a very surprising ending. It's a very surprising movie and that's all we'll say about it."

Maybe I'm just forgetting, but I feel like with "Infinity War" and "Endgame" they simply surprised audiences – and did so quite effectively! – without saying they were going to. I suppose seven years of mostly meh product since then has destroyed the presumption of quality Marvel movies used to enjoy inspires such carnival barking, but I don't feel like it's a great sign.

Then there's this:

Speaking to Fandango, Anthony Russo described the upcoming Marvel blockbuster as a "focused propulsive narrative," while still weighing in as one of the studio's longest films to date.

As you might expect from a movie with such a large cast, Avengers: Doomsday will clock in around the "two-and-half hour" mark, though even the Russos are unlikely to know the exact runtime just yet as reshoots were believed to be taking place only this month to add even more material.

I'm not a Hollywood insider, but I've paid close enough attention to movie business over the years to know that "reshoots two and a half months before the release of a movie which originally wrapped production in September 2025" is a bad, bad sign. That strikes me as evidence that the Russos had the film in the can, then showed it to executives and various people who freaked out about major flaws and ordered reshoots in an effort to make it coherent. It's exactly what happened with "Captain America: Brave New World" and that thing was about the biggest turd ever.

So: desperate, thirsty marketing and last-minute reshoots of a film that was greenlit well over two years ago? Sounds dire.

I'll be there on Opening Night.

Have a great day everyone.