Month: September 2020 (Page 2 of 2)

2020 NFL Predictions

Over the weekend I dug into the blog archives a little bit. I would pull up a random month from the past and scroll through the entries, skimming any that jumped out at me. I had thought a good quarantine project would be to re-read through the entire history of the site, but I never got around to that. Maybe that can be a winter project.

As I went through Septembers of the past, I realized to keep with precedent, I should throw together some NFL predictions for the upcoming season. Who knows how long the season will last and what it will look like as it progresses. And we all know who is going to win the hypothetical Super Bowl, baring an injury to one particular player. So maybe this is a waste of time and space. But seems like I should post something to keep up with history.

These are always half-assed, as I loathe the NFL offseason and all the hype that comes with it. This was an especially odd off-season, though, so I anticipate even more “I didn’t know that guy was on that team!” moments in the first month of the year than usual. Which makes these even more half-assed. And that seems appropriate for 2020!

AFC East

New England. Yeah, yeah, I know. But seriously, you trust Buffalo over Belichick? Come on. I also happen to think Cam Newton is going to do just fine and Josh McDaniels will embrace the options Cam offers that Tom Brady didn’t. The Pats might only be 9–7, but I can’t believe the Bills will win 10 games.

AFC North

Baltimore. I’m not sure I believe all the hype on Lamar Jackson. He’s definitely an amazing player. But I wonder if everything he did last year is repeatable. Or at least repeatable at the same level, or higher, that he did in 2019. Even if he’s only 75% of last year, that still means the Ravens are the best team in the division.

AFC South

Phillip Fucking Rivers. I hate that guy. And I hate that the Colts signed him. One of my brothers-in-law has been sending me pictures of Rivers all summer saying, “This is your quarterback.” My response is always, “Fuck that guy.” Houston really should be the favorite here. But since Bill O’Brien seems intent on crippling Deshaun Watson, I will say Indianapolis, provided that fucker Rivers stays healthy.

(Seriously, we should be in the midst of a glorious run where Patrick Mahomes, Andrew Luck, and Watson are battling each other every year. Luck is gone and Watson is never going to have all the weapons he needs. I feel cheated, and not just because Luck was a Colt. That was good football watching for a decade or more that will fall short of its potential.)

AFC West

Kind of weird that as soon as the Tom Brady era ends, the Patrick Mahomes era begins. You can just pencil in Kansas City as long as he remains upright. Concerns about the defense? Sure. But how many teams are going to be able to go toe-to-toe with the Chiefs offense for 60 minutes?

AFC Wild Cards

Pittsburgh, Cleveland

NFC East

Philadelphia. Like most of the NFC, I don’t love a team in this division. The Cowboys have a higher ceiling, but I trust the Eagles to play closer to their ceiling more than I do Dallas.

NFC North

Green Bay. Is Aaron Rodgers still Aaron Rodgers? Is the chip on his shoulder getting bigger the deeper he gets into his career without another Super Bowl? Will Minnesota have a few key injuries that destroy their hopes for a division title? Yes to all.

NFC South

New Orleans. One last go-around for Brees and Payton?

NFC West

Seattle. Not a sexy pick, but they are reliable and I feel like the 49ers will fall back some this year.

NFC Wild Cards

San Francisco, Minnesota

Playoffs

New England over Cleveland
Baltimore over Pittsburgh

New England over Indianapolis
Kansas City over Baltimore

Kansas City over New England

Green Bay over Minnesota
Philadelphia over San Francisco

Seattle over Philadelphia
New Orleans over Green Bay

New Orleans over Seattle

Super Bowl

Get extra bulbs for the scoreboard in Tampa, because the Chiefs and Saints are going to light it up.

Kansas City 45, New Orleans 42

Take these to your favorite betting app and lock that shit in!

Post Holiday Notes

A late return after the long holiday weekend. My in-laws have been in town since last Wednesday, which has adjusted my daily routine a little.

Our Labor Day weekend was pretty low-key. Friday night was so cool that we kicked on the outdoor fireplace for the first time this season. A couple of the girls hung out with friends on Saturday. On Sunday we hosted a light family gathering at the pool.

Last week we had absolutely perfect, early fall-like weather. Windows open at night, the air on for maybe a couple hours in the afternoon. Summer came roaring back yesterday, though. I played golf in the morning and my shirt was completely soaked before I hit the fourth tee. I think it’s the hottest round of golf I played this season. Sadly the word “hottest” only applies to the weather and not to my game. More on that whenever I get around to another golf post.


We are in our final week of kickball. Last night C’s team had a 10-run lead at one point and then had a couple bad innings on offense, but still went into the final inning with a three-run lead. They got two of the first four kickers out and seemed on the verge of their second win of the year. Then their opponents suddenly kicked the ball better than they had all game, our defense let us down, and we gave up 15 runs. We could only muster one run in our half of the 7th and gave our opponents their first win of the season. I should be used to how C and her teammates fold under any kind of negativity but last night really stuck with me. The team they played were not very good but our girls just kind of meandered through the game. They could have easily doubled their lead, perhaps even run-ruled the other team. And then that last defensive inning really sucked.

They have the final game of their careers on Thursday.

L’s last game is tonight. She’s been threatening to not play kickball anymore for over a year now, but this could for sure be her final game, depending what she does in the spring and if she is still interested in club soccer a year from now.

Her basketball team has had five practices. We tried to put some offense in yesterday. It’s a pretty simple five-out, motion offense, but it does take some time to understand where the cuts are, where you move to when the girl next to you moves, where the open spot the cutter should end up in is, etc. I’m hoping they can grasp it in time for games so we aren’t running the same plays we’ve been running for five years.


We’ve had very good luck with phones, both S and I, and M and C since they got theirs. We’ve never cracked a screen, permanently lost one, dropped one into a lake, etc. C’s phone is suddenly acting super wonky, though. Taps on the screen are not registering while phantom taps can take over and launch apps or attempt to make calls she wasn’t trying to initiate. It was almost like the phone had been hacked and someone else was controlling it.

Last night I did all the troubleshooting I could – hard resets, restoring the software, etc. – and nothing seemed to work. This morning I took the case off and it seemed to be working more normally. At least there aren’t the phantom taps. But a section of the screen still appears not to work. She drops it roughly 175 times a day so I would not be surprised if something inside has become disconnected even if the screen has not shattered.

L is pretty excited that she finally gets a phone of her own when her birthday rolls around in four weeks.


C’s grade had their first student test Covid positive since classes began this week. Fortunately the student was not in her room so we just got the generic email from the principal rather than a call.

Those calls are what all us parents fear right now. The call to come get your kid because they’ve been exposed, their siblings also need to go home, and your entire household probably needs to be tested. Thus I puckered up a little bit this morning when I got a call from school. Thank goodness it was just L asking me to bring her the homework binder she had left at home.

Friday Playlist

Let’s see what I can whip up for you this week. Some old stuff, some new stuff. All good stuff.

“You Got The Love” – Rufus & Chaka Khan
This week I read a long interview with Ray Parker, Jr. He seems like a pretty cool dude and has had an amazing career. He wrote this song with Chaka back in 1974. I had never heard it before but he mentions it in the piece. I immediately listened to it, and immediately loved it. A reminder than young Chaka was a foxy force of nature. This was the first song Parker Jr. wrote that became a mainstream radio hit. He had a few others over the next decade.

“Princess Pouty” – Ian Isiah
I’ve read a little about Isiah. He is an interesting cat, for sure. And this song…well it is interesting, too. There’s some Prince in there. But I also hear a lot of Prince-influenced acts that came later in the ’80s. I don’t know that I love this song, but I definitely like it a lot.

“The Fair” – Total Revenge
Now for something completely different, this abrasive track sounds straight out of the mid-90s.

“This Feeling Is Disgusting” – Mourn
Iiiiiiiitsucks. Kind of sums up 2020.

“Summertime” – Drew Citron
Enjoy the last weekend of the summer of 2020.

“So Good To Me” – Chris Malinchak
No one should ever remake any of the songs Tammi Terrell and Marvin Gaye recorded together. There were too perfect and no combination of voices can ever match what that duo created. Seven years ago DJ Chris Malinchak took a few snippets from “If This World Were Mine” and layered them over some beats and synths. It was brilliant, both in its original sound and in how it honored a Terrell/Gaye classic.

August Media

Funny what happens when sports come back. My media consumption was waaaay down in August. Or at least compared to the previous five months. Here is what I did knock out.


Jayhawkers

I remember when this movie was made. Justin Wesley, a recent KU basketball player and brother of former KU great Keith Langford, was cast in the main role as Wilt Chamberlain. A KU professor – Academy Award winner Kevin Willmott – was making the film. A few other notable locals from Lawrence had cameos. But it was a low-budget, semi-artsy film that never got a wide release, so I forgot about it.

Until July, when The New Yorker ran a piece about it. I had no idea the film was on Amazon Prime Video, so I added it to the queue.

It is a charming, well-intentioned film that also comes off as slightly stilted with a touch of cheese to it.

It is the story of how Wilt Chamberlain came to play basketball at the University of Kansas over hundreds of other offers he had, and his experiences during his time in Lawrence. The final 20 minutes are an extended retelling of one of the greatest NCAA championship games of all time, the 1957 game when North Carolina beat Wilt’s Jayhawks in triple overtime. It was a game that colored Wilt’s career forever and kept him from returning to Lawrence over 40 years.

The film plays a little fast-and-loose with the facts. Things that happened one year are pushed a year in either direction. Watching you would think that Wilt left campus immediately after that 1957 loss when he, in fact, played one more frustrating season before jumping to the Harlem Globetrotters for a year before becoming eligible to play in the NBA.

The film is honest in painting a picture of the Midwest in the late ‘50s. Although coach Phog Allen was careful to present Lawrence as an oasis from the racism that Wilt experienced in his previous travels outside Philadelphia, Wilt quickly runs into issues getting served at restaurants, being allowed to sit in regular seats at movies, and so on. But through Phog’s influence, the support of chancellor Franklin Murphy, the desire of the community for the team to win another national championship, and Wilt’s charisma, rules begin to bend for him.

Wesley is not a strong actor, and isn’t given too much. The loquacious Wilt the world would eventually meet is reduced to a man who nods and offers brief comments. But Wesley was a tall basketball player and could imitate Wilt for the action scenes.

As I said, it tries a little too hard at times. But it isn’t terrible. For KU fans, it’s a look at a fascinating point in the program’s history.

B


The Battered Bastards of Baseball

There are lots of reasons to love baseball. One of the most romantic is the idea of the small-town professional team, where the community rallies around a group of players who are mostly passing through on their way up or down the minor league ladder. Once upon a time the country was dotted with hundreds of independent teams, playing the lowest levels of baseball and giving countless men one last chance at the game.

By the early 1970s the independent teams had largely been wiped out, replaced by teams controlled by big league teams. Actor Bing Russell saw an opening in Portland as a chance to correct that and fulfill his longtime wish to own a team.

This film reviews his ownership of the Portland Mavericks, an independent, Class A team that played in the Northwest League from 1973 until 1977. The franchise was true to its name. Russell ran the club unlike any other in baseball. He kind of had to; with no MLB affiliation he had to take a different route to build a roster. The team was built on rejects and castoffs.[1] They played with an attitude and freedom uncommon in pro ball outside of Oakland.

To the surprise of nearly everyone, it worked. They won their division in their first season, finished second in year two, and then won their next three division titles. Their success rekindled a love for baseball in Portland, which had seen the AAA Beavers move to Spokane in 1972. Perhaps because of this newfound enthusiasm for the game, or perhaps out of an effort to run Russell out of the league, the Pacific Coast League expanded in 1978 and a new Beavers franchise replaced the Mavericks. Rather than take baseball’s paltry $25,000 relocation fee, Russell sued and won a $250,000 settlement.

This is just a fun, funny movie. It’s a great story, well told. And it makes you want to fall in love with some goofy team that nobody thinks can win.

A


Ted Lasso

I had no idea Apple was making a Ted Lasso series, based on the commercials from a few years back for Premier League soccer. Then I read this piece and figured, “Why not?”

Like that article, I was shocked at how much I enjoyed the show. Everything about it seems to be screaming “This is going to be terrible!” But it’s not. It is warm and kind-hearted and full of humorous moments. It may be the times we are living in, when every day seems more horrible than the one before, but I think I needed a show like this, that even with characters who are caustic and cynical, ultimately bends back toward empathy and kindness.

I have a huuuuuuge issue with the show, though. Everything we know about Ted Lasso leads us to believe he’s from Kansas. He coached a mythical Wichita State football team to the D2 national title. He wears shirts that represent Kansas City. He mentions KC being home a few times. But he talks like he’s from the south. And Jason Sudeikis is from Kansas City; he knows how we sound! Sure, there’s the classic, Midwestern hick accent that far too many people from my hometown have. But what he’s doing ain’t that; it that of an old ball coach from the Deep South. Maybe he figured since that’s the voice he used in the original commercials he couldn’t stray from it. Alas…

B+


The Endless Summer

I know I watched this, or at least parts of it, years and years ago. In high school, maybe? Or perhaps college. Something reminded me of it, I saw it on Amazon, and decided to rewatch it.

If you’ve never seen it, it is considered one of the greatest and most influential surfing movies ever. Filmed in the early 1960s, filmmaker Bruce Brown travelled around the world with Mike Hynson and Robert August searching out waves and an “endless summer” as fall and winter descended on America. They surfed in West Africa, likely the first to ever surf there. In South Africa, which had a budding surf culture, they discovered the perfect wave at Cape St. Francis that became a “must surf” spot. They also hit Australia, New Zealand, Tahiti, and Hawaii.

The footage is amazing for its time. Well-shot to begin with, it is also crazy that everyone was using long boards back then. Today you see surfers on shorter boards and remaining pretty static on them. Brown, Hynson, and August would all walk their longboards, passing from front to back as they rode waves, which blew my mind.

Brown’s narration is casual and goofy, sounding more like your uncle who thinks he’s super funny while showing family movies. Some of the commentary when they are in Africa is borderline racist, but it was the early ‘60s and I don’t think there was any true ill will behind them.

B+


John Mulaney: New in Town

Man, Mulaney knows how to do a standup performance. This is the second of his specials I’ve watched, and each time he nails the timing of the show. You get people laughing early, slowly ramp up the laughs, and the last 15 minutes should have people crying. In this case, his story of trying to get anxiety meds by faking an issue with frequent urination had me laughing so hard, and crying so much, that S was a little worried about me.

A


Pearl Jam Live at Lollapalooza 2018

One night I was watching some golf videos or something on YouTube when I noticed this over on the right hand side of the screen in the suggestions. Two-plus hours, and two bourbons, later, I was deeply satisfied with my choice.

A+


  1. Russell’s son, Kurt, even played for the team in its first season.  ↩

Reader’s Notebook, 9/1/20

Three highly lauded books have kept me busy the past couple weeks.


Disappearing Earth – Julia Phillips
The last part of a book is so important to how readers feel about the entire story. This is an example of a book that was elevated by a nearly perfect ending.

It begins with the disappearance of two young sisters from Petropavlosk, the capital of the Russian region of Kamchatka. The rest of the book advances in one-month increments, with each chapter focused on a different person. Most of them are women, living in different cities in Kamchatka.

The woman are of all ages and stages of life. One is a student from a small town living in a big city, dealing with the racism of Russians against the natives. Another woman faces a cancer diagnosis. Another woman wakes on the anniversary of her first husband’s death and goes to bed that night grieving her second husband’s death. Another woman is trying to figure out where to take her current relationship, which is with a devastatingly handsome yet equally stupid man. Another family, both a sister and a mother, deal with the disappearance of their sister/daughter a few years before the girls from Petropavlovsk, and wonder if the disappearances are related and if their sister got less attention because she was a native rather than a Russian. Another woman, the only possible witness to the kidnapping of the two sisters, searches for her lost dog.

These stories – and more – are all interesting and moving. But I was wondering how they would be tied together and if the resolution would make the journey worth it.

Phillips nailed the final two chapters wonderfully. The next-to-last chapter focuses on the mother of the two disappeared girls. A reporter, she is sent to cover a native arts festival. While there she meets a man who, after hearing a description of the only suspect in the kidnapping, realizes he knows someone who fits that description. As the chapter tumbles toward its end, there is a persistent fear that there will be no connection between this lead and the woman’s daughters. And then the mother notices something tiny, that most people would have missed, that brings everything together.

In the final, wonderful chapter, Philips takes us right to the edge of a resolution for the book’s two big mysteries. But she never offers the final reveal, allowing the reader to wonder how that scene would play out. That is a little maddening, but it also works. It ranks up there with Ben H. Winters’ World of Trouble for vague yet satisfying endings.


The Splendid and the Vile – Erik Larson
My second Larson history focused on the World War II era in about a month. This one is about Winston Churchill’s first year as wartime Prime Minister, stretching from May 10, 1940 to May 11, 1941. That span also covers the very worst of the Battle of Britain, Germany’s relentless bombing campaign of British cities.

The book is not just about the war, the politics of the time, or a straight biography of Churchill. Rather, it tries to put all of those elements in context with the family members and staff that surrounded Churchill. By doing so, we get a more personalized look into what life was like in London during the very darkest days of the war (for the British).

As much as I enjoyed that, I could not help but crave for more details about the way itself. There were a few things I never knew. First, Hitler’s #2, Rudolph Hess flying a plane to the UK to attempt to negotiate a peace treaty and spending the bulk of the war as a prisoner. Second, that the British attacked French ships that refused to turn themselves over following the surrender of France. I can’t help that I get dazzled when you throw WWII into the mix.

I had never read any biography of Churchill before, so it was humorous to learn what a kook he was. He was absolutely loony. But he managed to stay focused enough to lead the British through a horrible time, and eventually convince Franklin Roosevelt that the UK was a worthy recipient for American aid in the months before Pearl Harbor brought the US into the war.


A Burning – Megha Majumdar
Here is an example of a book that takes a familiar situation and places it into an unfamiliar context to allow the reader to examine it without their own prejudices attached.

Majumdar’s book takes place in India, in a town where a commuter train has just been fire-bombed by terrorists, killing over a hundred people. Through the lives of three people, Majumdar shows the dangers of nationalism, social media, corrupt traditional media, and how the lure of success and prosperity can make people behave strangely.

Jivan is a young Muslim woman who was seen at the train station with a mysterious bundle before the attack, and then running from the station afterward. Her Facebook chat history shows contact with a suspected terrorist, but she claims it was innocent flirtation with an interesting boy from another country. The media takes this knowledge and runs with it, turning public opinion against her. Much of her story is told from inside the women’s prison where she is held while awaiting trial and, eventually, her sentence.

PT Sir was Jivan’s PE teacher at the private girls school she received admission to. Stumbling into an opposition party rally one day, he is swept up in the excitement of the crowd. At another rally, he uses his knowledge of microphones to help the party’s leader overcome a technical issue. After this unlikely meeting, he is soon asked to do other favors for the party: testify in court against people they insist are guilty but there just isn’t enough hard evidence to convict. He shows up, tells his stories, and gets convictions for the prosecutors. With this service come payments which begin to change his family’s life and how people view him. Soon he is an integral part of the party’s election campaign, and when they win the state elections, he receives a ministerial position. When the media ask him about his former student, he doesn’t tell them the parts of her life that could turn the public in her favor, but rather those details that make her look worse.

Finally, Lovely is a transvestite who is attempting to become an actress. She takes acting classes, where she seems to excel. However, each time she attempts to break into the world of big, Indian films, she is typecast in small roles in the background. The man she loved has left her for a “real woman” who can give him a family. At Jivan’s trial, Lovely testified on her behalf, as Jivan had been teaching her English. In fact, the package that Jivan had the night of the attack was not a bomb but rather old books she was taking to Lovely to help with her studies. However, after Lovely posts videos online that go viral, she is offered a major part in a movie by one of India’s biggest producers. When it is suggested that the movie will be more successful if she reverses her support of Jivan, she quickly abandons her former friend.

There is a constant feeling of injustice that bubbles through the book. The media rushing to judgement, bending facts to suit the story they want to tell. No one in power offering to defend Jivan. PT Sir lying on the stand over-and-over to take away power from minorities and political enemies of his party. Lovely getting the door slammed in her face constantly. A political party that uses ethnic identity, language, and religion and a wedge to both gain power and turn the state’s citizens against each other. The biggest injustice is Jivan’s sentence, which shows that a society motivated by hate and fear and needing someone to blame can manipulate the court system to levy a hideously unfair sentence on someone who was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

There’s a lot in the book about where America is right now, and where we could be headed. Which makes an already chilling book even more concerning.

Stats

August 2020

  • Taylor Swift – 51
  • Prince – 25
  • HAIM – 24
  • Land of Talk – 23
  • Pearl Jam – 20

Complete stats available at my Last.fm page.

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