On pins and creedals

Posted on June 8, 2012 by Jorge Costales

Fans have a creed too.  Unlike the Church, ours is not spelled out or even welcoming.  Our creed is a winnowing process based on loyalty.  Doubting one’s team in between playoff games earns you a lifetime ban from this church. You show loyalty to a team whose ownership are cartoonishly dishonest about their business dealings, we are impressed.

Think about it. Since the end of the 2005 season, being a loyal Marlins fan would put you near the top of the Fan pyramid as surely as Gordon Cooper was atop the Astronaut pyramid on May 21st 1963. The Marlins had at least one fan with the right stuff.  His name was Louis Mendez, Sr. and the stuff he used were commemorative pins.

Louis Mendez, Sr. – The Pin Man

I’ve heard it mentioned–and I agree in part since I was there with a few of my Emmaus brothers–that if we had to pinpoint the moment the Miami Marlins began benefiting from a home field advantage at their new ballpark, it happened in a May 21st game against the Colorado Rockies. In the 4th inning of that game, Giancarlo Stanton hit a bases loaded home run against Jamie Moyer. That’s one way to describe it.

Here’s another. A 22 year-old hit a grand slam off a 49 year-old pitcher who was was in MLB before the hitter was born. The pitch came in at 72 mph and came off the bat at a record speed of 122 mph.  It was a home run even a Roy Hobbs would have bragged about, if he drank.

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LeBron James favorite new latrine

Posted on June 6, 2012 by Jorge Costales

Good news for Heat: Lebron James puts Kevin Garnett’s big mouth to good use. 

Bad news [ode to Zaslow] for Celtics:  King James is not finished.  Whole lotta chowda.

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Process of elimination

Posted on June 6, 2012 by Jorge Costales

Here’s why the Miami Heat losing game 5 at home could be a good thing.  The Heat would not have home court advantage in the Finals against either the Spurs or the Thunder. Which means that they would likely have to win more than one game on the road and possibly an elimination game.

Winning elimination games is one of those things that no one can predict until it happens. The Heat today don’t appear to be capable of doing so. Only if they win on Thursday will they appear capable. Which is why most post-game analysis is worthless with respect to future games. Unless of course you heard anyone predicting that Mickael Pietrus would hit 2 big 3’s down the stretch of game 5 on the road.

So as a Heat fan, more than analysts opinion, I’d like to know how typical it is to win elimination games in the playoffs. In addition, we’ll expand the period reviewed in cases where the teams have been together for a while.  So in our example, we’ll go back a number of years for Boston and San Antonio, but only to last year for Miami.

Look at the records below.  Nobody’s record looks all that clutch.  What’s real is the advantage of playing at home against a lower seed.  That’s not Thursday’s scenario.  I also believe that Miami’s chances in the Finals will be better if they get there this way as opposed to just winning their home games against Boston.  That’s why the game 5 loss might be a positive for the ultimate goal.

As usual we turn to Puzo’s masterpiece for the definitive outlook for the Miami Heat in game 6 on the road; Difficult not impossible.

Miami Heat – Core squad elimination games record — 0-1:

  • 2012 — TBD
  • 2011 — 0-1 — Lost game 6 at home vs Dallas – Finals

Boston Celtics – Core squad elimination games record — 4-3:

  • 2012 — 1-0 — Won game 7 at home vs Philadelphia [8th seed]
  • 2011 — 0-1 — Lost game 5 on the road vs Miami [2nd seed]
  • 2010 — 0-1 — Lost game 7 on the road vs Los Angeles – Finals
  • 2009 — 1-1 — Won game 7 at home vs Chicago [7th seed] / Lost game 7 at home vs Orlando [3rd seed]
  • 2008 — 2-0 — Won game 7 at home vs Atlanta [8th seed] / Won game 7 at home vs Cleveland [4th seed] / Won NBA championship

San Antonio Spurs – Core squad elimination games record — 5-4:

  • 2012 — 0-0 — TBD
  • 2011 — 1-1 – Won game 5 at home vs Memphis [8th seed] / Lost game 6 on the road vs Memphis
  • 2010 — 0-1 — Lost game 4 at home vs Phoenix [3rd seed]
  • 2009 —  0-1 — Lost game 5 at home vs Dallas [6th seed]
  • 2008 — 2-0 — Won game 6 at home vs New Orleans [2nd seed] / Won game 7 on the road vs New Orleans [2nd seed]
  • 2007 — No elimination games – won NBA championship
  • 2006 — 2-1 — Won game 5 at home vs Dallas [4th seed] / Won game 6 on the road vs Dallas / Lost game 7 at home vs Dallas

Oklahoma City – Core squad elimination games record — 1-2:

  • 2012 — 0-0
  • 2011 — 1-1 — Won game 7 at home vs Memphis [8th seed] / Lost game 5 on the road vs Dallas [3rd seed]
  • 2010 — 0-1 — Lost game 6 at home vs Los Angeles [1st seed]
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John Wooden and what’s important

Posted on May 28, 2012 by Jorge Costales

A man of great Christian faith and a great American passed in June of 2010, a few months shy of turning 100. The Christian in me was happy for his Judgment Day and much anticipated reunion wife his wife of 53 years, Nellie. Just how anticipated was that reunion? He had written her a love letter [see video – no really, please see this 4 minute video] every 21st of the month, the date she passed, which remain unopened literally on her side of the bed — for the last 25 years.

In a November 2004 Science of Mind article by Mitch Horowitz, Wooden describes how their relationship got started:

I was baptized with the young woman who was to be my wife later on, the only girl I ever dated, in 1927. We were juniors in high school and she was the only girl I ever went with and we had a relationship and she suggested that we join at the same time. I don’t want to say that I accepted Christ at that particular time because of the fact that I did this primarily because she wanted me to. But my acceptance came gradually as time went by.

Also in the Horowitz article, Wooden’s religious faith is discussed:

Wooden took great solace from the Bible, a copy of which sits in each room of his home today. His favorite passage, 1 Corinthians 13, reads in part: “Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.” It is yet another theme that marks his life: “I do believe that adversity makes you stronger,” he says, “And I do believe in many ways, perhaps not in financial ways, that adversity from hard work does make you able to accept the more difficult things as they would come along later in your life.”

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In the name of the Son and imperfection

Posted on May 24, 2012 by Jorge Costales

One of my favorite writers is the columnist George Will. Will wrote about his son on his 40th birthday:

Jon was born just 19 years after James Watson and Francis Crick published their discoveries concerning the structure of DNA, discoveries that would enhance understanding of the structure of Jon, whose every cell is imprinted with Down syndrome. Jon was born just as prenatal genetic testing, which can detect Down syndrome, was becoming common. And Jon was born eight months before Roe v. Wade inaugurated this era of the casual destruction of pre-born babies.
….
Judging by Jon, the world would be improved by more people with Down syndrome, who are quite nice, as humans go. It is said we are all born brave, trusting and greedy, and remain greedy. People with Down syndrome must remain brave in order to navigate society’s complexities. They have no choice but to be trusting because, with limited understanding, and limited abilities to communicate misunderstanding, they, like Blanche DuBois in “A Streetcar Named Desire,” always depend on the kindness of strangers. Judging by Jon’s experience, they almost always receive it.

Two things that have enhanced Jon’s life are the Washington subway system, which opened in 1976, and the Washington Nationals baseball team, which arrived in 2005. He navigates the subway expertly, riding it to the Nationals ballpark, where he enters the clubhouse a few hours before game time and does a chore or two. The players, who have climbed to the pinnacle of a steep athletic pyramid, know that although hard work got them there, they have extraordinary aptitudes because they are winners of life’s lottery. Major leaguers, all of whom understand what it is to be gifted, have been uniformly and extraordinarily welcoming to Jon, who is not.

The above picture beautifully embodies what Tommy Lasorda always made baseball fans feel like. The entire column is copied at the end of the post.

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Broadcaster narratives unencumbered by facts

Posted on May 23, 2012 by Jorge Costales

Watch any sport too closely and you will be driven to distraction by broadcasters whose job it is to find a narrative that keeps the attention of the casual fan. We fanatics will watch no matter the storyline. In that way, broadcasters are like job resumes. If you are expecting the truth, you are missing the point.

In last night’s Miami Heat blowout of the Indianapolis-based Danny Granger-led guerrilla warriors — known for their fierce ability to rush up to opponents and speak words which leave opponents unaffected, but annoy referees — we had such a narrative.  The narrative was that Miami’s Dexter Pittman committed a premeditated dirty play against the Pacer’s Lance Stephenson for a choke signal Stephenson had directed against LeBron James earlier in the series.  I don’ think the facts support that narrative.

Here is the 4th quarter game log involving the 2 players:

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Dreaming of G.K. Chesterton in a blue sweater

Posted on May 21, 2012 by Jorge Costales

I’ve been trying to complete reading — I’ve mastered just starting the book — G.K. Chesterton’s book, Manalive for over a year. Also in the past year, I have been making great use of the Miami-Dade Public Library system. Whenever I come across a book which may interest me, I go online and request it. I’ll pop into my local library [Hispanic branch, just a Renyel Pinto toss from the OB2] every couple of weeks and pickup my requests. The library’s online system works beautifully.

On a whim [I allege], I recently requested the new Carly Simon biography, More Room in a Broken Heart. I didn’t actually intend to read it, I just meant to look through it to see if my impression of Mrs. Simon, mostly based on a quote I happened upon long ago, was accurate. Here’s the quote:

I was 11 when I went to see my first shrink. I’ve seen a number of different gurus … (I’ve done) TM, of course. I’ve gone to an astrologist; I’ve seen psychics; I’ve done carpentry workshops .. I’ve done bio-feedback, I’ve done hypnosis. It becomes habitual. It’s like what it says in the song: ‘She’s looking for a cure, she doesn’t exactly know what its for.’

Once opened, I could hardly put the book down. I made it through about 300 pages in 2 nights. It was embarrassing. I swear I could hear derisive laughter as I walked by my C.S. Lewis and Chesterton collection of garage sale paperbacks. What was next, I wondered, a People magazine subscription? Adding insult to injury, its not even supposed to be a good biography, one which focuses on the dysfunctional parts of her life.

The lady in the blue sweater is the look my brain registered for Mrs. Simon, back when my brain began registering such things. Poor Chesterton, his book patiently waits its turn, dependent solely on the force of his ideas. Meanwhile, other forces, registered long ago and with no apparent expiration date, jump the line.

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Through the eyes of a believer

Posted on May 18, 2012 by Jorge Costales

Quick, what do you see in the photo to the right? Go ahead and click on it, I’ll wait.

If you see the mid-section of a male who recently underwent successful bypass surgery, the good news is that you are accurate.  The bad news is that your logical answer is a likely indicator of an under-utilized imagination.  [Please contact me for your Republican Presidential absentee ballot]. Imagination is a definite requirement for our purposes here.

If you see the remnant of sutures on the lower abdomen which remind you of Goldfish crackers, you at least show more imagination than the previous Republican. However, your answer also reveals an Oprah-esque appetite which makes this photo an eerie preview of how your own chest cavity might appear in the not too distant future.

What the subject of this photo saw when he peered down his own chest was a reminder of God in the form of an Ichthys, the popular symbol of Christianity.

An over-active imagination? Perhaps. But our subject did not arrive at his perspective lightly or alone.

Far from alone, our subject’s perspective dovetails nicely with that advocated by the great Christian writer, G.K. Chesterton. Garry Wills describes Chesterton’s style:

… the representation of familiar things from unsuspected angles, under new lights of the imagination, that we might see them with the innocence of surprise.

Go figure. Part of maturing in the faith entails retaining, or recapturing, our imagination and innocence. As Jesus implored, becoming “like little children” [Mt 18:3].

Getting back to our photo. Are you child enough to look past the scar? To the Grace behind a second chance. Or to the miracle of medical advances, in that the surgery did not exist when our subject was born.

If not a God, can you sense a certain ‘magic’ in this world? If you can, that’s good enough for now. Chesterton himself was not always a believer. But he did always have a sense of magic in or about the world. That appreciation one day led him to wonder that if the world had magic, might it also involve a magician?

Click here for more quotes from a trio of Englishmen born in the 19th century whose talents have fueled many imaginations into the 21st.

Thanks to Anaut for agreeing to have the surgery in order to facilitate this blog post. Talk about taking one for the team.

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Dwyane Wade evolves into Rasheed Wallace

Posted on May 15, 2012 by Jorge Costales

We knew that change was inevitable, but did Wade have to end up like Rasheed Wallace? To today’s equivalent of a young Wade, Giancarlo Stanton, we offer a cautionary tale.

Like almost all Miami Heat fans since 2003, I quickly became a big Dwyane Wade fan. As the franchise moved on from the Hardaway and Mourning era, Wade was a great surprise. While he was the 5th player taken in the draft, so were Jonathan Bender and Nickoloz Tskitishvili. Plus he was a shooting guard with no jumper. Everybody thought it at the time, so let’s just put it out there … Harold Miner.

A good rookie year was followed by a breakthrough 2004 playoff series against Indiana. This guy was different. He just might be great. Someone who embraced, and then came to personify, the mental toughness brand instilled by Pat Riley on the franchise. He didn’t even have visible tattoo’s, this guy was the anti-Iverson.

That was then. Today, Wade’s lack of hustle — in the playoff’s, playoffs! — even made it into an Ira Winderman column. Here’s what Wade’s game logs would look like if he got every call he acts as though he deserves [basketball gods must be wondering what they created during the 2006 Finals]:

Click to enlarge

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Finally, a transcendent NBA boxscore

Posted on May 1, 2012 by Jorge Costales

All other sports pale in comparison to the beauty of MLB boxscores, but the recent Clippers victory over the Grizzlies did produce one worthy of a ‘capture/screenshot’ due to the following:

Every Clippers starter had a negative ‘+/-‘ and every Clippers reserve had a positive ‘+/-‘

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