What are we not aware of today?

Posted on May 1, 2011 by Jorge Costales

Quick test.  I will give you two sets of facts and events and you pick those which you think matter most today and beyond?  As background, assume we have been dropped into Poland in 1918?  Here are the first set of facts and events:

  • 1918 – Having been partitioned for 123 years among her three predatory neighbors–Russia, Prussia and Austria–the newly resurrected Polish Second Republic came into existence following WWI.
  • 1919 – Treaty of Versailles settled the German-Polish borders in the Baltic region.
  • 1919 – The Polish-Soviet war began.
  • 1932 – Poland signed a non-aggression pact with the Soviets.
  • 1934 – Poland concluded another pact, with Germany’s new Nazi government, subsequently rejecting French proposals for a security pact directed against Germany, as it involved no guarantee of Poland’s eastern frontier with the Soviet Union.
  • September 1939 – Germany invaded Poland. Continue reading →
Posted in Catholic Faith & Inspiration | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Jorge Ramos: Small man with even smaller ideas

Posted on April 30, 2011 by Jorge Costales
Ramos already standing on soapbox

Ramos already standing on a soapbox

Univision network’s diminutive anchorman, Jorge Ramos, has pointed his cannon at John Paul II and the Catholic Church. Fortunately for us Catholics, his is a short cannon with limp arguments, as I will detail, but first a little background.

Continue reading →

Posted in Catholic Faith & Inspiration | Tagged , , | 8 Comments

Worst Day At Miami High Still Pretty Good

Posted on April 25, 2011 by Jorge Costales

The Miami High Sports Hall of Fame welcomed eight new members in its 2011 induction ceremony April 16th at the Miami High Auditorium. There may have been a more diverse crowd gathered in Miami that night, but none with a similar level of affection for one another. Miami High succeeds where urban planners fail. One of the inductees, John McGriff ’73, commented during his acceptance remarks, “I had one bad day at Miami High, the day I had to leave.” Yup, I thought, same with me, Class of ’77. If life were a movie, I would have jumped up and yelled, Amen bother! But life is not a movie and I don’t know Mr. McGriff, who stands 6’3″ and weighed 245 lbs back in the day, so I settled for making a note in my program.

Continue reading →

Posted in 2TG Favorites, Miami Senior High | Tagged , , , , , | 4 Comments

The Empty Tomb in a Garden

Posted on April 24, 2011 by Jorge Costales

The Empty Tomb in a Garden

Have you ever reflected on the role gardens play in our Christian faith? Fr Valle has, an excerpt from his Easter homily:

It is very interesting that Mary ends up in a garden looking for Jesus. After all, this whole lovely and terrible game of sin and salvation began in a garden way back in Genesis. What began in the garden of Eden comes full circle in the garden of Joseph of Arimathea, where they buried the body of Jesus in an empty tomb.

The email address to request to be put on Vallee’s email distribution list is Cioran262@aol.com. To see the entire homily click on ‘read more.’ Search for other Fr Vallee homilies in this blog by entering ‘Vallee’ in the search box in the upper right hand corner or look for Fr Vallee in the Labels.

Read Fr Vallee’s entire homily at the end of this post.
Continue reading →

Posted in Catholic Faith & Inspiration | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Great Silence

Posted on April 23, 2011 by Jorge Costales

The following is from the Catholic Radio Dramas website:

The Lord descends into hell* (*Limbo the place of waiting)

Something strange is happening – there is a great silence on earth today, a great silence and stillness. The whole earth keeps silence because the King is asleep. The earth trembled and is still because God has fallen asleep in the flesh and he has raised up all who have slept ever since the world began. God has died in the flesh and hell trembles with fear.
Continue reading →

Posted in Catholic Faith & Inspiration | Leave a comment

Pope Benedict XVI: I don’t know

Posted on April 22, 2011 by Jorge Costales

“I ask myself the same question.” We don’t have the answers, but we know that Jesus suffered as innocent children suffer.” That was Pope Benedict XVI’s response to a 7-year-old Japanese girl’s question about why children suffer.

More from Pope Benedict in a Good Friday address at the Colosseum [not to be confused with the Coliseum which used to be at 37 Ave & SW 16 Street and later became a Sportsrooms Fitness Center offering lifetime memberships–thanks Tim Foley–and is today a Publix]:

Let us gaze on the crucified Jesus, and let us ask in prayer: Enlighten our hearts, Lord, that we may follow you along the way of the cross. Put to death in us the “old man” bound by selfishness, evil and sin. Make us “new men”, men and women of holiness, transformed and enlivened by your love.

It does a Catholic’s heart good to hear our leader speak so plainly. It is perhaps not what others would expect from the the Pope, but both statements are consistent. After all, people who ‘know’ would have no need to continue to pray for enlightenment.

Posted in Catholic Faith & Inspiration | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Castro Proposes Post-Death Limits For Public Office

Posted on April 17, 2011 by Jorge Costales

Havana, Cuba (CNN) — Cuban President Raul Castro on Saturday proposed setting post-death limits for public office in a country where two brothers have ruled for more than 50 years.

“We have arrived at the conclusion that it is advisable to limit the fundamental political and state offices to a maximum of five years following the death of a Party member,” Castro said at the inauguration of a critical Communist Party meeting.

At the Communist Party Congress — the first in 14 years — Castro also said it was time for a “systematic rejuvenation of the whole chain of party and administrative posts,” including the president of the party and of the Council of Ministers. Sympathetic Cuba watchers immediately hailed the new initiative as a historic opening, noting that in other Communist countries, seven or eight years is the customary transition period following death. Over at the Cuba Study Group, there were immediate calls for the lifting of the embargo. Other long-time Cuba watchers were more skeptical, noting that “systematic rejuvenation” could just be a plea to the pharmaceutical industry to not let the rotting carcasses of the Castro brothers represent the end of their reign of terror.

Posted in Cuba | Tagged | Leave a comment

Morrison and the Door Closers

Posted on April 16, 2011 by Jorge Costales

The 2011 Marlins have a rock band feel about them. Morrison and the Doors – as in Logan Morrison and a bullpen that closes on everything; doors, streaks, an LA Woman, hopes and rallies. Hopefully, my wordplay will be the only other resemblance to that band, given that the Doors started strong and flamed out early.

See LeBron James was not the first icon to bring his talents to Miami. But by the End Of The Night of Jim Morrison’s visit in 1969 to the Dinner Key Auditorium, When The Music Was Over and he should have headed out the Back Door Man, instead the police arrived. They said, My Eyes Have Seen You and we were called by an Unhappy Girl. It was a Blue Sunday morning. A Twentieth Century Fox film would follow.

Have you seen the Florida Marlins numbers after 13 games? Logan Morrison must be thinking Someone Touch Me — except Maggie M’Gill from Love Street — he is first or a close second in every Marlins hitting category — see Marlins hitting stats here — 2nd in average to Sanchez [Spanish Caravan] and OPS to Dobbs [The Unknown Soldier]. Morrison has started to earn a reputation as a Wild Child and a very good hitter. He may look like The Wasp, sound like People Are Strange, but he hits like he’s ready to Break On Through To The Other Side [>1.0 OPS]. Morrison is so laid back he looks like he just Take It As It Comes, but I’m here to Tell All The People that it’s OK not to Touch The Earth for now, because The Changeling Logan Morrison is not.

The Marlins bullpen is turning former hit parades into The Soft Parade, with opponents hitting just .180 against them and sounding like Shaman’s Blues on a Moonlight Drive. They have Been Down So Long that it may seem like Strange Days to see where they stand in comparison with all of Major League baseball in the following relief pitching categories — see MLB pitching stats here:

  • ERA – 1st
  • BAA – 1st
  • Wins – tied for 1st
  • Blown Saves – tied for 1st
  • Saves – tied for 2nd

As a Marlins fan, I try to be optimistic, so no one needs to Light My Fire. We know not to expect an Indian Summer here in Miami, but the view from here is that odds are Five To One that this Marlin team will be Riders On The Storm instead of singing the Roadhouse Blues while looking for the Alabama Song Whiskey Bar.

Peace Frog. The End.

Posted in Miami Marlins & MLB | Tagged , , , | 3 Comments

Bill Simmons: Tiger Apologetic But LeBron Birther

Posted on April 12, 2011 by Jorge Costales

Some people just can’t let some things go. One of my favorite sports writers has now so invested himself in hating LeBron James that he inserts cheap shots in columns which have nothing to do with LeBron. Normally I am a fan of gratuitous insults — for example, anything at the expense of the New York Yankees, a hatred I share with Simmons, is always welcome — so my criticism here is not of insults. But part of the appeal of that type of insult is exactly that you don’t see it coming and it is irreverent.

In his latest column, Simmons reaches more than Ernie DiGregorio in a Harlem summer league game. In an ode to the sports world latest loveable loser, Tiger Woods, he states that Woods shares the same gift as Michael Jordan.  So here we have a Simmons pontificating about Tiger Woods in a way that a younger Simmons would have dedicated an entire mailbag to ridiculing – an excerpt:

Two decades later, Tiger left a similar crater that we haven’t filled. We hated The Decision because we talked ourselves into LeBron maybe possessing that same gift; by choosing South Beach and Dwyane Wade, he was telling us, “You were wrong.” That made us angry. That hurt our feelings. We looked around, searched for someone else, couldn’t find him. We bided our time. And suddenly, there was Tiger on Sunday, making another run at Augusta, pulling us back in yet again. The moralizing is over. The jokes are done. (Most of them, anyway.) We chopped him down to size, made him human, made him bleed. He never caved.

Woods never caved, really? Has Woods won a tournament since he was clubbed in 2009? Wasn’t Woods tied for the lead on the back nine on Sunday with inexperienced players? Haven’t his latest two supposed porn star dates been featured in movies which went straight to video? Define cave Bill.

But lets focus on the illogic of the LeBron jibe. According to Simmons, the gift in the case of Jordan and Woods was to make us care. Their athletic ability was so superior, it transcended their sport and nothing [and he really means nothing] about them off the field could diminish the gift. Despite all his powers of observation, LeBron had even Simmons fooled during his first seven years in the NBA. Although in an embarrassing hedge, Simmons describes his misdiagnosis as something he “had talked himself into, [LeBron] possibly possessing the gift.” Wow, balls to the wall on that one Billy.

So given his criteria, the question for Simmons is, what about LeBron deciding to exercise his free agency together with Wade would cause him to the remove the gift tag that he “possibly had previously talked himself into?” I’m assuming he considered LeBron’s talent level unaffected by free agency. If anything, this NBA season reinforced the uniqueness of LeBron’s talent, when his production level remained consistent despite playing with other great players. It also can’t be the championship angle, since Woods apparently still possesses it after not winning across three calendar years. The gift, like some religious ritual, once conferred cannot be rescinded.

The “make us care” criteria is where the wheels really come off in Simmons logic. Who else in sports today could have changed franchises and generated an unprecedented level of interest which filtered down to the entire league? Denying LeBron the ‘gift’ tag is only the latest shot from Simmons. Far from flowing naturally, the LeBron shots increasingly appear to be driven almost by contractual obligations.

One thing for sure, if the Miami Heat win the NBA championship, Simmons rep as an NBA expert should take a hit. How could it not, he has staked out a position on the biggest NBA story of his talking head generation, and he will have missed it completely. But why? Why would someone who loves the game, allow the hype to distract from the focus on the game? I say the reason is cultural. It’s not so much what LeBron did, but where he ended up. Miami, not Chicago, not New York.

Posted in Sports | Tagged | Leave a comment

Oh Hanley! Still

Posted on April 9, 2011 by Jorge Costales

When I saw Hanley Ramirez appear to get seriously hurt in Friday’s Marlins win at Houston, my reaction was a disappointed ‘oooh Hanley.’ Ramirez was off to a slow start and now this. The feeling was, ‘this guy’s not our Pujol’s, he’s our Linus.’

“Oh Hanley!,” was the catchphrase the Marlins likeable TV play-by-play announcer Rich Waltz used to describe the excitement about Hanley Ramirez when he first came on the scene. That was then, Mike Stanton is now. By far, the player Marlin fans can’t wait to see perform in 2011 is Mike Stanton. From afar, it must seem like an good example of how fickle fans can be.  After all, 21 year-old Stanton, for all his potential, has only 100 games in the big leagues coming into the year, whereas Ramirez is considered by some to be the best all-around shortstop in MLB and is only 27 himself.

Here’s what those who watch from a distance may be missing. In between Ramirez’s great debut in 2006 and now; he earned financial security in 2008, earned a 2nd place MVP in 2009, earned the public criticism of some his teammates, a reputation for surliness [the Miguel Cabrera Syndrome], and had a statistically disappointing 2010. Beyond disappointing, Ramirez became the 4th player [see the others here] in major league baseball history to be removed from a game for literally lollygaging.

So that’s how ‘Oh Hanley!’ morphed into ‘oooh Hanley.’ But when we fans start thinking we know what makes someone like Hanley tick [or not], we should consider how many of us can relate to being a can’t miss prospect since the age of 15.  The can’t miss tag carries even more pressure when succeeding was his family’s best [only?] chance to escape poverty back in the Dominican.  Poverty is a great motivator, and when combined with great talent, it equals riches in today’s MLB.

Once players like Ramirez achieve financial security for their families, we expect the transition in motivation — from a desperate need to succeed to a Ripken-like self-discipline — to be seamless.  It’s not that easy.  If it were David Allen would not be wealthy and playing on my iTunes in the background for encouragement.  As an aside, I thought that Ramirez’s signing in 2008 was a good example of how to quantify risk vs reward [see here] when it comes to professional athlete’s salaries.

Maybe what we Marlin fans need is a little distance in in the case of Hanley Ramirez. Someone who has a little distance and is considered one of the best writers covering major league baseball, Joe Posnanski, put together a list of the 32 best players in MLB and listed Hanley as #7. More important than the ranking, which is arbitrary [he had Hanley at #3 a couple of years ago], Posnanski makes the follow undeniable points in Ramirez’s favor:

Last year was a harsh season for Hanley Ramirez. He seemed to be settling in nicely as the most amazing player in baseball that nobody ever talked about, a proud tradition that went back many years. From 2007 to 2009, Ramirez hit .325/.389/.549, banged 86 homers, stole 113 bases, played an ever-improving shortstop and basically did things so remarkable that few believed them and fewer still saw them. 

Then, last year Ramirez got caught on camera loafing, got into a spat with his manager about it, and suddenly people in the mainstream KNEW Hanley Ramirez, but what they knew was that he was, in the famed words of the Bull Durham manager, a lollygagger. His numbers fell off quite a bit, and he got hurt toward the end of the year, and all in all it wasn’t too great. Based on perception, you would think Hanley Ramirez turned into Yuni Betancourt overnight.

And then you look at the season — .300/.378/.475 with 21 homers, 32 steals, 92 runs scored — and you can’t help but think that for a lousy season that doesn’t seem like too lousy a season.

At the time of the lollygaging incident, Posnanski offered up one possible explanation, but not an excuse, for Ramirez’s actions [see here]. When you factor in that we Marlin fans have that player locked in for the next 4 seasons at a reasonable salary — momentary time-out from hating on the revenue-sharing money-hoarding owner — I’m back to Oh Hanley!

Click at end of post to see Posnanski’s complete list of the 32 best players in MLB.
Continue reading →

Posted in Miami Marlins & MLB | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment