Monthly Archives: May 2011

Man, I’ve been loving these big, dark olives they’ve got at Fairway. They are meaty and buttery. Also come smoked but I prefer the regular jammies.

Witness: A very beautiful man.

[Photo Credit: Alfred Eisenstaedt]

Check out this brief but insightful interview with Wright Thompson over at the Bleacher Report. In it, Thompson talks about the importance of scenes in non fiction writing:

Use the right scenes

A bad scene is often worse than no scene. And I understand the difficulty of dealing with no access. I know that I have the luxury now of passing on stories if the access won’t give me the tools I need to hit a home run. I get that isn’t indicative of the real world, or the job I had to do at the K.C. Star.

But still, be aware of this. Deal with it as best as you can while dealing with the realities of the modern sports media relations machine.

Here’s a test: If you have to do verbal gymnastics to get from the scene to the story that comes after, you need a new scene. I’ve done it more times than I care to remember: scene, then bizarre twisted sentence or two to get me back on track. Take it from someone who’s made that mistake: don’t.

Understand how the scenes fit together

Sometimes a great scene doesn’t work. I recently wrote a story about cricket and couldn’t use perhaps the funniest thing I observed because it took away from the arc. It was a great scene for some story … just not this one.

Try to remember that. The story is more important than any individual part.

The story is the thing, the story is the thing, the story is the thing.

A mother on the subway this morning. She sat on the end seat, her infant on her lap, facing her. New kid, couldn’t be more than a couple of months old.

A big dude, teenager, got on the train and stood with his back to the door, right above the mother. His elbow was only a few inches away from the her head. He didn’t see her. I wondered how we manage to negotiate space in this town, wondered if he was uncaring or just oblivious. Then he looked down and saw the kid. He moved his arm, his stone face softened, and he smiled.

09 Ma and Pa

[Picture via The Dust Congress]

On a frigid night in Detroit, C.C. Sabathia gave up two hard hit balls to start the first and the Tigers scored two runs before the inning was over. Later on, two more runs scored off Sabathia–bunch of dunkers. The big fella wasn’t on his A-game, still, he was impressive, bending without breaking. It was a grind but also a fun performance, watching him compete–“gritty and gutty,” in the parlance of our times.

On the other hand, Brad Penny was effective for the Tigers but brutal to sit through. “If you have to write a term paper,” said John Sterling at one point early in the game, “you can do it between pitches.” Bob Lorenz and John Flaherty, the decidedly no-frills announcing team for YES, were calm and sober, a welcome departure from the usual YES histrionics. The Bombers were a sorry sight on the base paths and not much better at the plate, although Jorge Posada hit the ball hard a couple of times and is starting to swing the bat well.

Oh, well. A night to forget as the Tigers end their seven-game losing streak.

Final Score: Tigers 4, Yanks 2.

[Picture by Alfred Eisenstaedt]

Robbie Cano is back; Swish has the night off. Line up looks like such:

Derek Jeter SS
Curtis Granderson CF
Mark Teixeira 1B
Alex Rodriguez 3B
Robinson Cano 2B
Jorge Posada DH
Andruw Jones RF
Russell Martin C
Brett Gardner LF

Never mind the preamble…Let’s Go Yank-ees!

[Picture by Steve Perille]

Bronx Banter Book Excerpt

Here’s a smile for you. From Leigh Montville’s terrific new book, “Evel: The High-Flying Life of Evel Knievel:American Showman, Daredevil and Legend.” I reviewed the book in SI last week and can’t recommend it enough.

“Most of us think of what we do as writing,” said William Nack. “But Leigh Montville sits down and says, ‘Why don’t I tell you all a story?’ ”

“My philosophy has always been that sports should be fun—a thing of joy,” Montville once told SI. “I don’t get up a whole lot of outrage; I’d rather laugh. What I really like to do is take something and stand it on its head, look at it that way, from a different perspective.”

Montville is one of our best pure storyteller’s and he’s perfectly suited to tell the tale tale of Evel Knievel. Here’s the first of two-part excerpt detailing Knievel’s most infamous stunt–Snake River Canyon.

Enjoy.

Whoosh

The man of the moment made the moment a family affair. If this was going to be his last day on earth, then he would go out looking like a church deacon. Linda and the three kids would be there. His mother would be there from Reno. His father had been there all week. (“Bob always had to have a challenge,” his dad said at a press conference, sounding a bit like Ward Cleaver. “I tried to discourage him for years for fear of injury.”) His eighty-one-year-old grandmother, Emma, would be there. His half-sisters would be there from both sides of the family tree. His cousin, Father Jerry Sullivan, a Catholic priest from Carroll College in Helena, Montana, would give the benediction before liftoff.

His lawyers, accountants, bartenders, friends, and fellow reprobates from long ago had appeared already at the site. Bus trips had gone down from Butte. There had been a mass migration from the city, people driving the 364 miles in five, six, seven hours, depending on speed. The Butte High band had gone down to play the National Anthem. Everyone had assembled, former promoters, fans, everyone . . . Ray Gunn, his first assistant from Moses Lake in the early days, had returned for the show, friends again, signed up now to watch the jump from a helicopter and carry a bottle of Wild Turkey to the other side for an instant celebration.

The day would be part wake, part wedding reception, an all-time Humpty Dumpty experience. The broken pieces of Robert Craig Knievel’s life would be put together for this one time as they never had been put together, not once, in all of his years.

He would fly from Butte in the Lear in the morning with his family. Watcha would be at the controls and would buzz the crowd at the canyon, a dramatic touch. Watcha and everybody else would switch to a helicopter at the Twin Falls City-County Airport, arrive at the site to great applause, and the man of the moment would put on the flight suit in his trailer, and the show would begin.

Unless, of course, he canceled the show. “I have two demands that if you don’t meet I’ll cancel the show,”

Knievel said in an early morning phone call to Bob Arum from Butte. Arum prepared for the worst.

“First,” Knievel said, “I want to have all the press meet my helicopter when it lands. I want to make a statement.”

Arum said that would be impossible. Moving the entire press corps through the crowd could start a riot. (Another riot.) What he could do was bring Knievel to the press tent. That was possible. Knievel could make his statement that way. Same result.

Knievel agreed. “Second,” he said. “I want you to bring your two sons to my trailer before the jump. I want to say some words to them before the jump because people are going to blame you for my death and I want them to know it was my idea. And I want them to sit with my family at the jump.”

“Done,” Arum said, figuring that the two boys, ages eleven and nine, would do what he told them. “I’ll get them there.”

Knievel seemed sentimental in everything he did that morning. He seemed to be turning off the lights, locking all the doors. Just in case. He had a picture of the canyon, just the canyon, no Skycycle or ramp, that he secretly signed, “Linda, I love you,” across the blue sky. He told Kelly, his oldest son, last thing before everybody left Butte for the jump, to pretend to go back into the house for his shaving kit and hang the picture on the bedroom wall. He wanted that waiting for his wife if somehow the results turned out badly.

Even when he arrived at the site—plane flight, helicopter, there—he was sentimental. Even when he talked to the press.

“When I weighed last night all the good things and the bad things that were said, it came out a million to three for the good,” he told the press after he landed in Watcha’s helicopter. “So I hope all your landings in life are happy ones—and I thank you from the bottom of my heart.”

(more…)

Welcome to the new-look Bronx Banter, brought to you by Laura Chambliss and Ken Arneson. I wouldn’t have been able to do it without them and I can’t thank them enough for their talent and dedication.

As you can see, we are now designed more like a magazine or newspaper so you can search out your favorite subjects and dig through the archives with ease. I have just begun to go through and tag the entire Bronx Banter archives but there is enough to get started (this will be a work-in-progress with the hope that eventually every Banter post will be categorized and filed).

Nine recent posts will appear at the top of the page in the photo gallery but the regular features like  Beat of the Day and Taster’s Cherce, will have their own spot.  You can also access all of the most recent posts on the sidebar at the right hand side of the page.

So dig in and have at it. As always, we’re thrilled to have you.

[Photograph by Ruth Orkin]

The site will be down for up to three hours today as we flip the switch over to the new design. Bear with us…thanks.

[Picture by Ruth Orkin]

So no bad news is good news for Phil Hughes. Here’s Ben Shipgel in the Times:

All of Hughes’s tests Monday came back negative for circulatory and vascular problems, the Yankees said. The development deepens the mystery regarding Hughes’s lack of arm strength but spreads a feeling of relief that thoracic outlet syndrome is not the cause.

“I’m not sure if he has that, what they have to do and how long you don’t have him if that’s what he has,” Manager Joe Girardi said. “It makes me feel better.”

Hughes traveled to St. Louis to meet with Dr. Robert William Thompson, a renowned vascular surgeon, to confirm or to rule out that he had thoracic outlet syndrome.

Now he will return on Tuesday to New York, despite having a locker set up for him in the visiting clubhouse, to rehabilitate his shoulder as the Yankees redouble their efforts to discover why it feels numb when he pitches.

Curious. Very curious.

The Yanks scored three runs against Justin Verlander in the first two innings tonight and made him work plenty. But they also ran into two outs on the bases and so although they made Verlander throw 50 pitches he regrouped and went six innings without allowing another run. Bartolo Colon was solid again but gave up two solo home runs to Alex Avila and the score was tied at three after 7 full.

Let’s cut to the chase. Curtis Granderson led off the ninth with a walk against Jose Valverde and then looked to have second base stolen. But he wiped out, over-slid the bag and was tagged out, a strange, ugly play that went against the Yanks. Valverde gestured wildly as is his wont and then walked Mark Teixeira. Alex Rodriguez, who is slumping, fouled off the first pitch he saw, a good pitch to hit and a good swing. Fouled off another pitch, took a ball and then topped a little grounder to third. Brandon Inge charged, the ball stayed down, and Rodriguez reached with an infield hit.

Nick Swisher worked the count even at 2-2 and then lined a single up the middle. Teixeira came home, narrowly beating the throw and the Yanks had the lead again. Jorge Posada, who singled home two runs in the first, whiffed on a full count fastball out of the zone. Russell Martin was next and got ahead 2-0 before Valverde air-mailed a ball that went off Avila’s glove. Rodriguez scored standing up, and although Martin popped out to center to end the frame, Valverde was dancing no more.

Enter Mo. Vintage like so: Broken bat ground out to second; ground ball to third, Rodriguez with a strong, true throw; strikeout. Nine pitches, eleventh save of the season.

Swisher slapping fives with vigor, seventh-straight loss for the Tigers.

Final Score: Yanks 5, Tigers 3.

Happiness in the Boogie Down.

Yanks are in the Motor City, start of a four-game set against the Tigers. The wicked one, Justin Verlander goes for the home team; Bartolo Colon starts for the Yanks.

Cliff has the preview.

Why mince words? Let’s Go Yank-ees!

[Picture by Herve Bertand]

Robbie Cano is not in the line up tonight.

Over at Low Hud Brian Heyman’s got Kevin Long talking Jeter, Posada and Gardner.

[Photograph by Hellen van Meene]

[Picture by Patricio Suarez]

Let’s get the Led out, shall we?

Ham and cheese, made to order for the wife. That’s three slices of black forest ham and six slices of jarlsberg cheese, red leaf lettuce (dressed with olive oil, champagne vinegar and maldon salt), dijon mustard and thinly-sliced cornichons on rye. That’s how she likes it, that’s how she gets it.

Hey…it’s good to be the queen.

Just another heads up for you regulars. Tomorrow, Bronx Banter will have a new look. The site will be shut down for a few hours on Tuesday morning (east coast time), and then we’ll be back with a fresh new design. The comments section will be the same–actually more like we had it back in the Baseball Toaster days–but we are getting rid of the traditional blog scroll in favor of something that looks more like a menu where you can pick and choose where you want to go. It’ll take a minute to get used to but I think it’s going to enhance the jernt.

I’m excited. Can’t wait to see you on the other side.    

[Picture by Kenneth Josephson]

Yesterday afternoon I thought about the neighbor in my building who died last year of ALS. She was in her fifties, married to a professor. They have a teenage daughter. When I thought of her it was the kind of fleeting thing that doesn’t even register until later on. But it came back when the daughter called last night. Emily and I were in bed listening to the Mets game on the radio. It was after 10 and we hadn’t heard from the daughter in a good while. She asked if we were available to take part in an ALS walk in a few weeks.

The conversation didn’t last long and when I got off the phone, Em said, “I think it was a year ago that she died.” We talked about it for a few minutes. It made me uncomfortable so I put the game back on.

Then I got an e-mail from the husband. It said that today, Monday, marks the anniversary of when his beloved wife was “sprung,” a term he likes better than “dying” or “passed away.”

“I hope to mark the occasion by finding an unmanned police car and setting it on fire,” he continued. “I think she’d appreciate that. When we started dating more than 30 years ago, back in her ACORN days, I noticed a sticker on one of her notebooks that read ‘Let a Burning Cop Car Light Up Your Night.'”

I don’t know about burning any cars but I will be thinking of her today, as well as her husband and their daughter. I am relieved for all of them that they have been sprung.

[Picture by Patricio Suarez]