Busy Week

Pleased with the Yankees apparent turnaround in Atlanta and then against the Mets (or is it MASH Unit, or even David Wright and the seven dwarfs?). Congrats to Mariano Rivera on his 500th save. That’s a great achievement, but also hides what he will be remembered for- his postseason track record.

Also proud of what our national team did, despite Brazil’s second-half comeback. And of our soldiers, as they turned over control of Iraq’s cities to an Iraqi military.

Anyway, on to present matters. NBA and NHL free agents to chat about tomorrow, more so with hockey because basketball players can’t sign until next week. Ronaldo and Kaka to be officially introduced at Real Madrid… more big money signings to come?

I’ll have some thoughts on this stuff later… after dealing with my own business! Damn, the holiday weekend can’t get here soon enough. Should I go out to the beach or hit the city? Your thoughts welcome…

These Photos Sum it Up

When I left you following Brazil’s domination of the U.S. national team, I definitely didn’t see this coming on Sunday afternoon. And when I turned on the game midway through a Father’s Day party (in case you’re wondering, it was very pleasant, despite the cloudy skies, and my Dad liked his present), I could believe a 1-0 lead for the Americans (as good as the Pharoahs have been in the last couple of African Cup of Nations, they haven’t translated it to other international theatres, and also missed absent goal-threats Mido, Mohamed Zidan, and Amr Zaki). Even, albeit barely, a 3-0 Brazil lead over Italy which they held on to. Boy was Marcello Lippi steamed about that afterwards… Not this though, even after I heard the final whistle blow. Heck, the players themselves were more than a little surprised afterward.

Image courtesy of ussoccer.com

But led by the two men located on this photo’s left and right sides, they will be playing Spain on Wednesday in the first Confederations Cup semifinal (Brazil plays South Africa on Thursday). Yes that’s right. The current #1 team in the world, Euro 2008 champion, unbeaten in 35 straight games, the last 15 of which have been wins (games decided on penalty kicks technically go down as ties). Considering where the U.S. was on Wednesday, vis a vis where they hope to be next summer, don’t sweat it. For the players, work hard and show what you’re capable of. To the fans, cut out the attacks on Bob Bradley for a little while and get behind the team. As this blogger muses, can we really be sure of anything after Sunday’s results?

The other photos sum up the U.S. Open. You’ll remember that I wanted to live blog some of it. Well, the weather basically killed that idea!

Image courtesy of Wichita Eagle/AP

But big props to course superintendent Craig Currier and his legions for getting the course playable each morning so that we could crown a champion today.

Image courtesy of whatsinthegolfbag.com

And if you expected the man seen above to win, please tell me some lotto numbers to play this week. But after a bad start to his round last night and this morning, he sure did hold the nerves in during the inward nine, punctuated by a decisive birdie-par-par finale. Also, despite their costly bogeys late, Phil Mickelson and David Duval deserve a lot of credit for how well they played this week. Mickelson, of course, has other matters on his mind, while Duval might finally be back among the golfing elite after several years in the wilderness. Even though Tiger Woods never really factored, he still managed to finish sixth, and was actually the only player to shoot three rounds below par. If he gets back to making a few putts, look out in the Open Championship or PGA. Yep, he’s just that good some weeks.

Rain Check Monday

And it did pour for a little while this afternoon here on the Island!

But no witty weekend recap due to a lot of work earlier today- congrats to the Penguins (who surprised me a little by winning Game 7 in Detroit) and Lakers (whose coronation was no surprise at all) or reaction to the U.S.’ loss to Italy, done in by one of their own (sort of). Good effort from our men though against one of the top 5-6 teams in the world, and if they can avoid going down a man against Brazil and keep something in the tank for the second-half, they just might be able to put up another fight against the Selecao later this week.

I’ll leave you with this image until I blog about it more at-length tomorrow or Wednesday. Have fun, gentlemen! It’s not that difficult, umm… right? That’s what this blogger thought
about two years ago. Oh wait, that was under pristine conditions and without 30,000 or more fans plus several million TV viewers… oops.

Hilton Head… Or How I Became a Semi-American Hero

At least, that’s what some of my friends claim!

I haven’t taken many road trips, or things resembling them. A couple of trips with my parents to search for colleges, but those don’t really count. As an aside, though, here’s a 100% true story. Colgate was the first school they took me to see. I hadn’t considered applying there, heck, I didn’t really even know anything about it, other than that someone I knew had gone there several years earlier. Less than a year-and-a-half later, I was getting ready for Orientation atop the Hill, Colgate’s cure for the Freshman 15.

Once in college, I pretty much traveled home on breaks, took vacations with the family, and so on. Yet, I did randomly run into what became some of my closest friends in a San Juan casino while spending one Spring Break with my mom. As I think I’ve said, I’m never shocked to run into anyone from Colgate in New York City. But one random casino in Puerto Rico?

That brings me to Hilton Head, a traditional Colgate trip leading up to graduation. A couple of the friends I’d gotten closer to since San Juan asked if I wanted to join their group. If they hadn’t, I’m not sure if I would have gone at all. But I did, we rented a pretty sweet house one block from the beach- okay, it did evoke memories of Brady Bunch, except with woodchips instead of Astroturf on the lawn- and those several days were as fun as any I’ve ever had.

Our 16-hour trip down saw us get caught up in nasty storms near Washington and into Virginia, which I suspect were related to this set of devastating tornadoes across the South and Mid-Atlantic. But aside from a stretch of heavy traffic, we managed to keep going, thanks to great driving/co-piloting by Simon, Casey, and Dan Belke! Mike Nanna, Alex, Eric, and Mike M. also did a masterful job in the other car. Not that I’m shocked, they were ace writers/editors for the Maroon-News, top-notch Division 1 athletes, and/or are just plain great guys. They’re friends I will always be grateful for having made.

We also had to dodge the temptation to stop for this legendary tourist trap, but somehow we resisted…

Naturally, we all celebrated with a beer upon arrival the following morning. Aside from the trip down, the weather was just about perfect. A friend of mine, who’s senior week was in Ocean City saw it marred by a lot of wind, rain, and cool temperatures. Us? Beach and poolside! And of course, drinks by night. Who could begrudge us this after four years of work and lake-effect snow? Yet, I’m comfortable saying that we largely behaved with the dignity expected of graduates-to-be.

For reasons of taste, I won’t delve into the event which spawned the post title and the note in my ‘About Me’ page. However, if you ask me in a non-public forum, I’d probably be happy to tell the story. Neither I nor my friends will forget it for a long time.

Oh, and I probably won’t need to take many road trips in the future; they couldn’t be quite as much fun as the first one. But again, if anyone’s up for it…

There Are Two Places…

Thus begins Walter Cronkite’s supposed quote about Colgate University. He might have said and meant it, or maybe he didn’t, just as Yogi Berra joked about his infamous quotations (and later titled a book in the same manner). Doesn’t matter to us Colgate-types who actually lived the school. We wear it like a badge every time Spring Party Weekend comes around. Is it as crazy now as it supposedly was “back then”? I’d have no way to tell you; nobody else in my family has gone there and I don’t know too many older alums.

Actually, I do have one piece of anecdotal evidence to at least put Colgate up there with anyone else’s springtime festivities. Last year, my brother was a freshman at another prestigious liberal arts school (actually, it’s more of a small ‘full-service’ university). His version of SPW was the same week as ours. More students, more endowment, and arguably bigger-name musical acts, all over there, halfway across the country. And when I asked him how it was going early on the Saturday night, he and some of his friends were just about done. Some wouldn’t even wake up for the big concert.

I laughed. That would never happen at Colgate. From mid-afternoon Friday until the bars closed early on Sunday morning, it always was and still is pretty much non-stop anything and everything goes. Somehow, I only really experienced one SPW in this vein- last year. Not much of anything doing my first couple of years (to be fair, the event and Colgate’s social scene generally were undergoing some renovations), then I was abroad as a junior. Maybe it’s a good thing, as I’ll carry some distinct memories for a while to come of times and drinks shared just before the final push to graduation and real life. If that last point’s true, then when someone asks me about Colgate and SPW before experiencing it, my description won’t be a blurred compilation of years or complaints about the event getting worse as my four years progressed.

Of course, I’ll still start him or her off with Walter Cronkite’s quote. After all, he did give us a near mythological reputation to live up to.

Apologies for my relative lack of stories or specificity. Maybe I’ll do that later, but for now, I think that in an era of loose talk on facebook or the blogosphere frequently carrying unanticipated consequences, it’s probably better to keep the details private!

Watch This Space

More coming later today or tomorrow. Been pretty busy this week with day job-related stuff, not to mention all the baseball, playoff b-ball and hockey, etc… But with Colgate’s Spring Party Weekend coming up- no I can’t really make it up there- I’ll probably reminisce a little bit. Trust me, most of the memories are pretty tame! Also, with the terrific weather expected for this weekend, you might see me out and about some in Manhattan. So keep posted for updates and thanks for your continued support for Danimal’s Den!

Just a Typical NY Weekend

Yankee Stadium opens up and plays like a bandbox every day. Is it the weather, bad pitching, an actual product of the design? We’ll find out soon enough, but it’s definitely not something anyone saw coming. Listen, it looks really nice, but home-run havens can be tough to win a lot of games in. Took the Astros and Phillies a few seasons before they were in the playoffs after moving into their bandboxes, while Colorado got there in 1995 but not again until after they added a humidor to Coors Field.

On the field, a four-game split between the Indians and Yankees isn’t bad either way- although both teams will hate the manner in which their losses occurred- because they each definitely have talent (as I noted in the preseason predictions), and I won’t be completely shocked if they meet in October, although let’s not get too far ahead of ourselves. Especially when the Yankees have to figure out Chien-Ming Wang and their middle relief first- and fast– while Cleveland has to make sure Cliff Lee and Fausto Carmona are really up to the job. Luckily for them, nobody’s running off with the AL East or Central so far (I haven’t really seen enough from Toronto yet, though if Ricky Romero pitches anywhere close to as well as he did on Sunday, it would sure help them win games not started by Roy Halladay). I saw the Posada home run as it happened and then the numerous replays and just couldn’t tell what the right call should be, so the umpires probably got it right simply by leaving it as made on the field.

Oh, and about that weather. We could not have asked for a nicer Saturday and Sunday around here. Everything the meterologists hyped it up to be. Okay, maybe I’m a little bit of a hypocrite here, because I hate big snow storms as I’ve said here before, but I do enjoy a day turning out even warmer and sunnier than expected! Plus, great to see some friends from school on Friday night in the city- some of whom I hadn’t in several months.

Rangers are 2-0 after they blanked the Caps on Saturday (see above). Lundqvist stood tall again. Yes, he’s good. No, I didn’t expect him or them to win two games in Washington and play as strong a defensive game as they did in the second one. Mark Herrmann was a little surprised too. Still have to finish the job, and to that end, Game 3 at MSG will be huge on Monday night. Elsewhere, looks like Boston, Detroit, and Vancouver each have a foot in the next round. Didn’t think Anaheim would match the Rangers and win two on the road though. They’re arguably a better team, but were playing San Jose, who racked up the most points of anyone during the regular season and lost five times in regulation at home. I still expect that San Jose and Calgary, who is down 2-0 to Chicago but going back home for Games 3 and 4, will not go quietly into the night.

Don’t worry, at least a few more posts over the next several days.

Urban Heat Island? What Urban Heat Island?

It looked like a nice day outside, and I knew I had plenty of time to make a train home at the desired time, so I decided to walk down Central Park West and then Broadway for a little while this afternoon until I finally boarded the subway at Columbus Circle.

Well, according to the giant CNN sign atop 3 Columbus Circle- don’t let the images in this post fool you, it stands out from well up Central Park West as you look to the south- it was 64 degrees around 5:30 in the afternoon. Seemed reasonable given today’s predicted forecast. But man, I could feel the wind most of the way down. Not many sunny spots to walk towards either. It wasn’t winter, but not exactly as pleasant as a day in the mid-60s should be. And this was still about two hours from sunset.

I guess 70-75 on Friday and Saturday would be hard to ruin, though! At least, so long as I can get outside for a little while…

Before I go, a quick farewell to John Madden. Watching the NFL won’t quite be the same without him (even if the quality of his insights have probably declined over the past few year), but at least the video game’s going nowhere fast!

Photo sources: NY Times and John Lumea

And All is Right in the World…

Okay, not exactly. I don’t have a solution to health care, and we’ll see if the various groups who discussed how to find one at the White House can do better. Same with all the other issues.

And A-Rod could be out for a while. Despite the vociferous boos from a minority of Yankee fans, I appreciate how great a player is. What the Yankees do will have a lot to do with his performance because he is unquestionably the most dangerous hitter in the lineup. If A-Rod needs to have surgery for his torn labrum now instead of after the season, I’m not sure that the Yankees are that likely to win the AL East. I really think the Rays still have room to improve (even if tougher competition means their win total could still drop) and it’s anyone’s guess what the Red Sox will do this season. They will likely at least get the wild card because a reasonably healthy C.C. Sabathia, A.J. Burnett, and Chien-Ming Wang on the mound should turn a few losses from last year (started by the likes of Sidney Ponson and Darrell Rasner) into wins.

But… some warmer weather is finally coming to NY. And this guy’s back. Now things are really getting better. He’s not fit yet, while Derek Morris and Nik Antropov have to adjust to their new teammates, but coupled with the Blueshirts’ other acquisitions, the Rangers should at least be entertaining for the remainder of this season, if probably not a title contender. Granted it’s come against two of the NHL’s worst teams in the Avalanche and Islanders, but they are starting to win and score goals again.

Credit to ESPN and the Associated Press for this photo of a rivalry that we apparently haven’t seen the last of. Life is getting better each day.

Thawing Out…

As I’ve said before, I don’t like heavy snow. No real trouble getting to/from the city today, or even major delays. But seeing that much snow pile up in the driveway or the backyard honestly isn’t pretty at all. Belke, if you’re planning to settle around here permanently, I promise you this is not that typical for March. Neither are temperatures near zero. More like every several years to a decade, maybe more. But hey, for all I know, it may not snow here again until November. Maybe even beyond that.

Quick shout-out to Trevor. Crain’s says that his employer is the best company to work for in Chicago, and he’s in their photo. I hope my other friends out there see their offices on the list now or in the future, but for now, Trevor gets some bragging rights.

Lastly, I thought YES’ promos for the US National Team’s World Baseball Classic tuneup against the Yankees were a little weird. Basically about Derek Jeter playing against his club team. Who honestly cares? It’s an exhibition to get both teams ready for their respective campaigns. On the other hand, I saw those promos because I was watching YES/MLB’s profile of legendary manager Casey Stengel tonight (who won seven World Series titles between 1949-1960, including an unbelievable five in a row which I can’t imagine anyone will do again). Nice job showing the Stengel beyond his often strange public pronouncements (known as “Stengelese“). He was apparently really bright- not just in a baseball sense, either- and gave it to his players if they weren’t playing up to his standards. And he could sure play hunches well, not least in giving the ball to Don Larsen on that fateful day in 1956. Although not giving the ball to Whitey Ford to start Game 1 in the 1960 World Series meant he wasn’t available in Game 7. Pittsburgh won that series, and Stengel’s Yankee-tenure ended soon after. One more title would have broken the team record for managers that he shares with Joe McCarthy. With Joe Torre finishing his run with four, and with baseball much more competitive than it used to be (in Stengel’s heyday, there was no amateur draft, no free agency, and only eight teams in each league), I’d be stunned if any manager comes close to seven again, much less win eight.

If it isn’t already, this mark will join records like DiMaggio’s 56-game hitting streak, Cy Young’s 511 wins and 316 losses, Nap Lajoie’s single-season .426 batting average (plus Ty Cobb’s career .366 average), and maybe even Nolan Ryan’s seven no-hitters as totals highly unlikely to be broken, if not outright impossible (largely because, as with McCarthy and Stengel’s titles, lots of records were set in a different era of baseball).

Ahh, the new season is getting closer. You could spend a long time debating and relieving baseball’s history and stats, but there’s no substitute for real games…