Halloween Costumes Told Me Something About the Cubs

11/2/2016

Carl Edwards, Jr.

Addison Russell

(Note to readers: Please check out the lovely comment from Neil about his beloved grandmother, whose life spanned two epic eras in Cubs' history. In Comments below:)
* * *
As soon as I saw the costumes on the web, I knew the Cubs would be loose going to Cleveland, needing to win twice.

Still, how much is loose worth?

By Wednesday night I was questioning manager Joe Maddon’s tropism to yank his starting pitcher. Normal.

After the Cubs won on Sunday, to stay alive in the World Series, Maddon told his players to enjoy Halloween back home in Chicagoland. Never mind a workout in Cleveland on the travel day. Munch candy corn rather than clubhouse food.

Maddon was cool when he managed Tampa Bay, an educated mixture of geek and free spirit. (See the 2008 article by Alan Schwarz:)
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/10/sports/baseball/10rays.html.

Maddon was also cool managing the team with the long void in its dossier. He didn’t need to exhibit football-coach control over his players. Play. Then play.

This doesn’t imply anything negative about Tito Francona, the Cleveland manager. He’s good, too. But the Cubs needed to win two on the road, and Maddon showed proper insouciance by telling his players to take Monday off with loved ones, before boarding a flight to Cleveland – action-hero regalia optional.

The photos on the web tell the story:

http://m.mlb.com/cutfour/2016/10/31/207743190/cubs-wear-halloween-costumes-on-world-series-trip-to-cleveland

The Cubs won Tuesday as Addison Russell, most recently seen as a lime-green Ninja Turtle, drove in six runs, tying the World Series record.

On Wednesday, Maddon properly had all hands in the bullpen as Kyle Hendricks pitched into the fifth inning. Hendricks, known as The Professor, is smart and unflappable and had thrown only 63 pitches when Maddon got him with a 5-1 lead. The Fox crew questioned Maddon’s short-twitch strategy, even for a seventh game, and so did I.

The questioning wasn’t so much about Jon Lester’s serious imperfections in throwing to bases as it was about using another very good starter that early, ultimately forcing Aroldis Chapman to go multiple innings, again.

Turned out, Chapman was as spent as anybody could have feared. His face said he knew he didn’t have it. Then it rained, after nine innings.

During the 17-minute delay, the player showing the most yips – Jason Heyward, in his first year with the Cubs, in a year-long slump, swinging at 57-foot pitches -- had the inner strength to call a clubhouse meeting, to remind the players how far they had come.

Then the Cubs held on for an 8-7 victory in 10 innings, past midnight. One grand old baseball city celebrated and another mourned.

Maddon had treated the players like grown men. Of course, so did Francona. Now the Cubs can wear any action-hero outfit they want for the parades and parties that may last all winter.

Insouciance won.

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Here's another article by Alan Schwarz about Joe Maddon from the Tampa Bay days:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/23/sports/baseball/23maddon.html
* * *
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/23/sports/baseball/23maddon.html

Joe Maddon in travel mode. All photos courtesy of mlb.com.

Altenir Silva

11/3/2016 12:34:26 pm

Dear George,

I loved to know the word “Insouciance”. As I'm an English learning, I find out that word Insouciance could be the better definition about the sadness of the Brazilian soccer. In the past, as they had played in an 'insouciance way', they were great. But after they begin to follow another way to play, something more serious, they wilted.

By the way: Congrats to Chicago Cubs. In the honor of the World Series, I’ll to watch Taking Care of Business (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0103035/?ref_=nv_sr_1), one of the great movies about baseball fan.

Best - Altenir Silva (from Rio-Brazil)

Neil Scherer

11/3/2016 02:30:08 pm

Congratulations to the 2016 World Series Champion Chicago Cubs and now the real reason for their long overdue quest is explained:
Yesterday we witnessed the first Cubs World Series victory in 108 years. Congratulations to the Cubs’ faithful on an impressive dramatic victory for the ages, and one that represents a seemingly impossible comeback from a 3-1 hole and overcoming numerous turns in an epic GAME 7.

I was not one of those who were surprised by the Cubbies triumph. Though I knew that the Cubs’ long, long, long quest to be World Series champions had been associated with a number of curses—most centering on the Billy Goat, and more recently on poor Steve Bartman—I would have none of it. Instead, I ascribed to a different theory to explain the Cubs’ historical defeats. I noted that the Cubs’ long losing streak is matched only by the long life of my grandmother, Sarah "EMA" Gorelick, a remarkable 107 years. Ema was born in May of 1909, the year after the Cubs’ last victory. She passed away in August of this year, and though she witnessed an enormous number of events, including man’s first steps on the moon, 50 states in the union, the discovery of penicillin, 27 Yankee World Series Championships, air travel, automobiles, the invention of radio and television. BUT NO Chicago Cub World Championship.

Everyone who met Ema knew her to be a powerful force, despite her 4'10" stature. She commanded respect and her words of wisdom generally proved correct. And strangely this woman’s life paralleled the poor Cubs’ despair. I have searched for the answer to this remarkable connection. I know that she wasn't a fan of deep-dish pizza and never enjoyed barbecue ribs, but could these peccadilloes have been her reason for denying the Cubs a victory?

All Cub fans can now rejoice and join the list of WS champions and with the unlikely culprit resting comfortably; I’ve no doubt that there will be more championships in the future. Again, congrats to Chicago and welcome to land of champions.
Neil

Altenir Silva

11/3/2016 03:07:55 pm

Dear Mr. Scherer,
What a beautiful story about your Grandma Ema. I'm very thrilled with the Cubs. Because of the 108 years of the Cubs, the world came back to think again in the past. I think that it can be very healthy for all of us, in this moment: the Past to save the Future is the Present dream.
Best - Altenir (from Brazil)

Elliott Kolker

11/3/2016 10:29:03 pm

Poetic Legacy
For the 2016 World Champion Chicago Cubs
The Village Elliott: 11/3/16

Yo, Chief, start Trib's presses;
Our Extra expresses
Best headline since "Dewey Has Won!"
Lead with, "Cubs Now the Bride
After Hundred Year Schnide:
Scapegoat Exorcised with Gonfalon."

Yes the Cubs exorcised
Longest World Series Schnide
With a young team of Great Destiny,
But it's happened before,
"Destined" youths win no more,
Team grows old, earns"Not-Quite" legacy.

I read: "Said Connie Mack,
When Al Simmons came back
The year after won first bat title,
'To be True Champion
You must win second one,
Defending your title's that's vital.'

"'I believe that I shall,'
Replied Bucket-foot Al,
And, indeed, as bat champ, did repeat..."
So what Cubbies must do,
Is win Crown: Number Two
Snatching Title from Series Defeat

Would be "Great Champion"
If Cubs win second one,
By repeating most poetically;
Since in Theo, Both Trust
Seems to me Cubbies must
Defeat Red Sox to seal Legacy.

Comments are closed.

QUOTES

Measuring Covid Deaths, by David Leonhardt. July 17, 2023. NYT online.
The United States has reached a milestone in the long struggle against Covid: The total number of Americans dying each day — from any cause — is no longer historically abnormal….

After three horrific years, in which Covid has killed more than one million Americans and transformed parts of daily life, the virus has turned into an ordinary illness.

The progress stems mostly from three factors:
First, about three-quarters of U.S. adults have received at least one vaccine shot.
Second, more than three-quarters of Americans have been infected with Covid, providing natural immunity from future symptoms. (About 97 percent of adults fall into at least one of those first two categories.)
Third, post-infection treatments like Paxlovid, which can reduce the severity of symptoms, became widely available last year.
“Nearly every death is preventable,” Dr. Ashish Jha, who was until recently President Biden’s top Covid adviser, told me. “We are at a point where almost everybody who’s up to date on their vaccines and gets treated if they have Covid, they rarely end up in the hospital, they almost never die.”

That is also true for most high-risk people, Jha pointed out, including older adults — like his parents, who are in their 80s — and people whose immune systems are compromised. “Even for most — not all but most —immuno-compromised people, vaccines are actually still quite effective at preventing against serious illness,” he said. “There has been a lot of bad information out there that somehow if you’re immuno-compromised that vaccines don’t work.”

That excess deaths have fallen close to zero helps make this point: If Covid were still a dire threat to large numbers of people, that would show up in the data.

One point of confusion, I think, has been the way that many Americans — including we in the media — have talked about the immuno-compromised. They are a more diverse group than casual discussion often imagines.

Most immuno-compromised people are at little additional risk from Covid — even people with serious conditions, such as multiple sclerosis or a history of many cancers. A much smaller group, such as people who have received kidney transplants or are undergoing active chemotherapy, face higher risks.

Covid’s toll, to be clear, has not fallen to zero. The C.D.C.’s main Covid webpage estimates that about 80 people per day have been dying from the virus in recent weeks, which is equal to about 1 percent of overall daily deaths.

The official number is probably an exaggeration because it includes some people who had virus when they died even though it was not the underlying cause of death. Other C.D.C. data suggests that almost one-third of official recent Covid deaths have fallen into this category. A study published in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases came to similar conclusions.

Dr. Shira Doron, the chief infection control officer at Tufts Medicine in Massachusetts, told me that “age is clearly the most substantial risk factor.” Covid’s victims are both older and disproportionately unvaccinated. Given the politics of vaccination, the recent victims are also disproportionately
Republican and white.

Each of these deaths is a tragedy. The deaths that were preventable — because somebody had not received available vaccines and treatments — seem particularly tragic. (Here’s a Times guide to help you think about when to get your next booster shot.)
***

From the great Maureen Dowd:

As I write this, I’m in a deserted newsroom in The Times’s D.C. office. After working at home for two years during Covid, I was elated to get back, so I could wander around and pick up the latest scoop.
But in the last year, there has been only a smattering of people whenever I’m here, with row upon row of empty desks. Sometimes a larger group gets lured in for a meeting with a platter of bagels."

--- Dowd writes about the lost world of journalists clustered in newsrooms at all hours, smoking, drinking, gossipping, making phone calls, typing, editing.
***
"Putting out the paper," we called it.
Much more than nostalgia.
---https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/29/opinion/journalism-newsroom.html

Halloween Costumes Told Me Something About the Cubs

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