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Just say it out loud, the mantra that gets some of us through the winter.
Pitchers and catchers, pitchers and catchers. The good time is upon us. The batteries are reporting in Arizona and Florida. The New York Times has a touching recollection of the first dippy spring of the Mets, when Casey Stengel tried to convince people he was managing a contender. Robert Lipsyte, who was there in St. Petersburg that first spring, describes what it was like. My first team – Newsday – also caught the sweet goofiness of the Mets, telling people it was really all right to enjoy whatever was coming next from this motley bunch. Pitchers and catchers. The Amazing Mets, Casey called them. Too old, too young, too marginal. But what a good time. In the spirit of pitchers and catchers and rejuvenation and springtime, I am sharing a poem that popped over my transom the other day, from Brian Doyle, not the guy who batted .438 for the Yankees in the 1978 World Series or a bunch of other Brian Doyles, but a writer and editor in Portland, Oregon. He sent it to me; I send it to you, with his permission. Poem to Celebrate the Day that Pitchers and Catchers Report to Training Camp One time years ago when I was a geeky goofy gawky teenager I stood on the baseball mound and waited as our coach ambled Out to give me advice or take me out, I couldn’t tell just which From his face. Even though I had walked a couple of guys and Another kid had hit a ball so hard it bounced through the fence Before the outfielders could react, the coach didn’t seem angry. Coaches on other teams got mad and threw things and shouted, But not our coach, that I remember. When our coach arrived at The mound I held out the ball, as we had been taught, and tried To stay calm, but he said no no, stay in, you’re doing just great, I just came out to talk a little. Boy, did that kid crush that curve Or what? I haven’t seen a ball hit that hard in years. You notice The sound the bat made? Kind of a basso whunk? Authoritative, I would call that sound. Inarguable. Instantly identifiable, right? I don’t think we spend sufficient time appreciating the sonorous Aspects of the game, you know what I mean? The small musics, You might say. Like how the fungo bat has a high note. Sounds Sort of happy and relaxed, a before-the-game sound. And cleats On concrete, that sounds cool. Clatter, that’s the word. So, what Are you going to throw this next kid? I’d just stay with the heat; Now, I know you say you have no control, and while that’s true, You may actually suddenly achieve control – it’s not impossible. And remember that every wild pitch causes trepidation and awe, Which are not conducive to hitting. Hey, look a blue heron! See, Right there, by the right field line! Wow. Okay, kid, go get them. Brian Doyle 8/26/2013 01:48:26 am
My first team – Newsday – also caught the sweet goofiness of the Mets, telling people it was really all right to enjoy whatever was coming next from this motley bunch. 9/11/2013 02:53:49 am
The Pristine York Days has a against memory of the maiden dippy release of the Mets, whereas Casey Stengel dependable to assure persons he was managing a contender. 7/15/2014 04:12:35 pm
I put a link to my site to here so other people can read it. My readers have about the same happy. 7/15/2014 04:13:04 pm
Thank you for another great article. Where else could anyone get that kind of information in such a perfect way of writing?
Elliott Kolker
1/16/2016 06:23:12 pm
Pedro and Schillin
Elliott Kolker
1/17/2016 03:20:11 am
Pt ll:
Elliott Kolker
1/17/2016 05:51:55 am
Elliott Kolker
1/17/2016 07:27:54 am
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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 Categories
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