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Speaking of Baltimore, many of us consider Earl Weaver, the so-called Earl of Baltimore, one of the greatest managers ever, and his overall record as a Major League pilot (1480-1060, a .583 winning percentage) would seem to bear this out.  However, did you know that although Weaver had a star-studded lineup throughout his 17-year tenure as the Orioles’ skipper (i.e., Brooks Robinson, Cal Ripken, Davey Johnson, Boog Powell, Frank Robinson, Eddie Murray, Jim Palmer, Dave McNally, Steve Stone, Mike Cuellar, Pat Dobson), and although his Oriole teams won more than 100 games during the regular season an astonishing five times, Weaver was only able to bring the so-called Charm City a single World Series championship, in 1970 over the pre-Big Red Machine Cincinnati ball club, by the margin of 4 games to 1. 

The Birds’ regular season record that year was an amazing 108-54, or exactly 2 games out of every 3 in the win column.

In 1969, Weaver’s second year at the helm, the Orioles won an even more remarkable 109 games against 53 losses, but fell to the manifestly underdog Miracle Mets in five games; in 1971, Weaver’s charges won 101 games but were topped in a 7-game Fall Classic by the Pittsburgh Pirates; in 1979, the Orioles piled up 102 wins on their way to claiming the AL pennant, but again fell to the Steel City ball club (of Willie “Pops” Stargell “We Are Family” fame) in another 7-game Series.  In 1980, Weaver’s Orioles again made the century mark in wins with exactly 100, but the New York Yankees finished atop the Eastern Division of the American League with 103 wins, and then fell to the Kansas City Royals in the American League Championship Series (who in turn lost to the Philadelphia Phillies in the 1980 World Series, the first-ever World Series championship for the City of Brotherly Love). 

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For those of you who think there is nothing good to watch on TV, I commend to you the HBO series Billions, starring Paul Giamatti as a criminal prosecutor in New York City.  He is fantastic in this role as a staunch law-and-order guy, who is mostly under control but has at least one outburst of his Vesuvian temper every episode.  Although I loved Giamatti in The Cinderella Man and other movies in which he has starred, for my money this is the best role that the son of the former baseball commissioner has ever had.  Try it. 

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I read in the paper the other day that Denzel Washington is going to star in a remake of the epic gunslinger movie The Magnificent Seven, one of my favorites.  This is reportedly Denzel’s first western as a movie actor, and his first reunion with Training Day co-star Ethan Hawke.  Along this same line, I recently re-watched The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, starring Clint Eastwood and Eli Wallach, which for me did not stand the test of time.  While watching the credits, however, I was reminded that some of the scenes in TGTB&TU were shot in Italy, as were many other westerns from that time period, giving rise to the term “Spaghetti Western” in movie parlance. 

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A client of mine recently shared with me a fascinating story about an Indiana ENT physician-gone-bad, entitled The Runaway Doctor.  Apparently this physician’s story appeared on something called American Greed or some such show, and may be made into a movie.  In any event, it is best just to provide you the link and to recommend that you read it yourself.  Truly a cautionary tale about the “Root of All Evil,” the love of money. 

http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2011/01/missing-doctor-201101

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I forgot to share this quip about Bartolo Colon when I was recounting our Opening Day visit to Kauffman Stadium in an earlier issue.  After Matt Harvey gave up 2 runs in the bottom of the 6th, Mets skipper Terry Collins decided to pull the hook on Harvey and brought in the larger-than-most-forms-of-life Bartolo Colon.  As Colon lumbered in from the visitors’ bullpen, it was apparent that he did not spend the offseason focused on conditioning and weight loss.  As he was warming up, I paid a visit to the men’s room, and heard the radio announcer for the Royals comment that, “In comes the veteran Bartolo Colon, who is ageless but certainly not weightless.”  That one cracked me up. 

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I had a surreal experience the other day at the airport in Omaha as I was coming back from a deposition trip to the Bay Area.  As I was disembarking the plane through the jet bridge and about to walk inside the airport, all of a sudden I heard Scott’s voice talking to me, saying something like, “Did you get a good workout, Dave?” or words to that effect.  At first, I thought that B.T. was at the airport to greet me or something, but that made no sense and before long I figured out that his voice was coming from my phone, and not only his voice, but also his smiling face.  Now I was completely confused.  What kind of sorcery was this, and might this explain his mastery of the Hot Stove League—being able to appear at will and look in on what his co-owners are doing at any point in their day, such as making free agent decisions and the like?  Thankfully, the talking head on my phone quickly cut through my cloud of confusion when he suggested that I must have inadvertently activated the “Face Time” feature of my electronic device, which I quite frankly was not even aware existed, and which heretofore had never been utilized by me.  The mystery having been solved, I bid B.T. adieu, wished him a delightful anniversary trip with Beth to Milwaukee and Miller Park (his first visit there), which he secretly planned to surprise his lovely bride (such a giver, and so sensitive, that one), and then spent another five or ten minutes staring blankly at my magical cellular device, not sure quite what to make of it.  I would imagine that the look on my face was probably a lot like the looks on the faces of the unsuspecting spectators when they first saw Orville and Wilbur Wright streaking across the sky in their magical flying machines.  It’s a brave new world, for sure. 

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On my drive home from Iowa City on Tuesday afternoon, I wandered off the grid just a bit and found myself driving through a little burg known as Brooklyn, Iowa.  I took the road less traveled that afternoon because I had recently read about the owner of a Negro League baseball team by the name of James Wilkinson, and who hailed from Brooklyn, Iowa, according to a baseball blog by John Holman.  Wilkinson reportedly was the only white “founder” in the Negro Leagues, leading the Kansas City Monarchs to professional success as a club owner for nearly 30 years.  Wilkinson reportedly signed Jackie Robinson to his first pro contract in 1945, two years before Branch Rickey hand-picked Robinson for his candidate to integrate the Major Leagues.  A book is currently being written about him by Kansas City area author Tom Fredrick.  If you want to read more about the innovative and color-blind Wilkinson, the following is a link to a Des Moines Register article about him.

http://data.desmoinesregister.com/hall-of-fame/single.php?id=374