Author / admin

by admin

Book 47 (of 52) – Edge

Edge – Jeffery Deaver

In the stand-alone novel Edge, an agent for a secret government agency, tasked with protecting US citizens who have been targeted by mercenaries who will either kidnap, torture, threaten, blackmail, or even kill, is assigned to protect a local cop and his family from the man who killed his mentor.  While trying to keep his charges safe, the agent works to find out how he can capture his nemesis and figure out who has hired him to target the family under his protection.  Can he figure out which family member is the target before it is too late?

This is the third one-off work from Jeffery Deaver that I’ve read, following The Devil’s Teardrop and The Blue Nowhere, and the best thing I can say about all of them is that I would be willing to go on another adventure with the characters if he was.  In this outing, he (I presume) makes up a secret government agency or two and gives them a reason for being.  While I can see how a second go-around has the potential to be monotonous, I think there is enough there to do another version in a different enough way to be entertaining.  But, after twelve years, I assume that ship has sailed.

by admin

2022 BBWAA Award Predictions

The Baseball Writers of America have announced the finalists for their awards for the just completed baseball season, which will be announced next week.  It is a good bet that few of my original predictions for the winners will be accurate.  Hopefully, these new predictions will be slightly better, especially since I’ll have a 33% chance of being right.

American League

Most Valuable Player: Yordan Alvarez, Aaron Judge, Shohei Ohtani

Had Shohei Ohtani not had the season he had last year, he would easily walk away with this award.  But, as they say, familiarity builds, if not contempt, at least complacency. So Aaron Judge, who broke the American League home run record, will take home the prize.

Cy Young Award: Dylan Cease, Alek Manoah, Justin Verlander

Justin Verlander returned from Tommy John surgery at age 39 and won 18 games while posting a 1.75 ERA.  Seems a little suspicious to my eyes, but he will easily take home this award.

Manager of the Year: Terry Francona, Brandon Hyde, Scott Servais

As usual, I didn’t make any predictions for this award prior to the season.  Scott Servais should have won this award last year, but I don’t think he will make up for it this year.  Brandon Hyde led the Orioles to a 31-game improvement over the previous year and their first winning season since 2016.  That should get him the award.

Rookie of the Year: Steven Kwan, Julio Rodriguez, Adley Rutschman

Another award I didn’t predict prior to the season.  While all three had very successful seasons, my guess would be that Julio Rodriguez brings this award back to Seattle.

National League

Continue reading →

by admin

College Basketball Tipoff

The men’s Purdue Boilermakers kick of the 2022-2023 season tonight, the 125th in school history, so let’s take a look at the results of the now whopping 17 men’s college basketball games I have attended in my lifetime. You’d think it would be more, since I was a big fan and we had a great team while I was in school, but for some reason I only made it to two games while enrolled in college. The other fifteen have been post-graduation, although none came last season.  With Danny playing in the band for the women’s team at Purdue, I did manage to make a few of those games, but I haven’t decided how to track those just yet.  Anyway, without further ado, here are the standings for those 17 games.

All-Time Team Records

Team Won Loss Winning Pctg
Virginia Commonwealth Rams 1 0 1.000
North Texas Mean Green 1 0 1.000
Butler Bulldogs 1 0 1.000
Purdue Boilermakers 10 6 0.625
Northwestern Wildcats 2 3 0.400
Illinois Fighting Illini 2 3 0.400
Vermont Catamounts 0 1 0.000
Middle Tennessee Blue Raiders 0 1 0.000
Long Beach State 49ers 0 1 0.000
Iowa State Cyclones 0 1 0.000
Houston Cougars 0 1 0.000
by admin

FB8 – Week 41

A weekend trip to Boston helped pick up what had been a down week to that point, helping me finish above 30,000 steps for the third week in a row.  Things got off to a decent enough start on Sunday, as I finished with 4000 steps.  Despite answering the doorbell for the handful of trick or treaters on Monday, I ended Halloween with just over 3800 steps.  A trip to the office on Tuesday left me just 17 steps away from 4600.  Wednesday turned into the week’s low point, finishing with only 1900 steps.  Thursday bounced back a little, going up to 2800 steps.  An afternoon flight on Friday put me up above 6900 steps.  A trip to the Museum of Science and birthday dinner with Angelina on Saturday pushed me up over 8900 steps, my highest total since the end of September.

Total steps: 33,100

Daily average: 4728.6

by admin

Travelling The 50 States – Kentucky

Over my 48 years, I’ve done my fair share of travelling across these United States.  I thought it would be an interesting experiment go look back at those trips to each of the 31 states I have visited (62% isn’t bad, is it?) and see if, and when, I may be returning.  Working in alphabetical order, we continue today with the 15th state to be added to the Union: Kentucky.

State: Kentucky
Joined the Union: 1792
Visits: 7

Aside from driving through on my way to Florida, I’m pretty sure I’ve made seven distinct trips to Kentucky, although nearly all of them had nothing to do with Kentucky.  My first six stops came as part of trips to Ohio, specifically the town of Cincinnati.  The current home of the Reds, Great American Ballpark, is right on the Ohio River, which forms the border between Ohio and Kentucky.  When visiting my old friend Scott and attending a Reds game, we would drive over the bridge and find free street parking on the Kentucky side, walking across a pedestrian bridge to get to the park.  This trip occurred annually from 2003 through 2008.

My most recent foray into Kentucky came on the trip home from Universal in 2010.  For some reason, Angelina thought there would be nothing better than eating at a Kentucky Fried Chicken in the great state of Kentucky.  And so we did.

Will I return?  Who can tell.  It has been 14 years since my last game at the Great American Ballpark and, frankly, I wouldn’t be able to do the walk now even if I wanted to.  Aside from that, there isn’t much driving me down to Kentucky.

by admin

Team Stats: Hit By Pitch

We are days away from crowning the champion to the 2022 season and now just five months away from baseball returning to Chicago. I thought it would be a good time to revisit, for the first time in six years, the all-time rankings in both offensive and defensive categories for all iterations of the current 30 teams for the 1040 games I’ve identified that I have attended. We continue today on the defensive side of the ball with batters hit by a pitch.

Again, based on the raw numbers, the White Sox and Cubs are far and away the leaders in this category, as they are the teams I’ve seen the most. When you adjust the numbers per game, the Guardians and the Devil Rays lead the way, followed, surprisingly, by the Tigers, who hit a little more than 1 batter every other game.  The Mets are at the bottom, hitting less than one batter every nine games, while the California version of the Angels and the Miami version of the Marlins have yet to hit a batter in a game I’ve seen.

Hit By Pitch

Team Name Hit By Pitch
Chicago White Sox 221
Chicago Cubs 147
Minnesota Twins 33
Detroit Tigers 31
Cleveland Indians 28
Kansas City Royals 26
Houston Astros 22
Texas Rangers 18
Seattle Mariners 17
Cincinnati Reds 16
Boston Red Sox 16
Baltimore Orioles 16
Pittsburgh Pirates 15
Los Angeles Angels 14
Milwaukee Brewers Continue reading →
by admin

FB8 – Week 40

Another fairly consistent week, where every day fell between 4000 and 5000 steps, and I finished above 30,000 steps for the second week in a row.  Things got off to a decent enough start on Sunday, as I finished with 4300 steps.  A 6 step increase on Monday also put me over the 4300 step plateau.  Tuesday fell off just a bit, going down to just over 4000 steps.  A trip into the office on Wednesday turned into the week’s high point, finishing just 8 steps shy of 4900.  A day off of work and a birthday dinner put me just 6 steps over 4000 on Thursday.  Another day off on Friday led to 4300 steps.  A trip out to see Black Adam and celebrate my birthday with Daryl left me with 4500 steps on Saturday.

Total steps: 30,438

Daily average: 4348.3

by admin

The Pedro Grifol Era Has Reportedly Started

The White Sox have reportedly selected Pedro Grifol to be their next manager.  Grifol has spent the last ten seasons on the Royals staff and has been the bench coach under Mike Matheny for the past three years.  Given the emphasis general manager Rick Hahn placed on searching for candidates from winning organizations, a hire from the Royals, who finished their sixth straight losing season in 2022, is a little out of left field, but Grifol, a former catcher, appears to have a sparking reputation, thought to be well-prepared with analytics and a strong clubhouse presence.

Along with Grifol, the team is expected to revamp their coaching staff, with only pitching coach Ethan Katz and bullpen coach Curt Hasler remaining from former manager Tony LaRussa’s staff.  Former Blue Jays manager Charlie Montoyo is expected to join the staff as bench coach.  There should be more details released about the coaching staff once the World Series is over and the White Sox are able to officially announce the hire.

by admin

Travelling The 50 States – Iowa

Over my now 48 years, I’ve done my fair share of travelling across these United States.  I thought it would be an interesting experiment go look back at those trips to each of the 30 states I have visited (60% isn’t bad, is it?) and see if, and when, I may be returning.  Working in alphabetical order, we start today with the 29th state to be added to the Union: Iowa.

State: Iowa
Joined the Union: 1846
Visits: 1

To the best of my knowledge, I’ve made a single trip to the Hawkeye State, coming in 2014 on the backend of a trip to Minneapolis with Danny and Michael to see the White Sox battle the Twins.  On the way up, we took the route through Wisconsin, so, to mix things up, we decided to come home through Iowa.  If I had it all to do over again, I would have made a different choice.

I’m sure there are things to do and/or see somewhere in Iowa, but we did not encounter any of them on the long drive back home.  When it came time to find something to eat, we eventually found an exit that contained a Steak ‘n Shake.  This is where things got a little more exciting.  The restaurant was next to a hotel that seemed to be holding a furry convention of some sort.  Some of the costumed folks had made their way over to the Steak ‘n Shake, which was very confusing for a young Mr. Michael, who had not yet reached his tenth birthday.  After some awkward questions, his curiosity seemed sated, we finished our meal, and then continued our long journey back to the loving arms of Illinois.

Will I return?  I’m sure there may be a reason to do so someday, but I have no current plans.