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Finally, Heading To The Final Four

For the first time since 1980, the Purdue Boilermakers are headed to the Final Four.  This afternoon’s victory over Tennessee in the Elite Eight showdown at Little Caesars Arena in Detroit gives Purdue its first regional championship in the men’s NCAA tournament in 44 years.  The team will battle NC State Saturday in Phoenix for their shot to advance to the championship game.

What a weekend in Detroit!  Seeing a Sweet Sixteen victory against Gonzaga on Friday followed by today’s win against Tennessee, both teams that we had already defeated this year during non-conference play, was exhilarating and. to be honest, a little nerve racking.  Here’s looking forward to an exciting weekend as the school looks for its first basketball championship since the women’s team won it all in 1999.

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Book 13 (of 52) – 60 Songs That Explain The ’90s

60 Songs That Explain The ’90s = Rpb Harvilla

On January 1, 1990, I was 15 years old, a high school sophomore ready and willing, if not quite able, to take over the world.  The music of the next decade is, primarily, the soundtrack of my life, even to this day.  In his book 60 Songs That Explain The ’90s, Rob Harvilla dives into, not necessarily the most successful songs of the decade, but certainly some of the most impactful, across the pop, rock, and hip-hop genres.  He doesn’t go into the nitty gritty behind the crafting or recording of each song, but where it fell in the cultural zeitgeist and how they impacted the world, the scene, or maybe just his life.  Songs like Doll Parts by Hole, Vogue by Madonna, It Was a Good Day by Ice Cube, and Metallica’s Enter Sandman.  Fiona Apple’s Criminal, with its suggestive video, to Wonderwall by Oasis, whose Gallagher brothers remain at odds to this day.  And, of course, Smells Like Teen Spirit, Nirvana’s seminal hit that killed hair metal overnight and ushered in grunge and the so-called “alternative revolution” that ruled rock radio for much of the decade.

These are the songs that got me through high school, college, and my earliest days in the real world.  The songs I danced to at prom, rocked out to in the car after my friends and I got our licenses, and listened to on my way to and from work.

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How Sweet (16) It Is

The Sweet Sixteen kicks off today following an opening weekend with upsets galore that played havoc with my bracket, although my entire Final Four is still intact, which is better than some.

Things look pretty decent here.  Auburn’s loss to Yale knocked me for a bit of a loop, but, aside from that, things are fairly clean, with three of the four teams heading into this weekend still alive.

Things are slightly worse on this side of the bracket, with just two of the four teams I picked playing this weekend.  While Nebraska did me dirty, I correctly picked that Wisconsin had peaked after beating Purdue in the Big Ten Tournament two weeks ago.

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All Time Team Records

After a long, disappointing winter, the 2024 baseball season is set to get underway tomorrow.  To celebrate, it is time once again to look at the all-time team records for games that I have identified as having attended dating back to 1984.  Last year, I tied 2011 for my eleventh highest game total of all time, an increase of ten games from the year before, and managed to see 21 out of the 30 teams, so there should be some nice changes.

The White Sox just may be worse this year following a disappointing 2023, with new general manager Chris Getz treading water by bringing in defensive upgrades who can’t hit their way out of a paper bag.  On the other side of town, the Cubs brought in Craig Counsell to push a team that overachieved back into playoff contention but didn’t do a whole lot to improve the roster to help him do so.  The 2024 season may just be a maddening year on both sides of town.

All-Time Team Records

Team Name Won Loss Winning Pctg
California Angels 2 0 1.000
Arizona Diamondbacks 16 4 0.800
Florida Marlins 15 8 0.652
New York Yankees 19 12 0.613
Colorado Rockies 11 7 0.611
Cleveland Guardians 3 2 0.600
Philadelphia Phillies 13 9 0.591
Toronto Blue Jays 17 12 0.586
Los Angeles Angels 20 15 0.571
Boston Red Sox 19 15 0.559
Washington Nationals 7 6 0.538
Cleveland Indians 31 27 0.534
Chicago Cubs 235 213 0.525
Chicago White Sox 366 342 0.517 Continue reading →
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2024 Predictions

The North American portion of the 2024 baseball season is scheduled to kick off on Thursday, with a full slate of games featuring all 30 teams.  For the fourteenth consecutive year, I’ve looked into the crystal ball to make my picks for the upcoming season.

American League

East: Rays

Central: Guardians

West: Mariners

Wild Cards: Astros, Blue Jays, Yankees

AL Champion: Yankees

Cy Young: Tristan McKenzie

MVP: Julio Rodriguez

National League

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Fifty Years Of Music – 1985

Fifty years ago, I made my first appeared on the Earth.  In celebration, we are going to take a look at the year-end Billboard Hot 100 singles chart for each year of my life and see what songs resonated with me at the time and if they continue to do so to this day.

We continue our look back at the music of my lifetime with 1985, the year I wrapped up fifth grade, moved to sixth grade, did the Super Bowl Shuffle, and turned 11.  31 songs of the Hot 100 are familiar to me now, with only fifteen of them appearing in my collection in one way or another.

#97: Don Henley – All She Wants to Do Is Dance
iTunes stats: N/A

The sixth solo single from the Eagles drummer peaked at #9 on the Hot 100.

#92: Bruce Springsteen – Born in the USA
iTunes stats: 15 plays

Ranked as the 275th greatest song of all time by Rolling Stone, the track broke the top ten, hitting #9 in January of 1985.

#88: David Lee Roth – California Girls
iTunes stats: 22 plays

Roth’s first solo single after leaving Van Halen, this version matched the original by the Beach Boys, topping out at #3.

#75: Katrina and the Waves – Walking on Sunshine
iTunes stats: 14 plays

Hitting #9 on the Hot 100 in 1985, the song was briefly banned in the southern US after Hurrican Katrina in 2005.

#74: Bryan Adams – Summer of ’69
iTunes stats: N/A

Peaking at #5 on the charts, the song was ranked at #70 on Blender’s list “The 500 Greatest Songs Since You Were Born” in 2005

#67: Bruce Springsteen – Glory Days
iTunes stats: 14 plays

The fifth of a record-tying seven singles from the Born in the USA album to hit the top five, it stalled out at #5 in the summer of 1985.

#61: Harold Faltermeyer – Axel F
iTunes stats: 18 plays

The instrumental theme to Beverly Hills Cop, the track reached #3 on the Hot 100.

#58: Madonna – Material Girl
iTunes stats: N/A

Spending two weeks at #2, the second single from Like a Virgin gave Madonna two simultaneous top five hits.

#57: Tina Turner – We Don’t Need Another Hero (Thunderdome)
iTunes stats: N/A

Turner peaked at #2 with this hit from the soundtrack to Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, which also earned her a Golden Globe and Oscar nominations.

#56: Animotion – Obsession
iTunes stats: 16 plays

The band’s first single reached #6 on the Hot 100.

#53: Don Henley – The Boys of Summer
iTunes stats: N/A

The track, which earned Henley a Grammy in 1986, hit #5 on the Hot 100 and topped the Top Rock Tracks chart for five weeks.

#51: Prince & the Revolution – Raspberry Beret
iTunes stats: 5 plays

Peaking at #2 in 1985, the song re-entered the Hot 100 at #33 in 2016 following Prince’s death.

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FB10: Week 9

Work, along with a return of cold weather, reared its ugly head this week, knocking things back down again.  Things got off to a decent start on Sunday, finishing just 20 steps away from 4100.  Monday saw a small increase, pushing across that 4100-step plateau.  Things fell off a cliff on Tuesday, dropping down to 2400 steps and ending my streak of 4000-step days at nine.  A bit of an increase on Wednesday pushed me back up to 3200 steps.  Thursday saw another small increase, going up again to 3500 steps.  Friday was slightly worse, needing 31 steps to get to 3400.  Saturday ended the week on an upswing, coming 21 steps shy of 3800.

Total steps: 24,521

Daily average: 3503

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Active Pitching Leaders – Through 2023

Last weekend, we looked at the active leaders in games I’ve attended through 2023 on the offensive side of the ball.  With spring training winding down and Opening Day just a few days away, let’s take a look at the defensive side of the ball and the active pitching leaders.

Wins

Name Total
Chris Sale 21
Lucas Giolito 12
Reynaldo Lopez 10
Jose Quintana 8
Lance Lynn 7

Losses

Name Total
Jose Quintana 17
Carlos Rodon 13
Chris Sale 12
Lucas Giolito 9
Kyle Hendricks 9

ERA (> 35 IP)

Name Total
David Robertson 2.13
Taijuan Walker 2.25
Liam Hendriks 2.88
Johnny Cueto 2.97
Chris Sale 3.09

ERA (> 70 IP)

Name Total
Johnny Cueto 2.97
Chris Sale 3.09
Dylan Cease 3.33
Reynaldo Lopez 3.64
Michael Kopech 3.94

Strikeouts

Name Total
Chris Sale 313
Jose Quintana 208
Lucas Giolito 185
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Book 12 (of 52) – Butchers Hill

Butchers Hill – Laura Lippman

Tess Monaghan, who has just struck out on her own as a private investigator, gets her first two clients: a man convicted of murder who claims to be looking for the other kids who witnessed his crime and a woman looking for the daughter she put up for adoption years earlier.  When her leads on the first case start ending up murdered, she starts to doubt the intentions of her client.  Meanwhile, she finds that she has a surprising connection to the young girl she has been charged with locating.

Butchers Hill, the third entry in Laura Lippman’s Tess Monaghan series, finally addresses one of the biggest issues facing its setting of Baltimore: race.  Tess is forced to face some of her privilege as she takes on black clients who, while they share the same city, live in a different world.  Lippman does a good job of dealing with the issue, especially considering this book was originally published in 1998.  I certainly don’t remember much in the way of discussion about white privilege at the time.  I’m now a quarter of the way through the series, which I’m sure I’ll pick up again later this year.

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It’s Time To Dance

The nation’s attention turns to the college hoops scene for the next few weeks as the NCAA tournament kicks off later today.  I’m not in any pools this year, so most of these selections have no ultimate bearing on my life, aside from personal pride.  I do have the potential to purchase tickets for future rounds should a certain school from West Lafayette manage to get out of their own way and not embarrass themselves this weekend.  So, without further ado, let’s take a look at this year’s selections.

My selections here are mostly chalk, with a couple early upsets but with the top four seeds heading to the Sweet Sixteen.  Iowa State is my pick to advance to the Final Four.

Fun fact: the first men’s college basketball game I ever attended was Purdue versus Houston at Market Square Arena back in 1993.  Both teams are once again top seeds in this tournament.  I’m hoping Nebraska continues to pull off upsets against teams they have no business beating.  In the end, though, I have Marquette going on to Phoenix.

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