MLB Bullets Has Gone Home For The Winter

It's Day 3 of my reign as BCB Boss and I have yet to deliver my promised coverage of music from 1976 to 1991. So here goes a rant. I hate "Whip It." It's not a bad song as far as novelty songs go. If someone like Tenpole Tudor or A Flock of Seagulls had performed it, I might even like it. But when it became a big hit for Devo, the band went from being a chilling and thrilling combination of performance art and rock and roll to being a silly novelty act. We can argue all we want about how coherent Devo's "De-Evolution" schtick was, but it had a point: We're drowning in our own garbage. Not just physical garbage, but cultural, political and spiritual garbage as well. But that point was lost. No one wanted to listen to "Jocko Homo" after "Whip It," although one could argue few wanted to listen to "Jocko Homo" in the first place. But after "Whip It," it became hard to argue against Devo being novelty act all along.

It took thirty years for me to take Devo seriously again when they released "Something for Everybody" in 2010. I went back and listened to their first two albums and the first is terrific and the second isn't bad. I don't have a problem with Mark Mothersbaugh teaching kids to draw on "Yo Gabba Gabba!" In fact, I think that's awesome. And I have nothing against novelty songs in general. Plastic Bertrand's "Ça plane pour moi" is awesome. But "Whip It?" Blech.

On to baseball.

• In case you haven't heard, the Dodgers moved on to the NLCS with an eighth inning two-run home run by Juan Uribe off of Braves reliever David Carpenter, while Craig Kimbrel, who is now the anointed "best closer on the planet" with Mariano Rivera's retirement, sat in the bullpen waiting for the ninth inning that never came.
• Fredi Gonzalez's tactics have been severely criticized in this game. Grant Brisbee says that Kimbrel should have been on the mound in the eighth inning. Even if he couldn't get all six outs to end the game, he should have faced the tougher batters in the eighth and then Carpenter could have gotten the last out or two in the ninth
• Tom Verducci says that Fredi Gonzalez was "managing by the book" and it cost the Braves the season.
• David Schoenfield also wrote that Gonzalez blew it, but admitted when questioned that Carpenter is also a good pitcher and that it was unlikely that Kimbrel could have gotten all six outs. But Kimbrel still should have been pitching to Puig and Uribe at least.
• Will Leitch said Joe Maddon made just as poor decisions in the Rays game three as Gonzalez did, but no one is criticizing him because the Rays ended up winning that game. He doesn't agree with Gonzalez's moves, but he says that it's part of a manager's job to be the scapegoat, deserved or not.
• Maybe it was just karma for the Braves, who refused to be on the field when Chipper Jones threw out the first pitch in Game 1. Jones's crime? Picking the Dodgers to win the series on a radio show.
• Showtime has moved from the Staples Center to Dodger Stadium in LA, writes Harvey Araton. People make fun of the crowds at Dodger Stadium arriving late and leaving early, but I maintain that Los Angeles is a very underrated baseball town.
• Jon Paul Morosi says that Hanley Ramirez has grown up into the ballplayer we always thought he was going to be.
• The Tigers beat the Athletics in Game 4 to send the series back to Oakland for a decisive game 5. They were aided by a controversial home run by Victor Martinez that was upheld by the umpires after video review.
• Josh Reddick, however, says he has no doubt that he would have caught the ball had a fan not interfered.
• The other big blow for the Tigers in that game was a three-run home run by Jhonny Peralta, who is just back from a suspension for PED use. Check out the advertising sign behind home plate when Peralta hit the home run.
• Although they were eliminated in game four, the Rays won game three of the ALDS on a walk-off home run by Jose Lobaton. Jeff Sullivan examines the play and says it was a great pitch by a great pitcher to a bad hitter. And he hit the game-winning home run anyway. He calls it "nearly impossible." I call it baseball.
• Another reason why Tropicana Field is awful.
• David Price made a public apology for his twitter rant after game two. It was a real apology, not one of those "sorry if I offended you" apologies. It also seemed heartfelt and sincere. So I love you again, David.
• Jacoby Ellsbury is raising his free agent stock with a strong postseason.
• The Pirates take on the Cardinals in Game 5 tonight. Manager Clint Hurdle has bypassed Game 1 starter A.J. Burnett to give the start to Game 2 starter (and rookie) Gerrit Cole. Cole says these are the moments a ballplayer dreams about.
• The Cardinals made the playoffs on the strength of their incredible 2009 draft. The Cards got Shelby Miller, Joe Kelly, Matt Carpenter, Trevor Rosenthal and Matt Adams in that one draft.
• Another reason the Cardinals are so good is that they're able to do something few other teams can: produce talented major league pitchers out of their farm system year after year after year.
• TV ratings for the Division Series are way up this season. Those rating made TBS the highest-rated cable channel for the week. Although some people are not very happy with the quality of TBS's coverage.
• Will Leitch agrees that TBS's work on the games is terrible, but he says their studio show is the best around. (The Awful Announcing post in the last bullet agrees that the TBS studio show is good.) He credits Dirk Hayhurst, Gary Sheffield, Pedro Martinez and Keith Olbermann for making the show the best around. He's right. They're the one bright spot in TBS's coverage.
• Now returning to the news you really want to know about: Joe Girardi. The Yankees want an answer from him sooner rather than later.
• Wallace Matthews thinks the Yankees aren't being fair with Girardi. If the Bronx is truly where Girardi wants to be, he thinks the Yankees have nothing to fear by letting Girardi talk to the Cubs or Nationals.
• Steven Goldman thinks the Cubs are in for disappointment in their pursuit of Girardi. And that's if they get him. Now Goldman is a Yankees writer and he focuses on his manager's negative points, as fans of any team are wont to do. But he does make a few good points in that we just don't know that Girardi is the best man for the Cubs managerial job. Certainly A.J. Hinch and Manny Acta have a lot more experience working with younger players. His job with the Yankees entailed getting the best performances possible out of 37 year olds.
• The Yankees say they will make every effort to re-sign Robinson Cano, but they won't give him a ten-year contract.
• The Angels won't be looking for a new manager or general manager, as Mike Scioscia and Jerry Dipoto will both return in 2014.
• Phillies manager Ryne Sandberg named Larry Bowa his bench coach for 2014. Ryne Sandberg has always said the best manager he ever had was Jim Frey. Well, now he's just hired his own Don Zimmer. I wonder if we can trade Ivan DeJesus for the both of them again? Oh yeah, DeJesus isn't in the organization anymore.
• Jayson Werth wants Cal Ripken Jr. to be the next manager of the Nationals. Ripken isn't shooting the idea down.
• Curt Schilling is selling off most of his things to pay off his debts. You can buy some pretty unusual stuff from him.
• Kendrys Morales will reject the Mariners qualifying offer and become a free agent.
• Baseball Nation has a great profile of Giants coach Sir Hensley "Bam Bam" Muelens.
• Here's some audio of Vin Scully calling Don Larsen's perfect game.
• Finally, MLB historian John Thorne has a wonderful history and analysis of the greatest song ever written, "Take Me Out To The Ballgame."