(Rachel Maddow, left, and Laura Ingraham)
News sucks.
No, check that. The news sucks. I have forever respect for media who spend their days earnestly digging for truth, uncovering rare nuggets free of hype and the obvious.
That’s not me. Certainly not now. I’m referring to the people who grind at it, whose mission it is to tell us, I mean suggest to us, what’s going on. Beat writers who cover a city or town or education. Their pay generally stinks, most people hate them, and even their subjects consider them a gnat in their eyes.
What’s worse: Listening to a politician lie to you for 30 minutes? Or having to stand in a clubhouse for 90 minutes, waiting to ask a ballplayer one question, and that guy never emerges from the batting cage, the trainer’s room or the players lounge?
I did both jobs, one far longer than the other. I’d rather take the lies and get it over with.
I once asked Hal McCoy — HOFer, gentleman, god — if he ever thought about how many hours of his life he’d spent standing in the Reds clubhouse, praying for conversation. Hal wrote for the Dayton papers for, I dunno, 50 years. So. . .50 years times 170 games a year, spring training included, times 90 minutes a game.
Hal must’ve spent 20 damned years doing nothing but loitering between the lockers, um, pen in his hand — you know what I’m really meaning here, and it’s not his pen —-waiting for a pitcher to tell him what pitch he threw that cost The Club the game.
Hal never forgave me for that question.
(Cronkite. Not McCoy)
(Old) people love to reminisce about the great Walter Cronkite. Gave it to ya straight, he did, no right or left leaning. Reliable, trusted, worshipped. Maybe so.
What’d it be like today for Uncle Walter? Rough, man.
Social media dissecting everything, disrespect rampant. People orbiting their universes in general misery, pissed off at everything and everyone, usually for no tangible reason. “And that’s the way it is’’? Really, Wally? Let’s ask Twitter about that.
Which got me to thinking. What if there were no news?
What if I consciously decided not to give any time or headspace to what was going on? A full-on news detox.
I’m a lower-case news junkie. I’m not obsessed, just too curious and definitely too willing to engage. News as spectator sport is nothing but a cry for help. And Advil. Today, I choose to be cynical, angry and powerless! I watch certain news shows, I listen to certain news podcasts. God help me, I read the New York Times.
What if I stopped?
Not forever. But a week. Seven days without the wisdom of certain people whose names will go unmentioned here, because I know nothing good would come of revealing to youse the names of these devoted seekers of truth.
(LOL, OK? Keep your powder dry.)
What if I treated the news like a radioactive isotope?
A what, Doc?
Nevermind.
I’m gonna try it.
Starting Monday for a week, I will watch no news on TV. I will read no news. I will not suffer media people who try to tell me what and how to think. I will listen to two podcasts: Bill Burr’s Monday Morning Podcast and This American Life. That’s it. I swear. It’ll be a cleansing, sorta similar to what we do the day before a colonoscopy.
Sports is exempt, except when it invades my no-news bubble.
I am hoping that after a week, I’ll emerge dumber and happier. Maybe youse could join me and we can compare notes a week from Monday.
Now, then. . .
I’VE ALWAYS WONDERED what it’d be like to live in a country that’s in the world, but not necessarily of it. The Azores, maybe. Or Denmark. I’m pretty sure those people don’t wake up every day wondering what Putin did overnight. They might not have a Starbuck’s on every corner, but they don’t worry about socialism or the price of gas, either.
The Azores don’t have a target on their backs. Denmark’s back isn’t perpetually sore from having the rest of the world on its shoulders. They just live good, peaceful lives eating their Smorrebrod and drinking their Akvavit. Googleit, Mobsters.
It’s no picnic being the world’s superpower.
Who’s with me? Rapa Nui, anyone? We could spend a carefree week not doing anything but breathing occasionally.
PANIC IF IT MAKES YOU FEEL BETTER. . . Samaje Perine, max-effort guy, fan favorite, is now a Denver Bronco. If you assume the Bengals will cut Joe Mixon in June — saving $10 million in cap money — the team roster scoreboard of the moment reads, Starting Safeties 0-Starting RBs 0.
It’s a good reason for all you Mike Brown fans to crank up your chainsaws and come strong with the cliched rhetoric. Me, well, let’s just say it’s hard to type while I’m shrugging.
You’d think by now, The Fam (including adopted son Duke Tobin) would be getting some slack. A real game won’t be played for almost six months, time enough for the front-office savants to make everyone forget about Bell, Bates, Perine and whoever else might be packing.
Maybe we should all look at the roster today, and take note of the studs Duke and his boys have added in the past couple years. They done pretty good.
That said, the Men were the 29th-best running team in the league last year. And Perine was good at keeping St. Joe vertical.
MADNESS EXPERTISE lives here, but only before the games start. You can take my advice for Thursday and Friday. Or you can achieve the same result by torching a $10 bill, or whatever you spent to swim in your office pool.
UPSETS I LIKE THURSDAY AND FRIDAY. . . Furman, Drake, Boise State
TEAMS I’LL TAKE THE POINTS AND RUN WITH. . . Vermont, Oral Roberts, Charleston
BIG NAMES THAT WON’T SURVIVE THE WEEKEND. . . Baylor, K-State, Tennessee
PROGRAMMING NOTE. . .I’m blowing off TML Thursday, to spend the day degenerating at a local watering hole with walls of televisions, tasty wings and cheap drafts.
IMPORTANT STUFF THAT GIVES ME A HEADACHE. . . ESPN.com:
Diamond Sports Group, the Sinclair subsidiary that controls the regional sports networks for 42 teams across Major League Baseball, the National Hockey League and the National Basketball Association, announced that it has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on Tuesday night, three days before the end of a 30-day grace period it entered into with creditors.
Diamond owns the rights to 14 major league teams (Reds included) and must continue to pay them their rights fees; otherwise, teams would be free to break their contracts, at which point MLB might take over broadcasting duties
"Major League Baseball is ready to produce and distribute games to fans in their local markets in the event that Diamond or any other regional sports network is unable to do so as required by their agreement with our Clubs."
The plan, as Manfred explained it, would see the league try to get the games aired on local cable like usual while creating a new option for fans to stream local games.
Blah-blah-blah.
You’re gonna get Reds on TV, in some form or fashion. So you can keep telling us you won’t be watching them as you secretly tune in every night.
TUNE O’ THE DAY. . . Have I played this recently? Maybe. That doesn’t make it rock any less. Thorogood, channeling his Inner Chuck. Try not to dance in your cubicle.
Is No News Good News?
NEXT YEAR ON MARCH MADNESS THURSDAY ALL THE TML REGULARS SHOULD MEET AT A LARGE ENOUGH VENUE TO WATCH SOME BBALL DRINK SOME SUDS SMOKE SOME CIGARS AND MEET EACH OTHER IN PERSON. I HEARD THAT DOC MIGHT BE WILLING TO PICK UP THE TAB.
What's your definition of good shooting in basketball? What stat/s tell/s you how good some shooter shot? I use a rule of thumb guage of at least making as many as you miss, for what a shooter should shoot for to be considered good. So 6/1o 6o% 2pt shooting 12 points on 1o shots is good. But since made 3pt shots are 15o% the value of the 2pt make, 4/1o 4o% 3s = the same 12pts from those 1o shots and the 4o% 3baller is an equally good scoring efficiency shooter as the 6o% inside the arc ace. This also makes your 5o% breakeven 1/2 make/miss ratio for 2s = a 1 for 3 33.3% the breakeven pts/shot for 3s. Obviously these % values are mathematically incompatible, so why do sportscasters and so-called analysts even speak them out loud in a combined apples + oranges % confusion, especially if understanding what's really happening on the court is their mission?