The world according to Jim:
• We are a week past baseball’s trading deadline, and a week away from the first of two Dodgers-Padres series, with a fortified Little Brother closing in on the defending champs.
So, Dodger fan, are you frightened yet or at least worried about the front office’s inaction last Thursday, when so many late-inning relief pitchers changed hands but only Brock Stewart wound up (back) in Los Angeles? …
• There’s still a long way between now and October, true. But the weekend series next week in Dodger Stadium and the week after in Petco Park could provide a glimpse of how things might look if these teams play in the postseason for the fourth time in six seasons. Will we have to hide our eyes? …
• Oh, and closer Mason Miller said this on the Foul Territory show regarding his introduction to the Padres. “They told me right away, obviously, we don’t like those guys (the Dodgers) a whole lot.” …
• But here’s the deal: If and when the Padres win a World Series, they’ll no longer be considered Little Brother here. Until then, feel free to ignore it when their fans act out on social media. …
• The recent marriage between ESPN and the NFL, with Disney acquiring the NFL Network and the Red Zone channel in exchange for giving the league a 10 percent ownership stake, only makes official what already seemed obvious, even though it isn’t expected to take full effect until 2026. When it comes to any contentious story regarding The Shield, ESPN will have to answer questions about whether it is pulling its punches journalistically.
After all, the network was hardly willing to push the envelope when the league was merely a business partner. Remember Playmakers, ESPN’s 2003 stab at a dramatic series depicting pro football’s seamy side? It pulled in two million viewers a week but only lasted 11 episodes, canceled under pressure from the NFL. …
• Given that background, it’s good to see that ESPN posted a story on its website and Pat McAfee commented on a confidentiality agreement revealed last month between the league and the NFLPA to cover up an arbitration decision over efforts to restrict guaranteed money. Would ESPN break a story like that after the transaction is complete? The NFL will have an influence. …
• Additionally, according to The Athletic the NFL “also owns a piece” of Skydance, which just took over Paramount and by extension CBS. This is certainly one way to control the message. …
• Now we know more about the disgusting trend of, to use the euphemistic term, tossing sex toys onto the court during WNBA games, including one at Tuesday night’s Sparks home game. Mirjam Swanson and I discussed it in Thursday’s Audible, and Thursday afternoon it was reported that the trend is a scheme hatched by a group of cryptocurrency traders.
All it did was reveal their immaturity and misogyny. Take a bow, fools. …
• A footnote to last week’s quiz and the mention of the Angels trading for Mark Teixeira at the 2008 trading deadline only to lose him to the Yankees that winter as a free agent. As sharp-eyed reader Christopher Smith pointed out, the compensatory draft pick they received turned out to be none other than Mike Trout. …
• This week’s quiz: Max Scherzer, Friday night’s starting pitcher for Toronto against Clayton Kershaw in a battle of 3,000-strikeout pitchers, came to the Dodgers at the 2021 deadline along with Trea Turner (and Andrew Friedman beat the Padres’ A.J. Preller to that deal with Washington). How many of the guys traded to the Nats can you name? Answer below. …
• Another mea culpa from last week: In the mention of Inland columnist David Allen’s piece on ballpark visits, I obviously wasn’t keeping up when I referred to Houston’s Minute Maid Park. The naming rights were sold last winter to Daikin, a Japanese firm listed as the world’s largest air conditioning manufacturer. This Space regrets the error – after turning down the thermostat. …
• Somehow David keeps writing about baseball, as he did in Friday’s paper in mentioning his trip to The Ravine this week to watch his beloved Cardinals. And no, I’m not going to respond by visiting city council meetings. …
Quiz answer: Gerardo Carrillo, Donovan Casey, Josiah Gray and Keibert Ruiz. Carrillo and Casey haven’t gotten out of the minors. Gray hasn’t pitched since last July after undergoing elbow surgery, and Ruiz – once considered a hot Dodgers catching prospect – has a WAR of 5.7 and an OPS+ of 87 (100 represents the league average) in five years with the Nats. …
• Walker Evans’ trademark was a white cowboy hat. We don’t know if he’d ever ridden a horse, but we do know he made a sizable reputation in the motorsports world by going fast and kicking up lots of dust in the process.
Evans was one of the first superstars – indeed, one of the pioneers – of off-road racing, winning 142 races and 21 championships, including five Baja 1,000s. But one of his other accomplishments was to bring that sport a little closer to the urban footprint. Riverside was his hometown, and he helped to organize and popularize SCORE off-road events run by promoter Mickey Thompson at Riverside International Raceway, located in what is now Moreno Valley, from 1973 through 1988 when the track closed.
Evans also helped create NASCAR’s truck racing series in the mid-’90s and competed in 41 of those races, winning 10. And he contributed just as much to motorsports with his Walker Evans Racing enterprise, which collaborated with the major automakers to design and supply parts for off-roaders, particularly wheels and shock absorbers. He was a member of the Off Road Motorsports Hall of Fame, the SEMA (Specialty Equipment Market Association) Hall of Fame, the Motorsports Hall of Fame of America and the Riverside Sport Hall of Fame.
His passing last weekend at the age of 86 ended a remarkable chapter in motorsports history. He is survived by his wife Phyllis and son Evan. Rest in peace, sir.
jalexander@scng.com
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