Daily Archives: December 31, 2009

Decade in preview

Posted on by
2

I had a great idea for a Decade in Review list. It was going to be: “The Decade’s 10 Dumbest Decade In Review Lists.”

I was going to put the list itself sixth or seventh, because I’m meta like that. But I ran out of steam about two deep, because I got really bored scouring the Internet for dumb decade-in-review lists, plus I don’t really begrudge people the right to wax nostalgic at the times when it is deemed socially appropriate.

I’m not immune either, of course. I did write this just the other day, after all. I just usually spend more time, for better or worse, speculating about the future than remembering the past.

And I’ve got to be honest, I thought things would be a lot cooler by now.

Seriously: This is 2010? The future sucks.

I distinctly remember reading in Ms. McKenna’s third-grade class, when it turned 1990, that by 2010 we’d have a colony on the Moon. No joke. I read that in some sort of science magazine they handed out to elementary school kids. Oh, and Back to the Future II sure made it seem like hovercars would be pretty well established by 2015.

Where are all the hovercars? Why am I still grounded in my dented 1999 sedan like some sort of chump or sucker? Answer me that.

Heck, the Jetsons were supposedly set in 2062, according to the Wikipedia. Are we 52 years away from living in that world?

Get on it, science.

I mean, look: I don’t want to sound like an ingrate. I have a phone that gives me access to every bit of information I could possibly conceive, plus thousands of songs, and it streams video of live baseball games. I suppose that’s OK.

But we still can’t even get to Mars! Mars! Not even outside our own damn solar system! Are you kidding me? As the great comedian Jake Johannsen has pointed out, we transmit signals to far reaches of the galaxy in hopes of making contact with intelligent life, and what are we going to say if they answer? “We can meet you on the Moon”?

So I expect big things out of the next 10 years. Big, big things. Awesome things. I don’t mean like, “oh, we’ve really made the Internet better and more universally accessible, and now we have Hybrid cars that could save the Earth, and we’ve made tremendous strides toward curing various diseases” things, I mean like, “robot dinosaurs we can fly.”

Here’s hoping for that. Enjoy whatever festivities you get up to or don’t get up to tonight, and good luck in the coming decade. Thanks for reading and Happy New Year.

The full Nelson

Posted on by
5

I promised hdarvick I’d post something about Nelson Figueroa yesterday and failed, but here’s something.

Conventional wisdom says that Nelson Figueroa should not be allowed to pitch more than a certain limited number of innings in any given Major League stint before he’s exposed and big-league hitters figure out his stuff, but I’ve never been much one for conventional wisdom.

Figueroa pitched well for the Mets down the stretch last season, long after the wheels had already come off for the rest of the team, and exceptionally well in Buffalo. It’s difficult to put too much stock in the 70 1/3 innings he totaled for the big-league club in 2009 because of the sample size, but they can’t be entirely discounted either. He finished with a perfectly average 100 ERA+ and a reasonable 2.46 K/BB ratio, highlighting his season with the Mets’ only shutout at Citi Field.

Figueroa has a long history of very good Triple-A stats, but he did pitch better than usual at both that level and the Majors last year, and it’s difficult to decipher why. There was probably some luck involved, since Figueroa significantly lowered his home run per flyball rate and batting average on balls in play — figures that usually normalize in time — in 2009.

Judging from Fangraphs, using a limited sample, it appears Figueroa threw his slider a bit harder, more frequently and more effectively last season than he did in 2008.

I’m not certain if that’s the whim of small sample size or the sign of a real adjustment. Figueroa is a crafty guy, and maybe he made some change to his grip or delivery that allowed him to pitch to more weak contact.

I don’t think the Mets or most of their fans would be thrilled to see Figueroa penciled into the rotation for 2010, probably because he’s unspectacular, or because he’ll be 36 in May, or because of that old conventional wisdom.

But Figueroa’s great value is in his durability. As he told me back in 2008, he has thrown 153-pitch games and 280-inning years. I’m unclear on his contract status, but he’s still listed on the 40-man roster on Mets.com, and good. He should compete for a long relief role in Spring Training and is a great option to have around for spot starts for when someone in the rotation inevitably goes down.

Culture Jammin’: Jason Statham

Posted on by
8

The wife was out last night and Death Race was on Cinemax. So that’s what this is about.

Jason Statham is awesome. He perpetually looks like he’s about to kick someone’s ass, even in scenes when he’s tenderly romancing his wife in the kitchen and such.

In fact, it feels like just about every Jason Statham movie has a part when he unexpectedly beats the crap out of someone, like going from zero to Bruce Lee in a split second. The only movies he doesn’t do that in are the ones where there’s no downtime between him kicking asses.

Jason Statham is a master of beating people up with objects that are not normally used to beat people up, like a cafeteria tray or a bicycle or whatever. I know that this is nothing new in action movies, but he really makes an art of it. Anything is a deadly weapon in Jason Statham’s hands. Sometimes it seems like he’d be better off just using his fists, but whatever. If there’s something within Jason Statham’s reach, he’ll find a way to beat you senseless with it.

Jason Statham should play Bond. I don’t understand why they keep trotting out debonair charmers like Pierce Brosnan and Daniel Craig when Statham’s ripe for the picking. It’s the 21st century, baby. Bond should be doing a lot more kicking. Hollywood’s sitting on the most badass Brit since William the Bastard (who it turns out was French, but whatever) and they trot out Daniel Craig? What, you think Statham can’t wear a tux? C’mon.

The plot of Death Race was very similar to that of Gladiator in that both male lead characters were enslaved and forced into gladiator battles by someone who had murdered their wife.

Unlike Gladiator, though, Death Race had triumphant explosions. And somehow, Jason Statham didn’t win the Academy Award for his role in Death Race. Also, unlike Gladiator, Death Race was jaw-droppingly stupid.

They didn’t even bother explaining the rules of the death races themselves, nor why — and this part was particularly baffling — there were so many experienced death racers at this one prison even though nearly all the competitors in most death races die.

Apparently it’s a remake of a Stallone movie from the 70s, but I haven’t seen the original. I assume that one, like the original Rollerball, had some subtleties that the remake glossed over.

It basically seemed like someone made a movie out of a video game, only no one bothered to read the game manual or figure out what all the buttons on the controller did before they started filming. It even had random “lighted shields” in the middle of the road that the death racers tried to drive over for no clearly defined reason. Maybe for points, or bonus lives, or to unlock new levels or secret characters you can play.

But all that said, it was still awesome. Some movies are just about the spectacle. I’m still trying to find a showing of Avatar in IMAX 3D at a reasonable time that’s not sold out. Hoping tonight’s my night.

Items of note

Posted on by
1

Chad Ochocinco gave what Dan Graziano called “what may have been the greatest midweek opposing player conference call in NFL history” yesterday.

Sam Borden explains why the “pending physical” bit actually means something in the Jason Bay signing.

David Waldstein at the Times writes the definitive Jason Bay reaction piece, remembering previous Canadian Mets and investigating whether Bay could be baseball’s greatest Canadian hitter.

I thought we already settled this. Send Bruce Willis.