MLB Headlines Week 15

So I'm watching the Home Run Derby and Josh Hamilton sets a record by blasting 28 Home Runs in the first round. This annoys me for three reasons.
First, it reminds me of the downside to fantasy baseball. I'm watching this and can't enjoy it. He annoys me too much because he's not on my team and it sucks when I face him. He was like an 8th round pick this year too.
Secondly, Justin Morneau actually won the darn thing he's being completely outshone by Hamilton. Right now Morneau's an afterthought.
Thirdly, all I hear is how great a 'story' he is. He was a first round pick by the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, blew all his money on booze and drugs and was out of the league for three years.
Hamilton apparently finds God, signs with the Reds, gets traded to the Rangers, and now he's awesome and has put on a 'show' at Yankee Stadium.
Sure it's a good story, but you know what's a better story? If he didn't get hopped on goof balls in the first place. Why are we so opposed to somebody simply staying on the straight and narrow, practicing hard, and succeeding? Why do we only care if the hero has fallen and is in search of redemption?
I mean, I guess having the hero fall makes for a more interesting movie or something, but as a roll model perhaps a Ryan Braun is more admirable than a Josh Hamilton.
I guess America just respects a person more if they voluntarily screw up their life and career and struggle to get back on top than if they are just smart to begin with.
Or maybe I'm just bitter that he's not on my fantasy team.

http://www.mlb.com/ Headline of the Week:
Streaking Mets set sights on sixth straight win

Some good alliteration there. And you know I love a good streaking headline. Now onto our headlines:

Teebore
July 11th, 2008 - Twins 3 tigers 2
Nick Puntos pair of RBIs down field for the win

July 11th, 2008 - Angels 2 Oakland 9
Angels go the way of watermelons as Gallagher leads A's to victory

July 11th, 2008 - Diamondbacks 5 Phillies 6
Werth every penny: RBI single wins it in 12th

Dr. Bitz:
July 13th, 2008 – Twins 2 Tigers 4
Joyce is joyful, Thomas is triumphant, and Verlander is victorious in Tigers win

July 13th, 2008 - White Sox 11 Rangers 12
No way Jose. Contreras crappy in losing effort

July 13th, 2008 - Rays 2 Indians 5
Sabathia blasts one and bathes in his victory

Voting your left. As I predicted, I dominated last week. Time to go for two in a row!
And as a warning, on Tuesday my fantasy hitters had no no RBI, no runs, no steals, and combined for a .049 batting average. I wasn't happy. And then when my closers blew like 4 saves in a row I was even less happy. So this will be an exceptionally bitter Sunday Fantasy Baseball Log.

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12:35 PM: Yeah yeah yeah, hitters not hitting, closers not closing, team is sucking. Whatever:
R HR RBI SB AVG W SV K ERA WHIP
Me: 20 7 21 2 .213 1 5 34 4.64 1.33
Him: 25 7 21 6 .282 2 2 52 4.27 1.23

1:01 PM: Xavier Nady has an RBI single giving me a lead in RBI. We'll see how long that lasts.

1:20 PM: Sacrafice fly for newly acquired Jhohnnhy Peralta means another RBI for me. But Lance Berkman just got an RBI. So I still only lead by one. Yay.

2:09 PM: Out of shower now, pants on, Jhohnnhy Peralta hit a home run. I'm up in RBI and Home runs. Maybe I can lose this week 7-3. Exciting.

2:10 PM: And now Carlos Quentin hit a home run. I should shower more often. The Mrs. would appreciate that.

3:40 PM: My 'star' First Basemen Albert Pujols has managed to go 0 for 4 with a run in an 11 run game. Whatever.

4:10 PM: Whatever.

5:30 PM: Whatever.

10:37 PM: No real change in categories since 3:40 PM. It's been a boring, bitter, Sunday. Whatever.


R HR RBI SB AVG W SV K ERA WHIP
Me: 27 10 31 2 .244 2 5 45 5.28 1.43
Him: 32 8 27 7 .270 4 2 68 3.84 1.18

The categories I did well in I won and the categories I didn't do well in I lost. Go figure. Too bad I didn't do well in more categories....whatever.

Nemesis of The Week:
I think this week it has to go to Carl Crawford. He sucked so bad this week his manager benched him on Sunday. He had a run and a steal and that's it...for the entire week. He had exactly one hit this week in 26 at bats. That's a .036 average for those of you scoring at home. That's sucktitude. That's a nemesis of the week. He's as responsible for this week's loss as my opponent's players are.

Savior of The Week:
Carlos Quentin gets it this week. 6 Runs, 3 Home Runs, 9 RBI, and a .310 average. That's actually better than any of my opponent's players. Too bad the rest of my batters couldn't step up.

The Moral of this week's story is that bitterness will get you nowhere. Whatever. I should go read 'The Secret' or something.

Back to Back: Alternate History

Settling Accounts: In At The Death by Harry Turtledove

This is the fourth and final book in the Settling Accounts tetralogy, which is the third and final series in Harry Turtledove’s American Empire series. The entire series is an alternate history tale that chronicles events from World War I through the end of World War II in a world where the Confederate States of America won the Civil War and became a political power on the North American continent.

In At The Death opens with the United States firmly possessing the upper hand over the reeling Confederate armies. However, the Hitler-esque President of the Confederacy, Jake Featherston, has largely succeeded in “reducing the population” of his country’s African-Americans, imprisoned in numerous concentration/death camps (a clear Holocaust parallel). For the most part, the book deals with the race for the atomic bomb (or Superbomb, as the book dubs it) and the aftermath of the war.

I read Turtledove mainly for the plot. His characters, which exist mainly to serve as eyes for the reader on events as they take place, are largely one or two dimensional (with a few exceptions; for the most part, the characters that have been around since book one) and his writing style is simple and repetitive (annoyingly so, in some cases). In many ways, his books read like history books, with token space given to character development. This is fine with me, though, because I read Turtledove mainly for the plot (in fact, if someone wanted to write an alternate history textbook, jettisoning the viewpoint characters and fiction structure entirely, I’d read it).

I want to know what happens next in this alternate world he’s created. No matter how unlikely his deviations may be, it’s interesting to see where they lead, what ripple effects they create, and also, what events stay the same. Despite the differences, in this world, post-war inflation and worldwide economic depression leads to a rise in fascism and while the details are vastly different, there is still a holocaust during the Second World War. It’s that push and pull between what is changed and what is the same that makes reading alternate history fun.

I also enjoy the way Turtledove weaves actual historical characters into the story alongside his fictional ones. George Patton is a general during WWII in the series, but he is the aggressive and headstrong leader of the Confederate armies. Daniel MacArthur is a leading United States general. Also interesting to note are the fictional characters who are clearly analogues to real people, and the sides they are on in this divided world: the Hitler-esque Featherston, the Irwin Rommel-like US tank general Irving Morrell.

In the end, Turtledove is all about plot, and In at the Death was a suitable wrap up to this long, sprawling story. I remain intrigued by this world, and still want to know more. How does the Cold War differ in this world? What does the future hold for the Confederate States? Who will be the post-war presidents? I haven’t heard if Turtledove is planning on playing in this world anymore, but if he does, I’ll be there to find out what happens next, flaws and all.

The Plot Against America by Phillip Roth

If In At The Death is an alternate history text book, then this is an alternate history memoir (the main character even shares his name with the author). Phillip Roth is a Jewish school-age boy growing up during the late thirties and early forties. Through his eyes the reader sees the events of the world around him: the fear of his parents as the anti-Semitic Charles Lindbergh captures the presidency from FDR, the rage and frustration his cousin experiences at America’s growing friendship with Nazi Germany and its fierce isolationism, the growing family schism as his brother embraces the patriotic zeal of his opportunistic aunt.

This is, of course, a much better book than Turtledove’s. Roth is the Pulitzer Prize winning author of such books as The Human Stain and American Pastoral. This was my first experience with his writing. He has a tendency to start a narrative thread, and then deviate from it before doubling back to his original thread. I’m not sure if that’s indicative of his style as a whole but I enjoyed it.

The focus here is more on character than plot, and the alternate history is more a backdrop for a coming of age story than anything else (but then, ‘coming of age’ is entirely too simplistic a label for what young Phillip goes through). Roth does an excellent job of making the mundane exciting and keeping Phillip’s voice young and enthusiastically naive without becoming annoying and insipid; Phillip doesn’t always understand exactly what’s going on, but we do, and we feel sympathy rather than impatience with his ignorance.

The book’s biggest failing is the ending, which unfolds rapidly, outlining the titular plot and its ramifications by abandoning Phillip’s limited viewpoint and speaking in an omniscience that seems more akin to the author’s notes than the preceding pages. It’s almost as though Roth hit a deadline and handed over the outline for the ending rather than the ending itself. Some critics have called it a Deus Ex Machina, but that term is too over-and misused nowadays; instead it simply seems that there were elements of the story that needed to be told and Roth couldn’t figure out how to tell them using the limited viewpoint he had employed in the novel thus far.

Still, I greatly enjoyed the book. It tells a much more personal and limited story than standard alternate history but the characters and the situations they find themselves in are captivating enough. I am intrigued to further explore Roth’s writing.