While James Beale is on vacation, City Paper will attempt to plug the gaping chasm in its heart by writing on his blog.

Meant to get this up here sooner. In yesterday’s Daily News, Marcus Hayes wrote about Usain Bolt, the Jamaican sprinter who appeared to be from a completely different galaxy in setting the new world record in the 100 meters. He broke the record while, essentially, coasting.

I don’t take issue with Hayes writing about Bolt. Bolt’s feat was superhuman.

But the way Hayes wrote about him, well, Hayes starts out with the premise that watching Michael Phelps rewrite the swimming record books, while amazing, is somehow an alien experience because, you see, not everybody swims and even those who do don’t do it all the time. It’s not a human’s main mode of transport, and thus something of an inherent curiosity. So while we can ooh and ahh over Phelps, the feeling of swimming fast is just not something we, as humans, relate to deep down in our cores in the way, say, a fish would.

Running, though, is something that, according to Hayes, “Everybody” does. His lede is:

“Everybody runs.

Not everybody swims.

It’s that simple.”

Which, of course, is not simple for the simple fact that not everybody runs. But, y’know, I figured he was making a point, and would eventually, y’know, get around to the idea that there are people who have never run and will never run due to disability, illness, paralysis, whatnot.

But instead, the words “everybody runs” appear four more times in the piece without even a nod to the idea that, no, not everybody runs. Then this:

Everybody has run. You start when you’re about a year old. Eventually, everybody runs 100 yards or meters: in gym class, training for some sport, from parents or the boogeyman

Am I being a stickler? Expecting too much from a sports journalist? Or is this just, I dunno, kinda crass? I’m at a loss here.

nba.com

Dear Reader: I’ll be out of the office and without reliable internet access (/ the desire to walk up at a God awful hour to read what everyone and their mother has written about Philadelphia sports and post it online), so this is going to be the last non-guest post you’ll be reading until either Tuesday the 26th. Don’t feel too bad for me, I’ll be lying on a beach somewhere, hopefully drinking too many of these and playing too much of that.

For now I’ll leave you with this …

The Bills once had this kicker named Booth Lusteg. I guess this was around the mid-1960s. They blew a game at home, in War Memorial Stadium, because he missed a field goal at the end. After the game two guys were waiting for him in the parking lot and they beat him up. The police asked him if he wanted to press charges. “No,” he said. “I deserved it.”

this

Of the play of Aregentinian icon, Manu Ginobili, Denver Nuggets head coach George Karl said, “I’m going to put in on tape and show my son how to play basketball…just put your head down and run into people, I guess that’s a new brand of basketball.”

and this

One day in New York City, (Columbia Professor Emeritus) Morgenbesser put his pipe in his mouth as he was ascending the subway steps. A policeman approached and told him that there was no smoking on the subway. Morgenbesser pointed out that he was leaving the subway, not entering it, and that he had not yet lit up. The cop repeated his injunction. Morgenbesser repeated his observation. After a few such exchanges, the cop saw he was beaten and fell back on the oldest standby of enfeebled authority: “If I let you do it, I’d have to let everyone do it.” To this the old philosopher replied, “Who do you think you are-Kant?” His last word was misconstrued, and the whole question of the Categorical Imperative had to be hashed out down at the police station. Morgenbesser won the argument.

That does NOT, however, mean that you have heard the last of me for the week.  I’ll try to check in Thursday with a very special Sports Complex exclusive. Until then, enjoy my vacation.

oh local commercials, why are you such an endless source of entertainment?  This time it is Cole Hamels, selling you a car. 

Here are his line, uninterrupted:

“Hi, I’m Cole Hamels of the Philadelphia Phillies … and the largest selection … guaranteed.” (side note: how do these guarantees work? If I want to sell my car for -$20 do they have to match that? will someone call them on one of these guarantees?)

My favorite part is that Cole and the other two “celebs” keep looking at each other in between their lines.  How many takes did they need for this one, .3?

One more thing: either I’m really out of touch or the two people he’s with are absolutely not famous.   

h/t the fightins

I know I’m like three months late in blog time for this one, but in the fallout of Jimmy Rollins’ initial attack against Philadelphia fans : “you’re all frontunners” and then his : “just kidding, you’re just mean-spirited ner’-do-wells who don’t seem to understand matters of anthropologic nature, or baseball” apology. I thought I’d toss my hat into the ring and take a stab at trying to break down what was said, and why. 

Let us start at the start. Jimmy said that; unlike fans in St. Louis who were blindly loyal, or fans in Oakland which don’t seem to care about baseball, Philadelphia fans will support you when you’re up, but will kick you when you’re down.  He referred to this action as “front-running.”

To a Philadelphia fan using the word “front-runner” is indefensible.  It is akin to calling us fans of the 90s Hooker-and-Blow Cowboys, the Yankee Way (rocking thongs and banging Madonna, apparently), or Coach FrontButt and Notre Dame.  There is no longer insult amongst Philadelphians.  True sports fans wouldn’t have a drink with a front-runner and they wouldn’t let their sister date a front-runner.  You can argue semantics - as Jimmy did - but not understanding what that word means here shows a basic misunderstanding of Philadelphia.  For Jimmy, who has been here for eight years, not to know that that wasn’t an appropriate word to use reveals a disconnect with the fans.

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“Delehanty’s body was mangled. One leg was torn off, presumably by the propeller of the Maid of the Mist.”

Big Ed

Dick Perez

As a kid, I was obsessed with Phillies history. I’d head to the library and pore through old copies of The Baseball Encyclopedia and make up dream teams for my Microleague Baseball game. I became sort of obsessed with the Phils’ Hall of Fame outfield of the 90s… the 1890s.

In “Sliding Billy” Hamilton, “Big Sam” Thompson and “Big Ed” Delahanty (they weren’t terribly inventive with nicknames back then), the Phillies had an outfield that could hit, slug and run.

Delahanty’s career ended, two years after leaving the Phils, in the middle of the 1903 season. The story I, as a child, found was that Delahanty mysteriously fell off a bridge into Niagara Falls.

The real story is a big more sordid. The new album by The Baseball Project, Vol. 1: Frozen Ropes and Dying Quails (YepRoc), the songwriting endeavor of Steve Wynn (Dream Syndicate, Steve Wynn and the Miracle 3) and Scott McCaughey (Young Fresh Fellows, Minus 5, and R.E.M), full of darker-tinged baseball songs not in the vein of, say, John Fogerty’s “Centerfield,” tells the story of Big Ed’s untimely demise.

Essentially, dude got drunk and belligerent on a train and was thrown off by the conductor. Delahanty apparently started walking along the tracks, got to the bridge and, well… LIsten for yourself.

DELEHANTY’S BODY FOUND.
_______________

Baseball Player Swept over Niagara
Falls—Woman’s Body Also
Recovered.

NIAGARA FALLS, N.Y., July 9.—The body of Edward Delehanty, the right fielder of the Washington baseball team of the American League, who fell from the International Bridge last Thursday night, was taken from the river at the lower Niagara gorge to-day. Relatives of Delehanty arrived here this afternoon and positively identified the body as that of the missing baseball player.

The body of a woman thirty-five years old was also recovered at Lewiston to-day. It has not been identified.

Delehanty’s body was mangled. One leg was torn off, presumably by the propeller of the Maid of the Mist, near whose landing the body was found. The body will be shipped to Washington to-night. Delehanty’s effects have been sent to his wife by the Pullman people.

Frank Delehanty of the Syracuse team and E.J. McGuire, a brother-in-law, from Cleveland, are here investigating the death of the player. They do not believe that Delehanty committed suicide or that he had been on a spree in Detroit. In the sleeper on the Michigan Central train on the way down from Detroit, Delehanty had five drinks of whiskey says Conductor Cole, and became so obstreperous that he had to put him off the train at Bridgeburg at the Canadian end of the bridge. Cole says Delehanty had an open razor and was terrifying others in the sleeper.

When the train stopped at Bridgeburg Cole did not deliver Delehanty up to a constable, as the Canadian police say he should have done. He simply put him off the train.

After the train had disappeared across the bridge, Delehanty started to walk across, which is against the rules. The night watchman attempted to stop him, but Delehanty pushed the man to one side. The draw of the bridge had been opened for a boat, and the player plunged into the dark waters of the Niagara.

Delehanty’s relatives hint at foul play, but there is nothing in the case, apparently, to bear out such a theory.

Theo (l) bringing back memories

sports illustrated

In Phil Jasner’s report on Andre Iguodala’s absurd contract was this nugget that I found interesting:

With second-year big man Jason Smith likely out for the season after suffering a torn anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee, an unsubstantiated report surfaced that the Sixers had reached out to former Sixers center/forward Theo Ratliff with an offer to play for the veterans’ minimum. A source familiar with that situation said Ratliff had offers from other teams for more money, but that he was very interested in the Sixers.

If this is true I predict it would make a few people in Philadelphia pretty happy.  Theo isn’t the player he once was, and probably will have a minimal effect on Wins and Losses, but he’s a great team guy, a veteran voice in the locker room, and not a bad help defender for 10 mins a game. 

I’d welcome him back.

Morning Roundup: “So you say something as a person, forget the uniform, as a person I could say something back. But because of the uniform, I [the fans] can say anything I want to you, and that’s your armor, that’s your shield. It’s just not true. Not at all.” - Jimmy Rollins

Michael Phelps

getty images

Three lines on their world:

1. I had written a snarky line about Phelps‘ constant winning becoming boring, but then I realized I should probably just be happy he’s not Brett Favre and move on.  Anyway, another gold for the Baltimoreian.
   
2. Team USA rocked those smug Greeks
3. And the Mets swept their way into first place in the NL East

Three lines on ours:

1. The Phillies were swept out of LA, falling a game behind the Mets
2. Jimmy Rollins tries to explain why he ripped his fan base on national tv
3. and the Birds didn’t show much in a preseason win

Phillies, Birds, Sixers, Flyers and more from second place (?!) after the jump

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