Slapped Around (and Battles with Kushan Part 3)

  Before you start reading this, look into my eyes……I'm feeling something…wait…wait…I’m sensing you are having a conflict with a friend or …possibly a relative. I was right, wasn’t I? I think I may have been born with psychic powers.

  I’m not looking very psychic this week about the Yankees. Rafael Soriano, the former Tampa Bay reliever I had been lusting over since last fall as a possible replacement for the great Rivera, gave up the losing home run in Monday’s game to put the Yankees down 2 games to 1 to the Tigers, just one game from elimination. Taking the hill for the Yankees last night was A.J. Burnett, who I pleaded with Yankee manager Joe Girardi to leave on the bench in my last post. Last night Burnett survived 3 walks in the first inning and held the Tigers off until the Yankees got the bats going to even the series at 2 games apiece and set the stage for tomorrow’s decisive game 5. I super happy the Yankees have lived to fight another day and I hope Nova can continue where he left off in game one of the series. Some person left a comment on my blog calling me ‘a idiot’ (sic). It’s hard to argue that point at the moment. Soriano doesn’t seem to have the right stuff for New York, then Burnett comes up huge in a big spot. I don’t like getting slapped around on my own blog, but it’s not the first slap I’ve taken lately.

  After having my offer of having a chess club at the Salvation Army in downtown Des Moines accepted, I was ready to get started 2 weeks ago. On the day of the first meeting, I emailed my contact to make sure of the time. A reply came back telling me that the Salvation Army didn’t think there was going to be much interest in a chess club, so thanks but no thanks, they were not going to have a club, and they were sorry they didn’t tell me sooner. I resisted the urge to ask when they had planned on telling me, instead saying maybe we could revisit it in a few months. This was a setback of my own making. I should have put up some flyers around the area to see if I could have sparked some interest, which at the least may have committed the Salvation Army to have had the club for a couple of months. When I first started up in Marshalltown, my kids and I spent more than a few evenings staring at each other, but eventually the club caught on. I hope I’ll get another chance at a Salvation Army club in Des Moines, but my experience in these matters is that saying no gets easier the more you do it.

  I had another self-inflicted setback last month. On June 29th, I wrote how I’ve been buying $2,000 of Intel stock when it went down a dollar and then would sell when I could get my money back while keeping 5 shares for myself. In the 3 months since that post, I executed 5 buys and 4 sells and even though the stock was 21.39 on June 29th and was 21.22 at the close yesterday, I’ve accumulated 18 shares of Intel with 2 buys on the table as opposed to 1 buy on the table on June 29th. If I keep 5 shares for each sell and made 4 sells why do I only have 18 shares instead of 20, you may ask? On August 9th, Intel hit 20 so my program buy executed and I added a sell of 21.24 but then Intel went up to 21 2 days later and I put in another program buy for 20. On the 18th the stock hit 20 again, so I now had 2 buys at 20. The sell point went from 21.24 to 21.15 because I would only pay 1 commission on the 2 sells and Intel spent the next month flirting with 19 a share. I had visions of the stock bouncing like a bungee jumper from 21 to 20, triggering more and more buys. I decided to stop the possibility of this vicious cycle by changing the sell point to 20.93, which left me 8 shares instead of 10. On September 14th, Intel hit 20.93, I sold, and Intel spent all day at 20.7. I felt very smart indeed but in the last hour when Intel shot up to 21.40, I felt a lot less smart since I cost myself 2 shares by not following my own system. Yes, small potatoes and it probably means I’ll be eating cat food a week earlier than planned in my old age, but I feel bad that I left something for free on the table.

  2 weeks ago, when I performed my daily task of checking my blogs hits and ad revenue, I received the unwelcome news that Google was not going to advertise on my site anymore because of ‘suspicious click activity’. No other details. I appealed and my appeal was denied. I know that asking my Facebook friends to click on my ads is ‘verbotten’ so I’m not doing that any more, but I’ve written about which ads were the best paying on my blog for quite some time (political and dental) so I don’t know why my number came up 2 weeks ago. For all I know, the increased hits from winning the best blog award triggered the siren alarm. I’ll appeal every month or so the same way Tim Robbins in ‘Shawshank Redemption’ kept asking libraries for donations to the prison, but in the meantime I’ll be auditioning advertisers.

  And I don’t even want to get into how I received a bill last Tuesday for an extra hundred dollars for the room I rented for my chess camp 2 months ago or how I forgot to log out of my computer and thanks to a co-worker came in the next morning to my find my second monitor not working and no icons on my screen and all my shortcuts gone and....wait – I did say I didn’t want to get into it.

  On the chess front, as long as I’m at it, I thought I’d share the worst beatdown I’ve received in a long time. In late July, I was playing chess on the Internet Chess Club and Kushan Tyagi challenged me to a game. Kushan is a chess expert from Ames and currently the 25th ranked 14 year old in the United States. He finished 3rd in this year’s Iowa Chess Championship. I’ve played Kushan 4 times on chess.com at the pace of a move every 3 days and won 2 and drew 2 because I was only playing one game while he was playing dozens and got a draw against him in an offhand game at the West Des Moines Chessathon 2 years ago which to my mind was a bigger accomplishment. I had just hit my all time high rating in one-minute chess and Kushan and I stated with a 3 minute game.

  Pretty ugly, but I was happy to get the draw. Little did I know that would be the highlight of this day’s battles with Kushan.

  After those 2 wonderful efforts, we switched to 1 minute chess but it was more of the same:

  I wish I could say it was just a bad day, but since I won 4 of the 5 other games I played on the Internet directly before and after my battles with Kushan, I have to admit I was just outclassed. I had meant to publish these games earlier, but got busy with other topics and since they fit in with my other recent events, I hope Kushan doesn't mind that I was much slower to print my losses than my wins.

  Last Wednesday I came to work all worried about my hundred dollar charge for the chess camp and as I walked from my car to my workplace via the Skywalk, this lady stopped me and asked if I had a spare dollar I could give her. It was the first time I’d been stopped for money in 17 years in Iowa. I reached in my wallet and had no singles. She looked old, scared, homeless, and hungry so I just gave her a five. Maybe she just got a six-pack instead of a 20 ounce Bud or maybe she bought some food. It was none of my business. Once I gave her the money, it wasn't my money anymore and what she did with it was none of my concern. For all I know, I was put into all these difficult situations just to be be in the right mood on this day to give that lady a five-dollar bill. I couldn’t say that was why for sure, but no one else can say that wasn’t why for sure, either. I do know that as soon as I got to the elevator, an email popped up on my amazing iPod (RIP, Steve Jobs) telling me the hundred dollar charge for the chess camp was an error.

  I’ll get more chances to start chess clubs in Des Moines, find advertisers for my blog, profit from Intel stock ups and downs, and if I keep making baseball predictions I’m sure to look like a real psychic one of these years. And as for Kushan, I’ll just wait till HE turns 50 and then sic a grandkid on him!

Say Goodbye

  Terry Francona was dismissed as the manager of the Boston Red Sox this week. Francona is the only Red Sox manager in the last 90 years to have won a World Series and he won two of them, but when the Red Sox collapsed and not only lost the division to the Yankees but failed to get into the playoffs for the second year in a row, the world championships didn’t matter anymore and the Red Sox didn’t pick up Francona’s option and will look for another manager.

  I don’t know how the manager change will work out, but I think the Red Sox have made the right choice in letting their manager go. At the end of August, the Red Sox had a 1 game lead on the Yankees for the Eastern Division lead, but went 7-20 the rest of the way and finished 7 games behind the Yankees and a game behind the Rays for the playoff spot reserved for the ‘best loser’ that doesn’t win their division.

  The media is generally down on the Red Sox for making the move, but I think it should have been done even if the Red Sox had made the playoffs unless they managed to get to the World Series. This is a team that hasn’t won it’s division in 4 years or a playoff series in 3 and despite their home grown talent of Ellsbury, Predroria, Buchholtz and Papelbon, the Red Sox had a payroll this year of 161 MILLION DOLLARS, third in the majors behind the Phillies(172 Million) and you guessed it, the Yankees (202 Million). For that kind of money, the people running the Red Sox have a right to expect more than they have been getting. I thought the Yankees should have gotten rid of Torre after the 2004 collapse against the Red Sox instead of wasting 3 years hoping that Torre could recapture his old magic.

  Francona should have his pick of jobs and if nothing suits him, he can be a talking head on TV until a job opens up that he likes. In Boston, all eyes are now on boy wonder GM Theo Epstein. This year, Epstein won the right to pay top free agent Adrian Gonzalez and he had a very good if not great year, but his other big pick up (outfielder Carl Crawford was awful), there is no catcher, and the starting pitchers all were hurt at some point during the season except for last year’s free agent pickup John Lackey, who was so bad that the Sox fans were hoping he’d get hurt. If Epstein whiffs on his next managerial hire and batch of free agents, he could be the next to go.

  I wasn’t sad to see the Yankees game against the Tigers get rained out Friday since it meant saying good bye to facing Tiger stud pitcher Justin Verlander and his 100 mile and hour fastball and no-hitter potential twice in this series and if it does goes to 5 games the Yankees will only have to contend twice with 6’8” Doug Fister. Fister was very effective after being picked up from Seattle earlier this year, but he is no Justin Verlander and the Yankees finally got to him in the 6th inning of yesterday's game to take a 1-0 lead in the series behind the stellar pitching of young gun Ivan Nova, who is turning out to be the pitcher that Phil Hughes should have been. All in all, the rainout was a good deal for the Yanks, with the only downside that instead of Sabathia pitching twice, we may have to see A.J. Burnett pitching in the playoff series. I hope Yankee manager Girardi comes to his senses and leaves Burnett on the bench.

  Also saying goodbye is 92 year old Andy Rooney, who will be making his last regular appearance on 60 Minutes this weekend. I don’t watch 60 minutes very much, but I’ve caught Rooney’s 2 or 3 minute show-closing monologues on Yahoo or YouTube in bursts of 10 or 20 for years . Rooney has come in for a lot of ridicule and caricature for the style of his monologues, but I’ve always found them thought provoking and enjoyable. I’ve read most of his books of collected articles, and also enjoy reading his column in the Marshalltown Sunday paper. I like that he says what’s on his mind without a lot of fluff and by the end of his TV bit or article, I know exactly what he thinks and where he stands.

  I’m not an aspiring writer, but I write as a hobby and Rooney has been a big influence on whatever style I may possess. One thing I noticed is that Rooney very rarely uses adjectives or adverbs. (see for yourself). He makes the story so that he doesn’t have to waste words describing the words he does use. After I’m done writing my post, I read it over once again and end up stripping out almost all the adjectives and adverbs and I think I have better posts for it. I’ll miss Rooney and I hope he’s not retiring because he’s sick or dying. It’s pretty cool when a guy who is 92 can still make a living and I hope I’m still writing at that age. Here is another of Andy Rooney’s nutty monologues.

  Christopher Meloni said goodbye to his Elliot Stabler character in Law & Order :Special Victims Unit over the summer after 12 years. Based on a lot of the comments I read on the SVU facebook page, many viewers are going to give up on the show because they won’t get to see Stabler beat some suspect up and call him an a**-wipe. I’m also going to miss those scenes but I’m not going to give up on the show either. I like the show to see the detective work and the crackpot villains, not to see Detective Olivia Benson’s having an alcoholic mother, a rapist father, and no children with a biological clock stuck at 11:59 pm. And I’m pretty bored with Stabler’s problems with his kids and his marriage too. I get it. They have issues. OK? Enough already. Can we catch some rapists and predators, please?

  I’ve seen the first two post-Stabler episodes of SVU and I think the show still has a future. Danny Pino’s Detective Amaro and Kelli Giddish’s Detective Rollins roles are still undefined, but they seemed to fit right in with the rest of the team. The season debut was a knock-off of the IMF chief that got accused of rape in New York a couple of months ago and this week’s episode had the comeuppance of the dad from the Wonder Years after years of abusing young basketball players. Both episodes were long on Olivia’s emotional distress at losing her partner and having to get used to new ones and short on the evil predators and the dark side of the New York streets. Not a single gunshot was fired in the last 2 weeks and I only remember one scene shot at night. I hope NBC will take the money they are saving by not paying Meloni and put it towards some top quality scripts with memorable psychopathic predators and cast them with the best guest stars money can buy. It’s OK to spend a couple of minutes on the angst of the main characters, but the show has listed heavily in that direction over the last few years and I’d rather see the the cat and mouse war between the SVU detectives and the New York predators. When I think back of the great SVU episodes, I’m always drawn to ones like the RDK killer and the Robin Williams and Carol Burnett guest starring roles as opposed to the times where Stabler’s daughter got mad at him or Olivia found out something about her alcoholic mother and rapist father. Interesting cases are what make the Law & Order series and the quicker they get back to that formula and away from soap opera storylines, the better the show will be.

Payday

  I didn’t get paid last week but I will this week. My company is not in trouble, I just get paid every other week. This is my second job in a row where I get paid every other week and it is by far my favorite way to get paid.

  I got paid by the week in all my jobs until 1990. On all except one job, my boss or supervisor would give us our check if we were working on payday. If you weren’t working that day, you’d either wait till you were working or just come in and pick up your check. When I worked as a computer operator at a Bank, the bank gave all of us an account and would deposit our money on payday. Since we were the computer operators, the payroll department would give us a tape with the deposits (no disks, internet, or flash drives way back when) and we would load it into the computer. You could always tell who was broke because they would keep asking you if the payroll had been loaded yet.

  When I was young and single, getting paid by the week was great. Get paid on Thursday or Friday, get wasted and broke on the weekend, barely eat the rest of the week, get paid on Thursday or Friday, repeat. As I got older and started getting monthly bills like utilities and rent, blowing my paycheck on the weekend didn’t cut it anymore. I started saving some of my check for the monthly expenses and used some for weekly expenses like gas, food, and laundry. The months with 5 paydays were my favorite, since I had a little extra cash, which is always fun.

  When I started working for Wyatt Data Services in 1990, I was just engaged to Kathy and I got paid only once a month. Luckily I was moonlighting for extra cash at the time. The people I was moonlighting for thought I was crazy for insisting on being paid every week, but I was pretty hard up for cash that first month. Once I got a month ahead, being paid once a month was manageable and I let my part-time boss pay me less than once a week. When I got paid once a month, instead of looking forward to the 5 week months, I was now dreading them because it meant another week of expenses but the same paycheck.

  I left Wyatt in 1993 and went back to work at an coat manufacturer called Amerex for more money so we could move to Iowa and I was back to getting paid once a week. There were a lot of warehouse workers at Amerex and the company would have payroll truck come to the warehouse on payday to cash everyone’s check. Except for the goons hanging around with guns protecting the money, I liked cashing my check before I went home for the weekend. One time I didn’t check my money until I left the window and I was $60 light. I went back to the window and the goons all put their hands on their guns so I put my hands over my head and asked extra nicely if they could give me my $60. They said they couldn’t since I left the window but I did get my $60 back when it turns out the cashier was that much over for the day. I just cashed my check at my bank after that. One time my friend Frank Brandi (the Finance V.P.) cut through the line to ask the clerk a question and one of the goons grabbed his gun. Frank got right in his face and started yelling “What are you going to do? Shoot me?” The goon backed down and was never seen again at the payroll truck.

  At my first job in Iowa, the owner gave us a personal check on the 15th and the end of the month and for 12 years it was back to dreading the 5 week months. When he sold the company, the new owners went to direct deposit and I’ve never gotten a paycheck I needed to cash since except once when my paperwork didn’t make the direct deposit in time for my first check on a new job. I miss not getting a paycheck. I don’t miss taking a trip to the bank to deposit my check, but going to the bank with my check put my job in perspective. Now that my pay is some ones and zeros streaming over the internet and magically appearing in my account, sometimes it feels like I don’t even get paid and I miss the disconnectedness between my work and getting paid.

  When I started working at SourceCorp in 2009, I got paid every 2 weeks for the first time in my life and that has continued in my current job. It’s a lot like getting paid twice a month except twice a year there are 3 checks in a month and an extra 2 week’s pay is like a real bonus. Even if the ‘bonus’ gets used for an unexpected expense like a car repair or just to get ahead on the car insurance or property taxes, I feel great when I get 6 weeks pay in a single month.

  I’ve noticed the mood of the whole company brightens up on the 3 payday months. Since the government is involved with everything else, maybe they can mandate bi-weekly pay and legislate 6 weeks in every month so we can all get 3 paychecks a month every month. Not only would it help lift the mood of the country, since the workers would have an extra paycheck every month, they could spend that money to boost the economy. I hope when they make this law, there is a ‘Buffet’ clause saying millionaires don’t get the extra paycheck, but if they did I wouldn’t mind too much. After all, have you seen the cost of getting a Cadillac or Mercedes tuned up lately? I can’t imagine a politician getting elected if they went against this proposal.

  One really cool thing about getting paid once a month was having a big fat paycheck (This was still in the day when I got paper checks instead of direct deposit). Once I went to the bank across the street from our Hillside, NJ apartment to deposit my check on a busy Saturday and waited patiently in line while the clerk made useless small talk with every customer (This clerk was the inspiration for the widespread use of ATM machines and direct deposit). Finally it was my turn. I didn’t know the teller and was ready to give a New Jersey grunt when the subject of the weather or any other subject came up when I gave her my check and deposit slip. She took a long look at my check and said at the top of her lungs, 'WOOOOOOO!THAT’S SURE A LOT OF MONEY. WHAT DO YOU DO FOR A LIVING?’ Lots of people stared at me and I was pretty embarrassed but I didn’t want to admit I only got paid once a month, so I said very softly, “I kill people for a living and it’s sure been busy lately.” I got my deposit slip back in record time along with a mumbled “Have a nice day”. I replied, “Thanks. I’d like to talk more, but I have to get back to work now.”

Fall Festival Redux

  Last Sunday was the Fall Festival at St. Mary. Unlike the past 3 years, this year I wasn’t on the committee to help plan and while I missed hanging out with the other people on the committee, I’m pretty busy with work and my chess endeavors so it was nice not to have all the meetings, responsibilities, and worries over the weather, etc... I had volunteered to take money on the day of the festival like I had the past 2 years, but instead I was asked to take pictures of the Festival. It sounded like a plum job and I quickly agreed.

  Ben was finishing up his service hours for confirmation by working at the festival all day, so we drove the 6 blocks to the church at 9 in the morning to help set up. It was good to see people like Greg Konrad and Jack Kessler who helped set up for the Fall Festival each year when I was on the committee. Greg had succeeded me as a chairperson with my friend Peg Brown. Peg and I were original members of the Stewardship Committee and she was Matt’s confirmation sponsor. Peg also spent many years as the St. Mary business manager and is really good with a buck so I'm sure the festival made as much money as possible.

An empty gym at 9am turned into a packed house by 1pm.

  Unlike the last 3 years, it was raining on this festival day and that required a lot of changing plans. The games were moved into the school gym from outside. All the Hispanic food was being prepared under a tent but the customers would buy their food and take it to the gym to eat when the rain was more than a drizzle. We moved tables around and set up games and occasionally I would sneak away to take pictures of the progress of the pork loin meal being prepared in the church basement as well as the Hispanic food being cooked in the street. Then Ben and I were assigned the task of setting up the PA system for the afternoon live auction. We managed to find the speaker wire hanging behind a curtain and hook it up to the PA system. The Ben and another fellow hooked up the PA system to the wireless microphones and everything was A-OK. I took another break to take some more pictures and head to the Jiffy for a cup of coffee and get Ben a Sierra Mist with ice. When I got back to the church, I didn’t have my 2009 Yankee World Series Championship hat. I looked all over and didn’t find it, drove back to the Jiffy and didn’t find it, and went back to the gym and still didn’t find it and gave it up for lost.

  Around 11:30 the first wave of kids and parents started arriving to play the games and eat meals. I made my way around to the church basement for the pork meal, the street where the Hispanic food was being served, and the gym where the games were and took more pictures. It had stopped raining and I took a break and ate a fruit cup (watermelon, cantaloupe, and cucumber) while I hung out with my friend Dennis outside the Hispanic food stand while he was eating his lunch. Dennis’ wife Tammy was on the committee all 3 years I was and Dennis would hang out a lot and help on the day of the event. Dennis works at the scrap metal yard and last year I had a case of temporary insanity and challenged him to an arm-wrestling contest. We started and he yawned for about 30 seconds while I managed to move his arm 2 or 3 inches before slamming my hand almost through the table in less than a nanosecond. He doesn’t play chess, but I bet I could beat him in a Cheetos-eating contest. Dennis was missing his favorite team, the Super Bowl champion Packers play the Carolina Panthers to hang out at the festival today and we would check the score occasionally on my amazing iPod. The Packers were losing at the half 13-7 and I told Dennis it was his duty as a Packer fan to hustle home and root his team on to victory. He left and the Packers did win 30-23 so if they end up making the playoffs by a game I’m expecting to be voted a playoff share for my contribution.

Pork Loin, potatoes, vegetables, and pie on the inside; Fruit cups, tortas, tacos, and other Hispanic food outside. But not a Cheeto in sight...

  I made another round of picture taking and helped put up a huge tent so the band could have a dry place to perform and then it was time for lunch. Last year, people would buy $1 food tickets and then pay for their food with them, but this year you bought a ticket saying what kind of food you wanted and then gave the ticket at the food stand. It was a great idea and I’m jealous I hadn’t thought of that. Not only does it keep the food preparers from having to add up food prices, but it also keeps the food line moving because everyone already knew what they wanted since they already had the tickets. I bought a $5 ticket for a torta which I can best describe as an Italian Hot Dog with steak instead of the hot dog part. I could watch people make food all day and had a full view of the cooks preparing my torta. When I lived in Florida, I used to eat at the Waffle House and I’d always sit at the counter and watch the people making eggs, waffles, and hash browns. I ’m so old I was a customer when the hash browns could only be scattered, smothered (with onions), and covered (with cheese); but now they can also be Chunked (Ham), Diced(Tomatoes), Peppered(Jalapeno), Capped(Mushrooms), Topped(Chilli), and Country(Sausage Gravy). You can see the menu here. I was born too soon!! My video was interrupted once when I had to stop and pay off a persistent raffle ticket salesman, but I did manage to get 2 minutes of Torta-making at its finest.

The only thing better than watching the torta being made was eating it!

  I sat down by the band and ate my torta (which was 5-star quality) and then took some more pictures. I got a video of the band playing a song and made my way back to the gym to shoot some videos of kids playing games and the live auction and raffle prize announcements. 2 years ago I won some Long John Silver gift certificates and a car wash, but this year was another wipeout. Once the auction was over, it was time to clean up. I took apart the PA system and when I put it back in its big wooden box, there was my Yankee hat! I must have put it in there when I was fumbling around with all the wires. I helped put some tables and chairs away and it was time to go.

The third eye doesn't lie! At the 25 second mark, a kid is going to swipe an extra bottle of soda at a ring toss game until he sees the glare of the camera.

  I’ve never gotten to walk around at the fall festival before. Every other year I was either taking money or hanging out with my kids at the games. I liked the freedom being the ‘official photographer’ afforded me and I hope the 4 CDs worth of pictures and video are useful. This year’s edition was a top-notch event despite the crummy weather and I hope all the planners are proud of their efforts.

The Great Rivera

  Mariano Rivera of the Yankees set the all time saves record this week when he saved his 602nd game against the Minnesota Twins on Monday afternoon. Rivera came up as a starter/reliever in 1995 when the Yankees made the playoffs for the first time in 14 years and in 1996 became the set up man for closer John Wetteland. He was almost unhittable as a relief pitcher and was a big factor in the Yankees winning the World Series for the first time in 18 years. After 1996, the Yankees cut Wetteland loose and Rivera became the closer and the Yankees haven’t had to worry about that position for the last 15 years, except for rare occasions when Rivera gets hurt and has to miss a week or 2.

  There have been plenty of teams that have won championships with average hitting or average fielding or average starting pitching but I can’t remember a team that has won a championship without a great closer or at least one that is on a hot streak. The great Atlanta Braves teams of the 90’s had 3 ace starting pitchers in Maddux, Smoltz, and Glavine but were constantly undone by having closers that were has-been retreads like Alejandro Pena and Jeff Reardon or psychos like Mark Wohlers and John Rocker. The only championship the Braves won was in 1995 when Wohlers didn’t melt down like he did in 1996. The Braves were up 2 games to 1 and had a 6-3 lead in the 8th inning, but Wohlers gave up a 3 run homer to Yankee journeyman Jim Leyritz and was basically finished as a major league closer from then on. By contrast, the Cincinnati Reds won the 1990 World Series with average pitching, average hitting, but the killer bullpen of Randy Myers, Rob Dibble, and Norm Charlton (aka The Nasty Boys). If the Reds had a lead after 6 innings, the game was for all purposes over. The starting pitchers knew they just had to keep their team in the game for 5 or 6 innings, the hitters knew that if the game was close they could win if they just scratched out a run or 2, and their opponents knew that any small mistake in the late innings of a close game would lead to an almost sure defeat.

  In Rivera’s first year as closer in 1997, he blew a save against the Indians to cost the Yankees the playoff series and I wasn’t sure he had the guts to be the closer, but he proved me wrong with clutch pitching to help win the next 3 World Series and has been almost unhittable for another decade after that, even well into his 40’s. Except for a receding hairline, Rivera looks the same as he did 15 years ago. He’s lost 5 miles off his fastball over the years, but has been blessed with great health, pinpoint control, and late movement on his pitches. He also has the one thing a great closer must have, which is a good temperament. Rivera has pitched for the Yankees his whole career. Losing is not tolerated in New York and the pressure is magnified when a blown save will make headlines in all the daily papers. Could you imagine driving to work and turning on the radio to hear people calling in griping about the mistakes YOU made on your job yesterday? A lot of relievers can have a stellar year or 2, but when they hit a slump and attract media criticism, they quickly circle the drain and become a ‘Where are They Now’ question. Rivera has had to deal with slumps and even blowing the World Series in 2001 and yet he still is going strong and I’ve never heard him lash out at the fans or writers like other players do when they hit a slump. Trevor Hoffman, whose record Rivera just broke, is a great pitcher but he has spent his whole career in San Diego and pitched in just one World Series in which he promptly blew the save in Game three against the Yankees in his only World Series appearance. Who saved the game for the Yankees? Yes, the great Rivera.

  I’m not trying to make light of Hoffman’s accomplishments but the fact is he racked up a lot of his saves in no-pressure situations for the loser Padres and his blown saves made all the difference between his team finishing 4th instead of 3rd and giving the San Diego fans yet another reason to look forward to football season, while Rivera has performed in the crucible of New York for a team where his perfection is not only expected, it is taken for granted.

  Is Rivera the greatest relief pitcher of all time? I'd give him my vote, but but not just based on the counting of saves. Relief pitching has evolved to the point that half of the pitching staff is reserved to get a slim lead after 5 innings to a dominant closer like Rivera. Last week the Yankees lost 2-1 to the lowly Seattle Mariners in 12 innings and Rivera didn’t even play. He was not going to pitch unless the Yankees had a lead with an inning left and only then Rivera would come in to save the game. 40 years ago, the best relief pitcher would come in after the starter and pitch for 3 or 4 innings even if they couldn’t get a save. In the early 70’s the Yankees traded a ham-an-egger 3rd baseman named Danny Cater to the filthy Boston Red Sox for a left handed relief pitcher named Sparky Lyle. It was one of the great steals of the 20th century. As a left-handed pitcher, Lyle was prone to give up big hits to right handed batters off the short ‘Green Monster’ fence in Fenway Park’s left field, but when he moved to Yankee Stadium with its 450 foot left field fence, those big hits became long outs and Lyle became the first true weapon out of the bullpen. But Lyle wasn’t used like relievers today. He would routinely come in when the score was tied or the Yankees were even losing and the bigger the game, the earlier he would come in. From 1972 to 1978, the least amount of innings Lyle pitched was 82.1. By contrast, Rivera has only pitched over 80 innings twice in his entire career (107 in 1996 before he was the closer, and 80.2 in 2001) and Hoffman went over 80 innings in a year 3 times with a high of 90 as a rookie. In 1977 Lyle pitched 137(!) innings in 72 games and was the first relief pitcher to win the Cy Young award as the best pitcher in the American League. In the current baseball climate the manager and pitching coach would be fired for abusing a pitcher like that but it was par for the course 35 years ago. Lyle’s reward for leading the team to the World Championship at the cost of years off his career was to be demoted to a setup man for Steinbrenner’s new toy, Goose Gossage and his 100 mile an hour fastball. Gossage pitched 134 innings in 1978. Gossage never impressed me as much as Lyle. It seemed to me that a good hitter would always take his fastball and put it in the seats for a home run. I recall George Brett and Kirk Gibson winning some big games against him that way. Lyle had a great slider and I don't remember anyone hitting a big home run off him.

  How many saves could pitchers like Lyle and Gossage have racked up if they had been used the way Hoffman and Rivera were? I don’t know if they would have hit 600 but they surely would have had hundreds more. And I’m not even talking about the other relievers of the 70’s and before. If I had to take one reliever to save a game that my life depended on, I think I’d probably take Lyle since he was a hero of my youth. But my life would also be in good hands with Rivera. He is such a great closer that when I think of him, instead of thinking of all the times he closed out a playoff or World Series game, I think of the shock and disbelief I felt at the handful of times he didn’t get the job done (2001 World Series Game 7, 2004 playoffs against the filthy Red Sox Game 4, 1997 vs. the Indians). I’m lucky that I’ll be able to someday tell my grandchildren that I saw both Sparky Lyle and the great Rivera pitch.