Stick to baseball, 5/18/24.

For subscribers to the Athletic, I posted my first mock draft for 2024. I also held a free Klawchat on Wednesday to take questions on that and a few on some minor-league prospects.

I swear I’ll send out a new version of my email newsletter in the next day or two. It’s just been very hectic here lately. It’s not exactly slowing down – I may not go to any conference tournaments because my daughter’s birthday is this week and the Delaware state tennis tournament was delayed until Monday due to (a teeny tiny threat of) rain.

And now, the links…

  • Longreads first: ProPublica has the story of a mom in Texas who won election to her school board in Granbury on a platform of stopping left-wing indoctrination, only to find that none of that was happening. When she went public with her change of views, however, she found herself attacked by her former allies.
  • Is Mexico City about to run out of fresh water? Maybe not yet, but the situation is dire there and in many other large cities that have overdeveloped and/or relied too much on a single water source, with climate change exacerbating the situation on multiple continents.
  • I tweeted this link when the story ran, but it’s worth reposting: Jackson County legislator DaRon McGee (D) helped put the Chiefs/Royals stadium tax initiative on the ballot. He also hit up the Royals for free suite tickets last year while he was involved in negotiations with the club.
  • St. Petersburg, Florida, is banking on 7% annual growth to help pay for the stadium they want to build for the Rays, which is wildly optimistic in any circumstances, but I’d say even more so for a city right on the water in an era of rising sea levels.

Comments

  1. I can understand pushback on the Georgian “foreign influence” law as a referendum on Georgia being closer aligned to Russia or Europe/US, but what’s so objectionable about the actual law? How is it that different from US FARA laws?

    The US response seems particularly hypocritical in a “we get to do this but no one else gets to” way. Also amusing to see the US warning against Georgian “security forces forcibly breaking up protest” given what US cops have been doing on campuses lately.

  2. I wonder how Chait feels being lumped in with lightweights like Musk on socio-political issues. As far as I know he still hasn’t acknowledged the unseemly haste with which he embraced the problematic Bari Weiss story on the St. Louis clinic whistleblower.

    Rowling just comes off as unhinged at this point. A truly curious hill on which to die.

    • Brian in NoVA

      I think Chait views it (and same with certain other “liberals” like Yglesias) as proof that he has reasonable positions in general by showing he’s willing once in a while to tell a rich person to stop being so anti-trans. Then he can play footsie with someone like Weiss on other issues while using his exchange with Rowling (who is positively unhinged on trans issues) as proof that he’s in the sensible middle. Nevermind that it was performative bs on his end.

  3. Keith –

    I am not familiar with David Tennant, but I assume you meant actor” not “Doctor”, based on the subsequent link.

    • Keith is referring to The Doctor character on the long-running Doctor Who series.

  4. Benjamin Rogers
    • Maybe I am not familiar enough with these topics to understand this segue:

      “David Tennant remains my favorite Doctor….”

      “Tiffany Haddish, on the other hand, is not one of my favorite actors….”

    • A Salty Scientist

      To parse: David Tennant is Keith’s favorite Doctor Who (though not necessarily one of his favorite actors). Tiffany Haddish on the other hand (never played Doctor Who) and is not one of Keith’s favorite actors (presumably because she’s an asshat).

    • Yes, I realize this now – though I still do not understand the “:on the other hand…” segue.

      I could write, “Wingspan is my favorite board game because …” and,
      “Bram Stoker’s Dracula, on the other hand, is not my favorite novel, …”

      but I could also write those two sentences without the seemingly out of place “on the other hand …”

    • A Salty Scientist

      The connection is that they’re both actors. A similar segue would be “xxx is my favorite graphic novelist…yyy, on the other hand is not one of my favorite writers…”

    • So, the reference to the actor David Tennant as his “favorite doctor” rather than “favorite actor” is … a clever joke or play on words that I guess I missed (and still don’t quite understand)?

      I think I was confused by the reference to someone who (apparently?) is not a doctor as “my favorite doctor”.

      It’s okay if I am not understanding this 🙂
      If I had seen any of the tv shows mentioned, this would probably all make much more sense to me.

  5. Benjamin Rogers

    Doctor Who is a character who has been played by many different actors, each bringing something of their own to the role. The set-up allows for the character’s personality to vary with the actor playing the Doctor. Many people have a favorite iteration of the character. For a Doctor Who fan, “my favorite Doctor” is a phrase that makes perfect sense in this context. And it is not out of place to segue to an(other) actor.

    • A Salty Scientist

      Right, it’s like saying “Timothy Dalton* is my favorite Bond,” and then segueing to another actor.

      * Not really my favorite, but an excuse to mention that I think he’s a underrated.