longreads — Page 10

→ May 14, 2022
→ By keith

Stick to baseball, 5/13/22.

For subscribers to The Athletic, I posted a minor league scouting notebook, with comments on players from the Red Sox, Orioles, Rays, and Nats systems. My first mock draft for 2022 will go up on Thursday, May 19^th, and I’ll do some sort of chat or Q&A around it that afternoon.

At Polygon, I reviewed Ark Nova, the best new game I’ve played so far this year, a more complex title that draws heavily on Terraforming Mars but with streamlined rules and better art.

I sent out a new edition of my free email newsletter yesterday, and I have to thank all of you who’ve sent such kind replies. I mentioned the possibility of an in-person event in London in August, and it looks like we’re going to be able to make that happen, with the help of a reader who works at a bookshop there. Speaking of books, Smart Baseball and The Inside Game are both available in paperback, and you can buy them at your local independent book store or at Bookshop.org.

On The Keith Law Show, I got the band back together with Eric Karabell for a show last week. I was on the move most of this week (and then traveled again Thursday night) and didn’t have a recording window until Thursday morning morning, so I recorded next week’s episode with guest Jonathan Higgs of Everything Everything.

And now, the links…

The New York Times ran a multi-part series on how Tucker Carlson became the king of cable ‘news’ by leaning into white nationalism.
Far too many police departments are using far-right trainers to help teach their cops.
An Alabama OB/GYN explained what will happen to women’s health when the state’s theocrats finally get their wish and make abortion illegal, including a lot more maternal deaths, just like Jesus wanted.
AIPAC is working with the GOP to pour money into Democratic primary races to target anyone who might possibly at some point say something nice about Palestinian rights. You can support the progressive candidates they’re attacking here.
One of the more toxic figures in the board game (and sci-fi) worlds, Jon Del Arroz, was accepted as a member by GAMA, the Game Manufacturers’ Association and group that organizes the annual Origins board game convention in Columbus, and was immediately called out for his history of sexist and transphobic commentary. GAMA suspended him from their Facebook group, and now he’s threatening to sue them, as he’s done in other cases (including winning one suit where a group called him ‘racist’). It does remind me of a certain MLB pitcher’s tendency to sue or threaten to sue everyone…
The New Yorker looks at the strange life and disappearance of mathematician Alexander Grothendieck, one of the most important figures in the creation of the field of algebraic geometry.
The COVID-19 outbreaks in U.S. meatpacking plants in 2020 were the result of years of corporate safety violations and a coordinated effort with the Trump administration.
This 2019 piece looks at ethical and economic questions around a maize plant discovered on indigenous land in Mexico that can fix its own nitrogen (with the help of a symbiotic bacterium), which could be a massive boon to the global food supply. Who actually shares in this potential wealth?
I reviewed Honorée Fannone Jeffers’ incredible debut novel The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois earlier this week, and in the book she mentions “The Weeping Time,” a large slave auction held in Savannah in 1859 that was especially cruel to its victims. I wasn’t familiar with the story and found this 2014 Atlantic story on the largely forgotten tragedy.
Ticks are spreading across the U.S., abetted by increased (human & animal) mobility and climate change, and bringing new diseases with them.
The 2021 experiment where a biotech firm released genetically modified mosquitos in the Florida Keys has been a success, although proving its effect on long-term health outcomes will be difficult.
Amanda Makulec writes in the New York Times about how anti-vaxxer assholes used the death of her 3-month-old baby to try to claim the COVID-19 vaccines caused it so they could discourage pregnant women from getting these safe, effective vaccines.
The Tennessee nurse who was convicted of criminally negligent homicide after she accidentally adminstered the wrong medication to a patient received three years of probation but no jail time. Hundreds of nurses who were outside the courthouse protesting the prosecution cheered the decision. Prosecutions for medical errors are extremely rare, and criminalizing them is a dangerous precedent.
The women’s lacrosse team from Delaware State University, an HBCU in Dover, was racially profiled and threatened by a couple of good ol’ boy cops in Georgia. The school is filing a civil rights complaint.
PBS reports on the rise in lawn alternatives to grass, which requires a lot of water and chemical treatment to maintain.
Now Italy is investigating whether commentators on its news programs are being paid by the Kremlin to spread disinformation.
Marjorie Taylor Greene may have used campaign funds to buy herself a luxury car, according to FEC records. The grift goes on till the break of dawn…
Why do so many people think Amber Heard is lying? And why would any woman risk coming forward with stories of abuse given the treatment she’s received?
Margaret Atwood on how the Supreme Court is trying to make The Handmaid’s Tale a true story.
Derek Thompson writes about the death spiral of our culture wars.
Sounds like David Simon’s new limited series We Own This City is worth watching.
A brand-new third edition of Reiner Knizia’s classic game RA is already funded on Gamefound.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: abortion, board game news, environment, florida, food science, georgia, links, longreads, math, metoo, police, science, social media, stick to baseball, tv, vaccines

→ April 30, 2022
→ By keith

Stick to baseball, 4/30/22.

For subscribers to The Athletic this week, I offered my first “overreaction theater” post, looking at the first three weeks of games from players who made their MLB debuts this month. I also held my first Klawchat in a while on Thursday.

Over at Paste, I reviewed the game Skull Canyon: Ski Fest, which combines a Ticket to Ride-like mechanic with extra rounds where you go get bonus cards that help you rack up more points or do more things with each turn. It’s quite good.

On The Keith Law Show, I spoke with Dr. Ellen Hendriksen, author of the fantastic book How to Be Yourself: Quiet Your Inner Critic and Rise Above Social Anxiety (which you can buy here). You can subscribe via iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, amazon, or wherever you get your podcasts.

I sent out a new issue of my free email newsletter yesterday. You can find both of my books, Smart Baseball and The Inside Game, in paperback anywhere books are sold, including Bookshop.org.

And now, the links…

Longreads first: You’ve probably seen it by now, but the Washington Post‘s Taylor Lorenz revealed the identity of the woman behind the noxious LibsOfTikTok account, which has been doxing teachers and others who might dare to offer views in support of pro-LGBTQ+ rights.

Why is the Conservative Political Action Committee (CPAC) holding its convention in Budapest, home to Hungarian President Viktor Orbán, an anti-Semitic Putin adherent? Maybe because they agree with his views – and perhaps are trying to find new funding sources now that Russia’s spigot is off.

A school superintendent in North Texas has vowed to get rid of any books in school libraries that mention LGBTQ+ themes, including transgender people. It may not be constitutional. It’s certainly pandering to a religious minority. And it mirrors battles going on across the country in public library systems.

New York has a “Ferguson problem,” where many localities in the state use fines and fees to boost their revenues, with disparate impact on the poor and on residents of color.

The New York Times, which owns my employer, has been twisting crime statistics to support an argument that the city needs more policing, according to FAIR.org.

It is way past time that the U.S. end its military support for the Saudi war on Yemen.
Michigan State Senator Tom Barrett (R) is running for the U.S. House, and sent out a fundraising text that appeared to ask recipients to confirm their child’s “gender reassignment surgery” appointment. This is incredibly vile, but also, it’s fearmongering bullshit. There is no gender reassignment surgery for children. If you want to support his likely opponent, Rep. Elissa Slotkin (MI-8) is running for the same seat after redistricting, and you can donate to her campaign here.

Speaking of Michigan, State Sen. Mallory McMorrow (D) gave an impassioned speech against Republicans’ hateful “grooming” rhetoric aimed at LGBTQ+ people.

Fragile white alumni of the Virginia Military Institute are fighting to roll back the school’s diversity initiatives.

Florida Republicans are saying farewell to free speech, according to the notoriously left-wing periodical (checks notes) the National Review. Florida might be the least free state in the country at this point, between their war on math and their campaign to cleanse libraries. The New York Times examined 21 of the math textbooks Florida rejected.

Meanwhile, the state is only approving math textbooks from one firm, which Virginia’s race-baiting Governor Glenn Youngkin used to run.

A beautiful response: A Florida resident is circulating petitions to ban any mention of the Bible in public schools there, which has a lot more basis in our Constitution than the state’s attempts to criminalize any mention of sexual orientation or gender identity.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s stunt at the border turned up no drugs and no migrants, but it will cost the state $4.2 billion. I thought the Republicans were the party of fiscal responsibility? How is any taxpayer there okay with this much money, about $425 per Texas household, being thrown away?

He’s also sending busloads of migrants to Washington, D.C., using people as objects – which, I suppose, is in line with Texas’ history prior to 1865. You can join me in donating to this GoFundMe to help these immigrants travel to their ultimate destinations or provide them with other needed items.

All the progress we’d made on reducing exemptions to childhood vaccination mandates is eroding, and we’re going to end up worse than where we started as religious zealots seek to further expand those exemptions (even though no major religion opposes vaccinations).

Employees at the firm that provides QA to the software developer Bioware are trying to unionize.

How did Barnes & Noble become a tentative ally of independent bookstores? Via a common enemy.

Board game news: Well, not news, but watch this wonderful 1982 BBC mini-documentary on tabletop gaming.

Autobahn, a heavy economic game from the designer of Merv and Ragusa, is now on Kickstarter.

Eagle-Gryphon introduced a pair of new games from Portuguese designers, Lisbon Tram 28 and Porto.

A school in Uganda is bringing back its annual board game convention for kids for the first time since 2019. They posted on Reddit, looking for funding help, but since I saved this link they’ve actually reached their goal.

Paradox Interactive, which makes video games and has co-published board games based on several of those titles, announced dates and info for PDXCON 2022. I attended this event in 2018, at their invitation & expense, and enjoyed it quite a bit, although I stuck to the tabletop stuff.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: board game news, florida, links, longreads, michigan, new york, police, stick to baseball, texas, unions, vaccines

→ April 16, 2022
→ By keith

Stick to baseball, 4/16/22.

For subscribers to the Athletic, I had one new post this week, a roundup of top 2022 draft prospects I’ve seen, including Druw Jones, Termarr Johnson, and the now-injured Dylan Lesko.

Over at Paste, I reviewed Cascadia, one of the best new games of 2021, from the same publisher as Calico. It’s another hex tile-laying game but simpler to learn and play, with variable rules you can fine-tune to allow kids to join.

My own podcast returned with the Productive Outs guys – Ian Miller of Kowloon Walled City and Riley Breckenridge of Thrice – as guests. You can subscribe via iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, amazon, or wherever you get your podcasts.

I’m due for another issue my free email newsletter this upcoming week. You can find both of my books, Smart Baseball and The Inside Game, in paperback anywhere books are sold, including Bookshop.org.

And now, the links…

Longreads first: Child welfare workers in Texas are resigning rather than enforce the state’s hateful law denying medical treatment to trans kids.

Vanity Fair has a long investigative piece on EcoHealth Alliance, a nonprofit that has been at the center of the discredited lab-leak hypothesis, showing how EHA’s leader, Peter Daszak, made the situation worse both before the pandemic began and after the search for SARS-CoV-2’s origins began.

Firearms have surpassed motor vehicle crashes as the leading cause of deaths for U.S. children and adolescents.

Writing in the New Yorker, Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Elizabeth Kolbert writes about how two Florida lakes are suing to stop a development that would destroy nearly 2000 acres of wetlands. The lawsuit includes one actual human, as well as a marsh and a stream, and is the first of its kind in the U.S.

The CEO of Flutterwave, a Nigerian online payments and financial services company with a $3 billion valuation, may have engaged in fraud and insider trading to enrich himself at the expense of shareholders and employees with stock options.

The Texas Observer, a progressive investigative journalism magazine that had a particular focus on Indigenous affairs, lost most of its staff in the last six months due to a series of bungled situations and a divide over the periodical’s mission.

Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) worked to try to overturn the 2020 Presidential election, according to texts he sent to Chief of Staff Mark Meadows.

Biologist David Sabatini resigned his tenured professorship at MIT after three senior officials at the school recommended revoking it in the wake of sexual harassment allegations against him and concerns over his behavior towards other members of his lab. He is still, however, suing one of the women who has accused him of harassment.

David French writes in The Atlantic that the American right has “lost the plot” on free speech.

The British national who killed MP Sir David Amess was a “textbook example of radicalization” who started reading extremist propaganda online during the Syria conflict.

The cops who shoved a 75-year-old man to the ground for protesting were cleared of all wrongdoing. Because of course they were.

Meanwhile, a panel on the Fifth Circuit of the US Court of Appeals ruled that police who tortured a teenage girl in custody didn’t violate her rights.

Former St. Louis police officer Luther Hall, who was beaten by his fellow officers while working undercover during protests in the city in 2017, spoke out about his desire to leave the city and the lack of justice for his attackers.

There’s very strong evidence that the Epstein-Barr virus causes multiple sclerosis, although why some infected people develop the autoimmune disorder and others don’t isn’t clear.

Why aren’t Democrats doing anything to combat the GOP’s deranged claims that Democrats are all pedophiles and groomers?

South Dakota AG Jason Ravsnborg, who killed a man in a hit-and-run accident, may face consequences after all as the Republican-led legislature has voted to impeach him.

Texas is a shitshow in so many ways. Gov. Greg Abbott’s political stunt at the border has led truckers to demand that he stop inspections of every truck, a move he put in place due to baseless claims about border security. For a party that claims to be pro-business, this is a hell of a way to show it.

Climate change is contributing to the spread of Japanese encephalitis in Australia.

Techdirt decries major newspapers’ continuing failure to grasp social media.

Opinion journalism is beset by structural problems and bad actors. There are ways to fix both of these issues, from better labeling of opinion vs. news pieces to proper editing (in a world where most publications have reduced editorial staff substantiall).

Ukrainian hackers have published a tremendous amount of personal data on Russian troopse fighting in the current war, as have other activists seeking additional ways to fight back against Russia’s pointless invasion of its neighbor.

The Titans’ new state-funded stadium will cost about $2 billion, and the economic impact figures the team has given the legislature appear to have been created out of thin air. Great use of public funds in a state that offers below-average education to its citizens.

A Toronto man amassed a huge cache of guns and killed two men at random before his arrest, which may have prevented a mass shooting given the arsenal he had in his apartment.

Board game news: Birds of a Feather is back on Kickstarter, and while it’s clearly meant to capitalize on Wingspan’s runaway success, it’s also a much lighter game aimed at a different audience.

The newest game from publishers Lucky Duck Games (Chronicles of Crime) to hit Kickstarter is The Dark Quarter, a co-op narrative game set in New Orleans.

Postmark Games has a print-and-play game called Voyages that just requires you to bring your own dice.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: board game news, climate change, coronavirus, environment, frauds, health, links, longreads, metoo, police, south dakota, stick to baseball, tennessee, texas

→ April 10, 2022
→ By keith

Stick to baseball, 4/10/2022.

I had two posts for subscribers to the Athletic this past week, my annual MLB season predictions post, which never fails to rile up people who don’t read the intro despite all the disclaimers I issue, and a draft scouting notebook that covered a slew of likely first-rounders, including Brooks Lee.

Over at Paste, I reviewed the trick-taking game Shamans, which is semi-cooperative, as at least one player in every round is a saboteur working against the others. I think it’s a better version of The Crew, a straight cooperative trick-taking game that won the Kennerspiel des Jahres award a few years ago.

I sent out a new edition of my free email newsletter this past week. You can find both of my books, Smart Baseball and The Inside Game, in paperback anywhere books are sold, including Bookshop.org. My podcast will return shortly – travel has made it difficult for me to find windows to record the last couple of weeks.

And now, the links…

A former assistant attorney general in Arizona has spent decades helping that state craft some of the most punitive laws against people convicted of crimes, including drug offenses and other non-violent crimes, even though he’s never held elected office. Arizona’s population isn’t this conservative as a whole, but the far right has the state government in a stranglehold.
Brett Favre used his name and influence to steer Mississippi state welfare funds to his pet projects, and may have profited from one.
This New Yorker review of Fintan O’Toole’s new book We Don’t Know Ourselves looks at how Ireland freed itself from the pernicious influence of the Catholic Church. We could learn from them.
Humans are one of the only species that menstruates, but there’s relatively little research and treatment for the pain and discomfort it causes. That may be changing, along with a new hypothesis on why we’re one of the very few species to experience it.
The ivermectin grift has completely fallen apart after more studies showed it’s useless against COVID-19, although the grifters haven’t given up just yet.
More idiots on the right keep falling for the myth of “furries” in schools.
The Justice Department has finally told states that they shouldn’t deny gender-affirming medical care to trans kids. These hateful laws, pandering to the religious right, are just going to increase suicide attempts among kids who are already at higher risk for it.
The Chief of Adolescent Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital estimated that Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” law may lead to 4000 new suicide attempts per year in that state alone. Now more red states are pushing these bigoted bills. If you live in any of these states, have you called your state rep and senator, and the governor, to express your views on the bills?
Abigail Disney wrote an editorial urging her grandfather’s company to stand up for love and acceptance.
Entrepreneur Rhian Beulter shared a personal story of acceptance from her childhood.
Sending social workers rather than cops to low-level mental health or intoxication-related 911 calls in Denver has kept police out of over 2000 such incidents. It saves money and it saves lives.
The mass of the W boson may be higher than theory predicted, which would require changes to the standard model – although this new result isn’t final.
25^th Century Games will publish a new (third?) edition of Reiner Knizia’s classic game Ra, launching on Gamefound in the next few weeks.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: arizona, board game news, disney, florida, ireland, lgbt rights, links, longreads, mental health, mississippi, police, stick to baseball

→ April 2, 2022
→ By keith

Stick to baseball, 4/2/22.

I had three posts for subscribers to the Athletic in the last ten days, two scouting notebooks from the Cactus League (here’s one, here’s the other), and my annual breakout candidates post. That last one is shorter than usual because I just couldn’t confidently back any other names for it.

I’m working on the next edition of my free email newsletter. You can find both of my books, Smart Baseball and The Inside Game, in paperback anywhere books are sold, including Bookshop.org.

And now, the links…

This is an extremely long read, even by longread standards, but if you want to understand why the vast majority of scientists accept a zoonotic origin for SARS-CoV-2 as the most likely explanation, read Philip Markolin’s post.
The University of Pennsylvania engaged in an unconscionable witch hunt against one of its own students, a victim of physical and sexual abuse whose mother appears to have told the school her daughter lied on her applications there and to the Rhodes Scholarship program. She is suing the school, which has not responded publicly to this article.
Texas Governor Greg Abbott loves to brag about his so-called “border initiative,” but the evidence doesn’t support his claims.
The Guardian has a look inside online cryptocurrency communities (although I suppose an offline one would be a bit weird), examining the sorts of people involved in that world, many of whom don’t fit the stereotypes.
Leonard Leo is stepping down as head of the arch-right, Uihlein-funded opinion site The Federalist to found a new conservative advocacy group, probably funded by more dark money. Leo had disproportionate influence in the conservative takeover of the federal judiciary.
The “CHEST” protocol supposedly used large doses of vitamin C to fight sepsis. It appears that the protocol’s creator, Dr. Paul Marik, fabricated his results.
The editorial board of Nature argues that this is a terrible time to stop tracking COVID-19.
Bitcoin is a disaster for our environment. Can we stop it?
With scientists under attack for nothing more than doing their jobs, who will step in to defend and protect them?
It’s no longer the main story from the awards, but Justin Chang pointed out that the improvement in the quality of Oscar nominees has come with the telecast’s increasing disdain for those same movies.
Don’t Look Up was terrible, and director/co-writer Adam McKay really doesn’t get why.
Meanwhile, the Hollywood Reporter published commentary from an Oscar voter who remained anonymous but was willing to show himself as a racist, retrograde asshole. I’m not sure why the Academy wouldn’t sift through the ballots to identify the voter and ban him from voting.
The Governor of Utah vetoed the state’s bill against trans athletes, and his letter explaining why is worth reading. The transphobic theocrats in the state legislature overrode his veto, though. This was all over one athlete, by the way.

South Dakota Republicans declined to impeach their attorney general even though he killed a man in a hit-and-run accident. He’s going to get off with zero consequences for the homicide.
The University of Texas-Austin denied tenure to a pregnant professor and now has to pay her $3 million after losing a lawsuit. That’s good, but will it discourage them or any other university from doing it again?
A Tennessee nurse made a medication error that killed a patient, admitted it immediately, and was still found guilty of homicide by a jury. I’m not sure how this helps medical safety. I do think it might deter people from becoming nurses in Tennessee.
There’s a new wave of specialty coffee shops in India, a country that would traditionally export its best coffee to developed countries.
Children are bearing the brunt of Russia’s brutal war on Ukraine.
A Wilmington, Delaware, teacher who mentored dozens of kids and became a popular advocate for students from the city died in a motorcycle accident last month.
NEON announced that its film Memoria will go on permanent tour in cinemas around the country, which is incredibly ableist – many people can’t go to movie theaters for COVID-19 or other reasons.
Board game news: The legacy game Jurassic World: The Legacy of Isle Nublar has one more week on Kickstarter.
Nightmare Cathedral, what appears to a midweight area control and worker-placement game from the publishers of Teotihuacan and Tekhenu, is on Gamefound for another 11 days.
Stefan Fatsis has a fun story about a ridiculous coincidence in competitive Scrabble.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: board game news, coronavirus, cryptocurrencies, dark money, delaware, frauds, links, longreads, oscars, stick to baseball, tennessee, texas, utah

→ March 19, 2022
→ By keith

Stick to baseball, 3/19/22.

I had a surprisingly busy week, writing five pieces for The Athletic about some of the big trades and signings since the lockout ended

My podcast guest this week was old friend Joe Sheehan, talking about the CBA and what transactions had already taken place at the time we spoke on Monday afternoon. Listen via The Athletic or subscribe on iTunes, Amazon, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Over at Paste, I reviewed MicroMacro Crime City, the Spiel des Jahres winner for 2021, a mystery game that asks you to solve a series of 16 cases by examining a giant map and answering a set of questions. It’s fun and novel, but it’s one-and-done – once you finish the 16 cases, you’ve completed the game.

And now, the links:

Koch Industries, whose owner, Charles Koch, is probably the biggest dark-money donor in U.S. politics, is refusing to cease doing business in Russia. This is the same Charles Koch who funds all kinds of astroturfed efforts against LGBT rights and CRT in schools so he can keep his taxes low and regulation to a minimum.
The completion of a highway in the western Amazon, first started in the 1970s to connect the otherwise isolated Manaus (2.2 million people) to Porto Velho (539,000), is leading to deforestation and now killings of residents by those seeking to profit from the construction.
As Florida’s death-loving Governor claims you shouldn’t vaccinate kids against COVID-19, the evidence and the experts agree that this advice is wrong.
David Gorski takes on DeSantis and the Great Barrington Declaration grifters by pointing out that there’s a long, dark history of this kind of thinking, rooted in eugenics.
One-third of all U.S. child COVID-19 deaths came during the omicron surge this winter, in case you’re still on the fence about vaccinating your kids.
We have yet more evidence that ivermectin doesn’t help COVID-19 patients at all.
State government health policies are driving increasing gaps in health outcomes, notably in the varying state responses to COVID-19.
Duchess County, New York, decided to spend $12.5 million in federal COVID-19 aid funds to renovate the Hudson Valley Renegades’ stadium.
Netflix cancelled The Baby-Sitters Club after two seasons, with the first season taking seven Emmy nominations and two wins. Vulture spoke to one of the show’s executive producers about the service’s decision. Slashfilm did as well, with more focus on the loss it represents for female audiences.
Tennessee State Rep. Gloria Johnson (D) tweeted through a list of some of the alarming, hate-filled, anti-science bills coming in that state.
Like the law in Texas preventing schools from talking about race, a bill that was designed to stop the teaching of critical race theory even though it wasn’t actually being taught anywhere.
Board game news: Birdwatcher, a fast-playing competitive game from first-time designer Zakir Jafry, is available for pre-order. I’m going to have a hard time not thinking this was at least inspired by Wingspan, though.
The Villainous game universe will get its first set of Star Wars villains this summer. I’m slightly disappointed at the absence of Cad Bane, though.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: board game news, brazil, coronavirus, florida, links, longreads, new york, stick to baseball, tennessee, texas, tv

→ March 13, 2022
→ By keith

Stick to baseball, 3/13/22.

I released my first ranking of draft prospects for 2022 over on The Athletic, and held a live Q&A to take questions about it. I also wrote up the two trades from Saturday night, involving Chris Bassitt and Isiah Kiner-Falefa/Mitch Garver.

Over at Paste, I reviewed The Adventures of Robin Hood, a narrative game from the designer of the Legends of Andor, but with simpler mechanics and a clever encounter system with a two-layered board.

I spoke with the Locked On Dodgers podcast in a two-part interview you can watch here and here. I also sent a new issue of my free email newsletter, talking about Monty Python and the development of my sense of humor.

And now, the links…

Longreads first: The New York Times asks what it means that even Americans are consuming less beef.
Vanity Fair has a fascinating article on Grimes, talking about her persona, her upcoming concept album, and that guy.
Kathryn Schulz, who appeared on my podcast a few weeks ago, wrote about the complicated history of Bambi, the book, as it enters the public domain.
ProPublica reports on barbaric conditions in Louisiana’s largest juvenile detention facility in Louisiana, part of the race in the Deep South to see which state can get to the 19^th century fastest.
Conservative billionaires pushing fake news are becoming a major US export, as now a single South Korean oligarch is pushing conspiracy theories to keep the two Koreas at war.
Vulture has a wonderful interview with Murderville showrunner Krister Johnson on the “treasure chest” of in-jokes, Easter eggs, and other small gags on Homestar Runner.
Melissa Rodriguez, the former executive chef at Del Posto, is now opening three new restaurants in that space, including a high-end pizzeria. Resy interviewed her about the venture, the pandemic, and the end of Del Posto (which was good, but wildly overpriced).
Several research papers still in the pre-print stage have put more nails in the coffin of the lab-leak hypothesis have appeared in the last two weeks. The New Republic looks at how we can learn from this to try to prevent the next zoonotic pandemic.
The best path forward now is for institutions to work to improve mitigation efforts, including encouraging further vaccinations.
Cobb County is taking a big loss on its public funding of Truist Park. This Axios piece has a quick summary of the same.
Stop acting like pediatric deaths from COVID-19 don’t matter because of their numbers. Those children had names.
Mask requirements in schools reduced COVID-19 cases. We’re going to see increases in cases again now that schools everywhere are lifting mask mandates.
I don’t understand how asking people to harass a journal editor to try to short-circuit the peer review process is remotely ethical, but Alina Chan, who wrote a book that pushes the lab-leak hypothesis, is long gone around the bend at this point.
The Philadelphia Inquirer had a long article on where to eat and what to do in Wilmington, hitting our big 3 fine-dining restaurants (Le Cavalier, La Fia, and Bardea), and several other favorite spots of ours (Swigg, Wilma’s, De.co Food Hall, The Queen), although they whiffed badly with some of their inclusions (Mrs. Robino’s, Wilmington Country Store).
ABC News ran a long segment (about 12 minutes) on the lack of any evidence to support the use of ivermectin against COVID-19.
Now bot accounts are using false fact-checks to spread fake news about the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Tennessee Governor Bill Lee appointed an arms dealer who sold ammunition to the Aurora mass shooter to the state’s board of education, not long after appointing a 9/11 hoaxer to the state’s “textbook commission.” What a shitshow.
Brandon Tensley writes at CNN about how and why the GOP is targeting LGBTQ+ rights across the south and far west. I think the answer is simple: They’re pandering to their evangelical base. This is why the raving lunatics running Idaho want life in prison for anyone providing gender-affirming care to trans kids.
And in Texas, a family that once invited Attorney General Ken Paxton and his wife to dinner found themselves the target of one of the state’s witch-hunt investigations into families with trans kids. Shame on anyone who votes Republican in Texas this year. This policy is going to lead to more suicides and grievous harm to vulnerable people, all to satisfy a small population of bigots.
Disney has been censoring same-sex affection in Pixar’s films, according to several employees, who wrote a letter also demanding that the company stop donating to Florida legislators who voted for the state’s “don’t say gay” bill.
A Georgia man took an $85,000 SBA loan for his business, and then spent two-thirds of it on a rare Pokémon card.
An American man wanted on rape and sexual assault charges in Utah is accused of faking his own death and pretending to be someone else in a COVID ward in Scotland, where he’s since married a British woman. The man, suspected of being George Rossi, has been identified by his tattoos, and his adoptive father also says that it’s him.
A Trump-appointed judge dismissed a complaint against Rep. Madison Cawthorn, alleging that his support of the January 6^th insurrection made him ineligible to run for office, because people might take up arms otherwise.
Apparently Trump has been holding “contests” where small-donor dollars would win trips to meet him, but then they never award the prizes, according to a report from the Washington Post.
Board game news: Former Z-Man Games employees have founded a new publisher, Moon Crab Games, and announced their first game, Leviathan Wilds, a cooperative, tactical game of movement on various boards representing massive creatures the players try to climb.
Hamlet, a cute town-building game from the designer of the lovely game Petrichor, is fully funded already on Kickstarter.
So is Tiwanaku (formerly known as Pachamama), a Minesweeper-inspired board game from the publishers of Magic Maze.
And so is Envelopes of Cash, a game about corrupt recruiting in college football (so, you know, reality), designed by a reader of mine.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: baseball, board game news, coronavirus, delaware, Economics, frauds, idaho, lgbt rights, links, longreads, louisiana, pizza, russia, stick to baseball, tennessee, texas, the swamp

→ March 5, 2022
→ By keith

Stick to baseball, 3/5/22.

I answered some questions on the Blue Jays’ farm system this week, which was a transcription of my appearance on our Spin Rates podcast. The Klawchats returned this week. I’m planning to start written draft coverage this upcoming week with a top 30.

On my own podcast, my guest was author and journalist Kathryn Schulz, talking about her wonderful new memoir Lost and Found, about the death of her father and how she met and married her wife, the author Casey Cep. Listen via The Athletic or subscribe on iTunes, Amazon, that other site, or wherever you get your podcasts. I appeared on the Romantic About Baseball podcast as well.

And now, the links…

Longreads first: Why are Wisconsin judges charging women who accuse their husbands of abuse? ProPublica documents the case of one woman who did just that and lost custody of her four kids because the judge charged her with contempt four times and ordered her arrest.
The New Yorker has a tremendous interview with J. Kenji Lopez-Alt, conducted by Helen Rosner, as his new book The Wok hits shelves on Tuesday.
My friend Tim Grierson wrote about Tears for Fears’ enduring hit “Everybody Wants to Rule the World.”
I don’t know if this New York Times piece, on how RFK Jr.’s family friends feel about his descent into anti-vaxx grifting, is helpful or not.
Two new pre-prints show more evidence for a zoonotic origin for the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. There’s also a follow-up thread that underscores one of the findings that wasn’t well-covered in that article. Needless to say, the lab-leak grifters were quick to attack – the author of a book that depends on the lab-leak hypothesis asked her followers on twitter to harass one of the journal’s editors to try to stop publication, and is trying increasingly desperate attacks on the pre-prints.
Also, a new journal article found that gender-affirming care improved mental health outcomes in transgender children. Just in case you weren’t clear on what was going on in Texas and anywhere the Republican Party is in charge. Oh, Texas Children’s Hospital has paused hormone therapies for trans kids, thanks to the state’s directive. These could be your kids. We should all be outraged.
Of course, now pro-Putin propaganda is flooding anti-vax groups online, along with the usual anti-science and anti-Semitic nonsense.
There’s no evidence that wearing a mask leads to physical or psychological harm for kids. They don’t cause carbon dioxide poisoning, don’t lead to developmental delays, and help prevent the spread of COVID-19.
The Biden Administration’s most recent moves have killed our collective approach to slowing the pandemic, by taking measures designed to protect the most vulnerable members of society and making them into personal decisions.
Now anti-vaxxers are trying to convince parents not to take their kids to the pediatrician.
Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey and state Sen. Wendy Rogers are both directly connected to white nationalist Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes. The connection may be part of why Ducey declined to run for the U.S. Senate this week.
Supreme Court nominations have become a farce because of a Supreme Court ruling, writes Dana Milbank of the Washington Post.
While nobody was paying much attention, Trump endorsed a right-wing plan to take over the GOP – and steal an election or two.
The newly-elected government of Honduras is going to ban open-pit mining, a profitable but environmentally disastrous practice.
A small bit of good environmental news: the scourge of purple sea urchins that has devastated the California coast’s kelp forests has led to a new industry that harvests and farms the urchins to sell uni, the roe of sea urchins often found at sushi restaurants, in turn easing some of the pressure on the kelp forests.
Missouri lawmakers are rushing to legalize sports betting, but only in casinos and sports stadiums. So who’s funding them?
Legendary video game designer Sid Meier (Civilization, Pirates!, Railroad Tycoon) warned of the dangers of the industry’s shift towards in-game purchases.
My friend Zabe Bent was quoted in a brief NY Times piece on how best to design bike lanes in cities.
Board game news: Capstone Games opened pre-orders for the Terra Mystica: Big Box, including the base game, two expansions, and a solo “Automa” mode, for $149.95.
Library Labyrinth, a cooperative library-themed board game from the left-wing publisher Dissent Games, is now on Kickstarter.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: board game news, coronavirus, environment, links, longreads, missouri, Music, russia, stick to baseball, the swamp, video games

→ January 22, 2022
→ By keith

Stick to baseball, 1/22/22.

I’m still grinding away on the top 100, with more than half of the player capsules written so far. It’ll run on January 31^st, followed later that week by the column of guys who just missed. The team-by-team reports will run the week after. I have a podcast episode ready to roll that should be up any day now.

My latest review at Paste covers The Rocketeer: Fate of the Future, a two-player game from Funko based on the cult classic Disney film, which is itself about to get a reboot.

And now, the links…

Before the longreads: Richard Uihlein has been a major dark-money contributor to the GOP and various right-wing endeavors (including anti-LGBT rights groups) for years, but a new report found that he helped fund groups trying to overturn the 2020 election. His company, U-Line, is one of the major sellers of shipping boxes in the country. If you run a company where you use cardboard boxes, please consider using another manufacturer. If you get a package and the box was made by U-Line, contact the shipper and ask them to consider using another manufacturer. Here’s another call for a boycott of U-Line.
Longreads: Brookside, Alabama, has created a machine for hitting travelers with bogus traffic violations and generating fines for it, according to this outstanding investigative piece from John Archibald on AL.com.
Clarence Thomas’s wife, Ginni, is a right-wing activist with what appears to be undue influence at the Supreme Court, according to this report from the great Jane Mayer (author of Dark Money). Judge Thomas has not recused himself from cases in which his wife his involved.
Texas Monthly looks at the stalled investigation of an abusive gymnastics coach in Texas, and how it parallels a dysfunctional process across the gymnastics community.
The Washington Post has the story of an alleged thief who lived with a wealthy woman for the last few years of her life and then started selling off her art and jewelry when she died – and may have stolen from many other people as well.
Joss Whedon gave a long interview to New York that I don’t think went the way he planned it. Tim Grierson broke it down for MEL.
A Vanderbilt student who was raped by another student there writes about how the university declined to expel her rapist, despite a finding that he had committed the most serious violation in the student code.
Input looks at Instagram “petfluencer” account owners who clone their pets. Just because you can does not mean you should.
I didn’t know Cincinnati had an unused subway tunnel network for a train system that was never built.
Maybe Cincinnati would have a subway if they hadn’t pissed away $920 million to pay for the Bengals’ stadium in the last twenty years – with more costs to come.
The University of Michigan fired its President after learning he may have had an affair with a subordinate, about two years after they first moved to fire their provost for his own sexual misconduct allegations.
Senate Republicans’ move to block the John Lewis Act puts more than just voting rights in grave peril.
DirecTV announced, finally, they will drop the misinformation-spreading OANN later this year. Do you have Verizon FiOS? CenturyLink? Prism? AT&T U-Verse? Call them and ask them to do the same.
The seven Chicago-based AV Club employees who were told to move to Los Angeles, only to find their jobs had already been listed online for new hires, have all chosen to take their CBA-protected severance.
The COVID-19 vaccines are safer than aspirin or acetominaphen.
Arkansas is so in the thrall of anti-science forces that they gave ivermectin to prisoners who caught COVID-19, despite a lack of any evidence that the deworming paste is effective against the virus. Some of those prisoners are now suing the state.
Florida Republicans may pass a bill that would prohibit schools from teaching anything about the racism of white people that would make white students feel “discomfort.”
Many major media outlets have been reporting on a “rise” in thefts that isn’t actually happening. Stories about cargo thefts against Union Pacific have omitted the fact that UP laid off most of its security employees during the pandemic.
Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni – who has been in power since 1986, and once spent foreign aid to buy himself a private jet – has imprisoned and tortured a writer for insulting him and his son in a tweet.
Paste profiled Yard Act, one of my favorite new rock bands of the last two years, a Gang of Four-influenced post-punk act with lyrics that are spoken as often as they’re sung.
Board game news: The Kickstarter for Skate Summer, a route-building and set collection game from Pandasaurus, opened up this week.
Keymaster Games, publisher of Parks and Trails, opened pre-orders for Caper: Europe, an upcoming two-player heist-themed game.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: arkansas, cincinnati, dark money, heists, links, longreads, michigan, Music, stick to baseball, texas, uganda, vaccines, vanderbilt

→ January 16, 2022
→ By keith

Stick to baseball, 1/16/22.

Still working on the prospect rankings – I started the actual writing this week, after several weeks of prep – which will run starting January 31^st at the Athletic. I appreciate your patience. My podcast and my Paste reviews will return this week.

And now, the links…

Longreads first: This New York Times story by Maggie Jones on the realities of sex after age 70 is one of the best pieces of longform journalism I’ve ever read. It is quite long, but it’s thorough, clear, and highly empathetic, all while discussing a topic that remains largely taboo even as other areas of human sexuality have become more acceptable in mainstream media.
Guitar World interviewed Mastodon’s guitarists about their writing and playing styles, including the writing of their massive new album Hushed and Grim.
Have we forgotten how to read critically? I’d counter: Did we ever know?
From last March: Smithsonian goes long on the history of Neapolitan pizza, the world’s “first” fast food. (Maybe.)
Philadelphia magazine has updated its list of the metro area’s top 50 restaurants for the first time since the start of the pandemic, but without ranking them this time. The new list has two of our favorites right here in Wilmington, Bardea and Le Cavalier, and some wonderful places in Philly, including High Street (in its new location!), Stina, Suraya, and Friday Saturday Sunday.
A study widely shared by anti-vaxxers has been revised to reflect new data showing vaccine boosters are more effective against the Omicron variant than previously believed. I’m sure the anti-vaxxers will correct themselves as soon as possible, without anyone else pointing this out to them.
That said, Omicron is still putting incredible pressure on our overtaxed hospital system, in large part due to the number of people who have refused to get vaccinated.
Here’s a study showing that COVID-19 vaccines nearly eliminated hospitalization and life support requirements for teenagers who were infected with the virus. No vaccinated teens in the study group died of COVID-19, compared to seven deaths in unvaccinated teens. Here’s the Washington Post article on the study.
CORBEVAX, the open-source COVID-19 vaccine that represents our best chance so far to vaccinate the developing world, has received more funding from the company that makes Tito’s Vodka than from the U.S. government. Wealthy countries are busy buying Pfizer and Moderna vaccines while failing to fund a vaccine that would reduce the odds of new variants emerging in less wealthy nations.
A Canadian ~~hero~~ judge ruled that an unvaccinated father may not see his kids until he gets vaccinated. Imagine being so caught up in anti-vax conspiracy theories that you would rather refuse to see your own kids than get a safe, effective shot.
Maine’s medical licensing board has temporarily suspended the license of a doctor who spread anti-vaccine and other COVID-19 misinformation. She has also prescribed hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin, two drugs that are ineffective against COVID-19, by falsely claiming her patients had other illnesses.
There was a huge brouhaha over on the forums for Tabletop Simulator after it came out that a moderator was banning users just for saying the words “gay” and “trans.” Kotaku has the whole breakdown, including the culture wars in TS’s Steam reviews now.
The L.A. Times has more on the battle between G/O Media and the Writers Guild, with the union arguing that the AV Club’s private equity owners have treated the site’s Chicago-based employees unfairly.
Baltimore’s top prosecutor, Marilyn Mosby (D), has been indicted on charges of perjury related to a series of financial transactions where she claimed hardship so she could buy multiple properties in Florida.
Michigan’s Attorney General has referred her investigation of GOP electors who signed a document that falsely claimed Trump had won the state’s electoral votes to federal prosecutors. The electors may have committed forgery of a public record and election law forgery, each of which would lead to jail times.
Also in Michigan, a woman filed a criminal complaint accusing former state House Speaker Lee Chatfield (R) of sexually assaulting her when she was a teenager. Chatfield is the woman’s brother-in-law, and he claims they had an “affair” that began after she turned 18. It’s very Clemens-esque.
A Chicago alderman and community organizers are urging the feds to investigate how Mayor Lori Lightfoot (D) may have misused federal COVID-19 relief funds.
Two LA cops ignored a robbery in progress to try to ‘catch’ a Pokemon Go creature. They were fired, sued to get their jobs back, and lost their appeal.
Amazon employees in Bessemer, Alabama, will get a second chance to vote on unionizing after the company was found to have engaged in unfair anti-labor practices during the first election.
Also in Alabama, an especially loony anti-vaxxer who was recently arrested for refusing to wear a mask in a Whole Foods is now saying drinking your own urine cures COVID-19 (it doesn’t).
This story on bokit, a fried-dough sandwich native to Guadeloupe, will make you want to visit the Caribbean island and French overseas department.
Invasive species from around the world are threatening Antarctica’s ecosystems by hitching rides on the increasing number of ships that visit the continent.
Board game news: There’s a video trailer for a new board game based on the hit series The Queen’s Gambit, a show about an existing board game called … chess.
All we have so far is this tweet, but the publisher of the great two-player game Riftforce has announced their second title, a deck management game for up to 8 players called Underdogs, as well as an upcoming expansion to Riftforce.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: alabama, board game news, caribbean, chicago, coronavirus, delaware, environment, links, longreads, misinformation, Music, philadelphia, pizza, police, stick to baseball, unions, vaccines

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