→ April 21, 2026
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Stick to baseball, 4/21/26.

My one post on The Athletic last week was a long scouting notebook covering Vahn Lackey, Joseph Contreras, Liam Peterson, and other players I saw in a week in South Carolina and Georgia.

Over at the AV Club, I reviewed Catan on the Road, a new portable Catan game that loses the map – and thus the competition for space – but keeps the resource-trading mechanic and even tweaks the rules to encourage players to trade more.

I sent out another issue of my free email newsletter late last week. You should subscribe.

And now, the links…

  • Upward Bound is a bestselling novel written by nonverbal, autistic author Woody Brown using the discredited communication technique called Rapid Prompting. His mother may be the actual author.
  • A group chat started by the secretary of Miami-Dade’s Republican Party was filled with racist slurs and antisemitic comments by FIU students, but so far the school has yet to take any action against them. One of those students, Ethan Ratchkauskas, is suing the school on First Amendment grounds after saying someone had to “swiss cheese that professor,” later clarifying that he meant shooting them full of holes.
  • Courtney Williams was one of the whistleblowers who spoke to a journalist about sexual harassment and discrimination at Fort Bragg in the 2010s. The Justice Department just arrested her, claiming she revealed sensitive information.
  • Most of the stories about former Virginia Lt. Gov Justin Fairfax (D)’s murder of his wife and subsequent suicide were about him. CNN profiled Cerina Fairfax, the victim in his case.
  • It appears that the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, which traces its origins to 1786, will continue publishing after all, as the nonprofit institute that owns the Baltimore Banner is buying the paper. Block Communications, owned by the Block family, had decided to shut the paper down rather than abide by federal labor court rulings against their unfair labor practices.
  • Senegal just passed a law doubling the penalty for same-sex relationships, while also criminalizing “promoting” or “financing” LGBT relationships. The bill passed the West African nation’s legislature with no votes against it.
  • A Missouri cop who killed a 2-year-old girl while working as a SWAT team sniper is now a Missouri State Highway Patrol trooper. Keaton Siebenaler has never faced any consequences for firing at a silhouette during a hostage situation, which is how he ended up killing Clesslynn Crawford during a standoff between her father and police.
  • Quined Games’ reprinting of Rudiger Dorn’s Goa is up on Gamefound right now. I owned it, and played it, but it didn’t quite do it for me – at least not to the level of its reputation.

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→ April 12, 2026
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Stick to baseball, 4/12/26.

For subscribers to the Athletic this week, I posted my ranking of the top 50 prospects for this year’s draft, although unfortunately one of them, Jacob Dudan, is now undergoing Tommy John surgery. He threw 110+ pitches five times in his last six starts, after throwing just 30 innings last year as a reliever. I’m sure that’s just a coincidence. If I added another name, it would be Virginia Tech’s Brett Renfrow or Arkansas’ Ryder Helfrick.

I swear I’ll get a newsletter out next – I’ve had a mad week of travel, so I’ve had very little time to just sit and write freely.

And now, the links…

  • Longreads first: By now, you’ve probably seen the New York Times piece that claims that Satoshi, the pseudonymous inventor of Bitcoin, is actually a British cryptographer named Adam Back. I have some issues with the article, particularly the way it centers the author’s search and feelings rather than Satoshi/Back or why finding him might be important, but in general I think it’s an excellent piece of reporting. (And I have no opinion on whether he’s right.)
  • Two Congresspersons from Arizona conducted a surprise inspection of an ICE concentration camp there and found the detainees packed “like sardines,” with rooms meant for 24 people holding up to 40, no beds, and no showers. Anyone responsible for this should be put on trial, with life in prison the sentence for anyone found guilty for creating, carrying out, or enabling this inhumane treatment.
  • The online left is, unfortunately, also prone to believing in conspiracy theories. Brandy Zarozny details one of them, a man named Sascha Riley who has been pushing a fantastical (and probably delusional) tale that, as a child, he was sexually assaulted by several prominent Republicans, including the current President. Riley seems to be unwell, making this all kind of sad beyond just the maddening aspect of people believing so ardently in something untrue.
  • Four women have come forward to accuse Rep. Eric Swalwell (D), also a candidate for Governor of California, of sexually assaulting them. Several Democrats have called on him to end his campaign, but I have yet to see a single one calling on him to resign from Congress – which he needs to do.
  • Washington state has held a man with an intellectual disability in inhumane conditions for 23 years, all for a crime he can’t understand. He’s been assaulted and bullied by other prisoners and residents of the house where he lived on conditional release at one point.
  • Former Republican Senator Ben Sasse, who has stage 4 pancreatic cancer, spoke to the Times’ Ross Douthat about the disease and his choice to be so public about his journey. I don’t wish this fate on anyone. I also don’t think it exempts him from answering for, say, opposing efforts to fight climate change or fighting against LGBTQ+ or reproductive rights. Indeed, isn’t that the time to ask questions like that? Would you do anything differently? Are you thinking less about the here and now and more about the world you’re leaving behind?
  • Author Alex Preston used an LLM to write a book review that was published in The New York Times, and he got caught. The Times has dropped him as a freelancer. Also, write your own shit, people.
  • The Department of Defense sent U.S. soldiers into harm’s way in Kuwait ahead of the Iranian missile attack that killed six service members and injured 30, and they were totally unprepared for the strike, according to survivors – directly contradicting the lie put out by Pete Hegseth.
  • An editorial in the National Catholic Reporter states quite clearly that Catholics who support this Administration are choosing between complicity in the war on Iran, with its attacks on civilian infrastructure and vulgar, hateful language towards the Muslim nation, or the true tenets of their faith. The Administration has couched the war on Christian nationalist rhetoric, but there is no squaring that with the nonviolent Christ of the Bible.
  • Board game news: Bitewing has a new Kickstarter for two more games in its travel-sized game series, Arribada and Seagrass.

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→ May 24, 2025
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Stick to baseball, 5/24/25.

My first Big Board, ranking the top 100 prospects for this year’s draft, is now up for subscribers to The Athletic; I held a Q&A on Thursday to take questions about it and other prospects. I also posted a minor-league scouting notebook from my recent looks at Andrew Painter, George Lombard, Jr., Jhostynxon “The Password” Garcia, Mikey Romero, and others.

Over at Paste, I reviewed the game Diatoms, which has some incredible art and high-quality components, and almost plays too quickly – I wanted a few more rounds to keep building patterns.

I’ve now sent out two issues of my free email newsletter in the last two weeks, which I think counts as a streak.

And now, the links…

  • Longreads first: The best thing I’ve read this month is this San Francisco Chronicle story by their food critic, MacKenzie Chung Fegan, about her experience eating at The French Laundry and how chef-owner Thomas Keller treated her. It is nuanced, thoughtful, and ultimately allows the reader to draw their own conclusions.
  • Matthew Cherry won an Academy Award for his short film Hair Love, which then turned into a book and an animated series on HBO Max. He’s now working on a new short film, an animated musical project called Time Signature, and has a Kickstarter up for it.
  • My editor at Paste, Garrett Martin, reviewed a new video game called Despelote that is about sports but not specifically a sports video game. It sounds fascinating.
  • Two new boardgame Kickstarters this week: Tangerine Games has one for Sauros, a dinosaur-themed trick-taking and tile-laying game.
  • Board & Dice, which specializes in heavy Eurogames, has one for a new edition of Trismegistus, which is very highly rated on BGG but also has a game weight rating of 4.18/5.

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→ January 18, 2025
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Stick to baseball, 1/18/25.

One new piece this week for subscribers to the Athletic, my reaction to Roki Sasaki’s announcement that he’s going to sign with the Dodgers. I also contributed to the Athletic’s Hall of Fame ballot roundup, listing my selections with a brief explanation.

I do have another board game review going up at Paste next week, but most other writing has been on hold as I work on the top 100 prospects ranking, which is due to go live on January 27th. I actually still haven’t settled on who’s #1 – I see six or seven worthwhile candidates, but nobody is a clear leader. I do hope to get a newsletter out in the next few days as I feel more comfortable about my progress on the top 100.

And now, the links…

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→ November 11, 2024
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Stick to baseball, 11/11/24.

We updated my ranking of the top 50 free agents in baseball this offseason on Monday after all options were declined or exercised to reflect the actual free agent pool. My next article there will probably come when we have a big transaction.

I sent out a new edition of my free email newsletter, covering my feelings on the election, on Saturday.

I locked my Twitter account earlier in the week due to the site’s change to allow blocked users to see your posts. At this point, I will only post links to my work there, and I’ll be more active on Bluesky and Threads. Of course, I’ll still be here, and in the comments under my articles on The Athletic.

And now, the links…

  • Multiple women have accused University of Florida men’s basketball coach Todd Golden of stalking and sexually harassing them, according to a report in the independent site The Alligator. The University received a Title IX complaint against Golden on September 27th.
  • A 13-year-old girl in Florida went to the police after she was raped by her adoptive father; the police didn’t believe her and charged her with lying. When he raped her again, she recorded it on her phone. Taylor Cadle, now 21, came forward this week in a PBS story on the police’s complete mishandling of the case.
  • Prof. Donald Fanger taught my favorite class at Harvard, Comedy and the Novel, where we read several novels I still love, including my all-time favorite, Mikhail Bulgakov’s The Master and Margarita. Prof. Fanger died this July at age 94.
  • France is prosecuting seven people involved in spreading the lies that led to the beheading of a French teacher who had shown an example of the cartoons from Charlie Hebdo that Islamist terrorists cited as their reason for murdering 12 people at the magazine’s offices in 2015. The actual killer was shot dead by police shortly after he murdered the teacher, Samuel Paty; this trial is about the online “hate campaign” that took place before the attack.
  • Trump’s Truth Social platform outsourced coding jobs to Mexico even as he threatened companies with retaliation for sending jobs outside of the U.S. American Second to Profits.
  • Elon Musk’s false or misleading claims about the election, including those about the major candidates, were viewed over 2 billion times, according to an analysis by CNN. I’m sure that had no effect on anyone’s voting choices, though.
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→ July 13, 2024
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Stick to baseball, 7/13/24.

I posted a third projection for Sunday’s first round of the MLB draft, and updated my Big Board of the top 100 prospects in the draft class, both for subscribers to the Athletic. I also took your questions here in a Klawchat on Thursday. On Saturday, I’ll have a new post with smaller scouting reports on about 20-25 more players in the draft class, guys whose names you might hear Sunday or Monday but who didn’t make the cut for the top 100.

At Paste, I reviewed Neotopia, a perfectly cromulent filler game for family play that didn’t bring anything new to the tabletop. I do like the way the scoring forces players to think about balance throughout the game, though.

And now, the links…

  • Longreads first: Gateway Church founder Robert Morris blamed his 12-year-old victim for the sexual abuse he inflicted on her. And so did Morris’s wife, according to the victim, Cindy Clemishere, who courageously came forward a month ago with the story, leading to Morris’s abdication and the resignations of four other Church leaders. No drag queens, no trans people, just a pastor and the leaders of a giant, tax-exempt religious organization.
  • Also in Texas – what a great government they have down there! – the state has spent years siphoning public funds to so-called “pregnancy crisis centers,” usually religious groups that try to convince pregnant women not to have abortions, but there’s no evidence it has had any effect at all, aside from violating the principle of separation of church and state.
  • Vaccine denialist and antisemite Robert F. Kennedy Jr. helped spawn a measles outbreak in Samoa that killed several children. He’s denying that, too.
  • It doesn’t matter what Trump says or does, though. His supporters don’t waver. If they think an action is bad, and Trump does it, they change their opinion of the action. If that’s not cultlike behavior, well, I don’t have a better word for it – and the media needs to cover his campaign accordingly.
  • Meanwhile, Arizona’s public schools chief is trying to push the right-wing PragerU materials into classrooms, promoting the misinformation group’s content on the department website, by claiming that teachers have only been presenting the “extreme left side” in classrooms. I’m very glad I didn’t raise my daughter there.
  • Voters in Jackson County, Missouri, resoundingly rejected a sales tax hike to use taxpayer funds for stadium projects for the privately-owned Chiefs and Royals just three months ago, so, of course, the owners are just going to try to put it up for another vote and threaten to move the teams out of state.
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→ June 1, 2024
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Stick to baseball, 6/1/24.

Nothing new this week at the Athletic, but I have a top 50 pro prospect rankings update slated for Monday the 3rd.

Over at Paste, I reviewed the roll-and-write game French Quarter, from the designers of Three Sisters and Fleet: the Dice Game. I think it’s fantastic, although it’s harder than any of their previous games to play well.

I’ll be back on Stadium on Monday at 2 pm ET for Diamond Dreams and somewhere in the 2:30 pm show Unpacked for one more segment. We’ll discuss some of my new rankings on the first show and have an interview with Colt Emerson lined up.

A million bonus points if you know what today is, by the way. I’ll accept two answers, although one is more obvious than the other.

And now, the links…

  • Longreads first: You’ve probably seen this Guardian longread on the so-called “pro-natalist” family who, among other things, think nothing of physically abusing their children in the name of “discipline.” My issue with the piece is this: The parents claim that their parenting is “evidence-based,” yet they then do many things, including smacking their children, that are unequivocally contrary to all available evidence – and the piece’s author does not push back in any way. That is your job as a journalist.
  • WIRED has the story of Jane Willenbring, the victim of sexual harassment by disgraced Professor David Marchant while they worked in Antarctica, whose willingness to come forward led to Marchant’s firing and the renaming of the glacier that once bore his name.
  • A nurse at NYU’s Langone Health hospital mentioned the genocide in Gaza during her speech accepting an award for her compassion in caring for mothers who’d lost their babies. The hospital fired her. They’ve said she was warned before “not to bring her views on this divisive and charged issue into the workplace.” The hospital took its name from Republican billionaire donor Kenneth Langone, who has previously compared critics of rising income inequality to Nazis.
  • UC-Irvine law professor David Kaye writes in the New York Times that we should allow the International Criminal Court to do its job after the Court announced charges against the leaders of Hamas and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu. The U.S. has remained outside of the ICC for twenty years, even though we could do the most good by accepting its tenets and supporting its efforts to pursue war-crimes charges – as we have asked the ICC to do against Vladimir Putin.
  • Even before Friday’s verdict, Greg Sargent noted that Trump’s anti-media rhetoric had turned more dangerous with the convicted felon’s apparent endorsement of a rant about how he’ll “get rid of all you fucking liberals.”
  • The Washington Post sat on the story of Samuel Alito hanging pro-insurrection and pro-nationalist flags at his house for several years. The New York Times has been reporting on the story now, including this very measured piece on what seems to have happened, including disputes over the order of some of the events in the neighborhood dispute.
  • A passenger on a United flight into Fresno this week has tested positive for measles. This should be a criminal offense – they put many, many other people at risk through their actions, like driving drunk.
  • Michael Hiltzik writes in the LA Times that now Democrats are just as bad at Republicans in putting political concerns over science, as Rep. Raul Ruiz (D-CA) continues his sham hearings promoting the debunked lab-leak hypothesis.
  • Pope Francis apologized for using the Italian equivalent of the f-slur and saying there was too much of that in the priesthood when arguing against allowing celibate gay men to take orders. I think there’s too much emphasis here on the word choice and nowhere near enough on pretty much everything that lies behind it.
  • Luthier is the latest complex game from Paverson Games, publisher of last year’s excellent heavy game Distilled. There’s a full site up for the game but the crowdfunding link isn’t open yet. I saw Luthier at PAX Unplugged; it’s gorgeous and huge, but my guess is it’s too long a game for my personal tastes and attention span.
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→ December 9, 2023
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Stick to baseball, 12/9/23.

Five new pieces for subscribers to the Athletic this week, breaking down the Jarred Kelenic trade, the Alex Verdugo trade, the Juan Soto trade, the Eduardo Rodríguez/Jeimer Candelario/Craig Kimbrel signings, and the Tyler O’Neill trade.

At Paste, I recapped everything I played at this year’s PAX Unplugged board game convention here in Philly. My time there was a little shorter than normal for various reasons, but I still sneaked in a whole bunch of great new games. I also got Apiary to the table here last night.

My free email newsletter has moved over to Substack. If you got an issue from me on Monday, then you’re all set. Mailchimp is sunsetting their free Tinyletter product, so I had to move it to a different site.

And now, the links…

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→ November 18, 2023
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Stick to baseball, 11/18/23.

I offered my opinions of the Aaron Bummer and Cal Quantrill trades for subscribers to the Athletic. That Jake Bauers trade really didn’t move the needle, but I’ll probably include a thought or two on the Vidal Bruján trade when we get another one so I can include it in a longer column.

On my podcast this week, I spoke with film critic Matt Singer about his new book Opposable Thumbs: How Siskel & Ebert Changed Movies Forever. You can listen and subscribe via iTunes, Spotify, amazon, or wherever you get your podcasts.

I appeared on Seattle’s 710 AM to discuss the Mariners’ possible offseason moves and the challenge of competing in the AL West in 2024.

My free email newsletter has returned, as I sent out a fresh edition last night, my second one this month.

And now, the links…

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→ September 23, 2023
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Stick to baseball, 9/23/23.

For subscribers to The Athletic, I posted my annual Minor League Player of the Year column this week, as well as my last regular-season scouting notebook of 2023, covering prospects I saw from the Red Sox, Orioles, and Nationals. I’ll head to Arizona in October for Fall League coverage, of course. My podcast will be back next week and I’ve already filed my next review for Paste.

And now, the links…

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