{"id":11104,"date":"2026-01-17T08:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-01-17T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/?p=11104"},"modified":"2026-01-16T20:49:19","modified_gmt":"2026-01-17T01:49:19","slug":"stick-to-baseball-1-17-21","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/2026\/01\/17\/stick-to-baseball-1-17-21\/","title":{"rendered":"Stick to baseball, 1\/17\/21."},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>For subscribers to the Athletic, I had three pieces this week, on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/athletic\/6960882\/2026\/01\/11\/alex-bregman-cubs-red-sox-bo-bichette\/\">the Cubs\u2019 signing of Alex Bregman<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/athletic\/6968614\/2026\/01\/13\/ryan-weathers-yankees-marlins-trade-analysis\/\">the Yankees\u2019 trade for Ryan Weathers<\/a>, and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/athletic\/6976044\/2026\/01\/15\/rays-reds-angels-trade-analysis-gavin-lux-josh-lowe\/\">the three-team trade between the Rays, Reds, and Angels<\/a>. I am primarily working on the prospect rankings, which are scheduled to start running on January 26<sup>th<\/sup>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>For the AV Club, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.avclub.com\/iliad-board-game-review\">I reviewed Iliad<\/a>, a fantastic new two-player game from Reiner Knizia that made my top ten for 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I am about to hit send on the next edition of <a href=\"https:\/\/keithlaw.kit.com\/\">my free email newsletter<\/a>. It was almost done, then I set it aside for a moment, which turned into five days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I have many links this week to pieces in the <em>New York Times<\/em>, which I often do because I assume many of you have access to those with your Athletic subscriptions (if you have the bundle). I believe the <em>Times<\/em> in general produces some of the best journalism in the country. I do not endorse all of the views printed in the paper; I just work there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And now, the links\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Longreads first: The outgoing governor of Virginia, Glenn Youngkin (R), and the board that oversees the University of Virginia appear to have rushed through the appointment of a new President, even though that candidate, Scott Beardsley, <a href=\"https:\/\/augustafreepress.com\/news\/vanishing-act-how-uvas-presidential-search-missed-what-took-us-an-hour-to-find\/\">appears to have fabricated or embellished large parts of his resume<\/a>, according to the Augusta Free Press. After that ran, over 200 faculty members signed <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cavalierdaily.com\/article\/2026\/01\/a-statement-from-201-concerned-faculty-about-uva-president-beardsleys-appointment#google_vignette\">a letter to the board<\/a> saying that the appointment should not stand.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The so-called \u201cpeace\u201d deal between Israel and Gaza is a fiction, as <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/interactive\/2026\/01\/12\/world\/middleeast\/israel-cease-fire-gaza-demolition.html\">Israel continues to demolish Gaza one building at a time<\/a>, according to a <em>New York Times<\/em> investigative report.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The <em>Times<\/em> also <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/12\/30\/business\/npr-katherine-maher.html\">profiled NPR CEO Katherine Maher<\/a>, who has chosen to fight back against Republicans\u2019 attacks on the public-radio institution and even taken the Trump Administration to court, although some other public-radio figures disagree with her tactics.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><em>America<\/em>, a magazine published by the Jesuits, published a scathing piece on the attempts by the Administration and its toadies <a href=\"https:\/\/www.americamagazine.org\/short-take\/2026\/01\/09\/baptizing-the-lie-about-ice-and-the-killing-of-renee-nicole-good\/\">to demonize murder victim Renee Nicole Good<\/a>, just as the Reagan Administration did with the four nuns raped and killed by the right-wing government of El Salvador in 1980.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The <em>Texas Observer<\/em> exposed <a href=\"https:\/\/www.texasobserver.org\/revealed-four-businesses-patriot-front-north-texas\/\">four businesses operating in North Texas with ties to the neo-Nazi Patriot Front<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/us-news\/2026\/jan\/13\/upenn-trump-jews-list\">The Trump Administration demanded that UPenn send them detailed personal information on all Jewish professors, students, and staff members<\/a>. If this doesn\u2019t make you think of Nazi Germany, I really can\u2019t help you.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The suspect in the arson attack against a Mississippi synagogue told the judge at his arraignment that \u201cJesus Christ is Lord\u201d and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mississippifreepress.org\/suspect-in-beth-israel-burning-called-it-a-synagogue-of-satan\/\">said to investigators that the building was \u201ca synagogue of Satan.\u201d<\/a> So who radicalized him? Can we deport him to Vatican City?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Those \u201calt\u201d government accounts on social media that popped up during Trump\u2019s first term always looked like grifters, not actual government employees trying to leak information. The Alt National Park Service one <a href=\"https:\/\/substack.com\/home\/post\/p-161500621\">is the worst of the lot<\/a>, and certainly not authentic in any sense of the word.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>A new documentary looks at Jeff Smith, the Frugal Gourmet, a celebrity chef from the days prior to social media <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/01\/12\/dining\/jeff-smith-frugal-gourmet-documentary.html\">who turned out to be a serial sexual predator<\/a> who likely assaulted dozens of young boys.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The notoriously left-wing <em>Wall Street Journal<\/em> exposes <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wsj.com\/health\/rfk-jr-supplements-industry-maha-ac8cc684\">how RFK Jr. is cozying up to supplement makers<\/a>, who peddle unproven and sometimes dangerous remedies that aren\u2019t subject to the same safety and efficacy requirements as prescription medicines.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>A white nationalist who praised the Nazis\u2019 use of concentration camps <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rawstory.com\/california-redistricting-2674875476\/\">has flipped from Republican to Democrat to try to capture a Congressional seat in California<\/a>. Kyle Langford posted a picture of himself last year at Auschwitz and called it his \u201c0% unemployment plan.\u201d<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>I came across this March 2025 story from the <em>Times<\/em> about <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/03\/22\/arts\/music\/mayhem-norwegian-black-metal-anniversary.html\">the Norwegian black metal band Mayhem<\/a>, as I saw they have a new album, <em>Liturgy of Death<\/em>, coming out in February. The article is a heck of a read, and treats the band \u2013 who have released just seven albums over 35 years due to suicide, murder, controversies (to put it mildly), breakups \u2013 as a sort of counterculture icon. It doesn\u2019t mention that at least one of the current members, longtime drummer Hellhammer has voiced indisputably racist and homophobic views, which I find very hard to understand given that it\u2019s hardly a secret.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>For subscribers to the Athletic, I had three pieces this week, on the Cubs\u2019 signing of Alex Bregman, the Yankees\u2019 trade for Ryan Weathers, and the three-team trade between the Rays, Reds, and Angels. I am primarily working on the prospect rankings, which are scheduled to start running on January 26th. For the AV Club, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1049,1080,1387,1456,190,961,1059,852,1438,907,597],"class_list":["post-11104","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-anti-semitism","tag-california","tag-gaza","tag-immigration","tag-links","tag-longreads","tag-mississippi","tag-music","tag-scams","tag-social-media","tag-virginia","entry"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11104","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11104"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11104\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11105,"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11104\/revisions\/11105"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11104"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11104"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11104"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}