Read This Book!

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I just finished my favorite book in a long time, Max Barry's Company. It is a blistering satire of the corporate world. With its acute observations and round-about wordplay and logic, its Office Space meets Catch-22. It's only $15 at Amazon. The donut sub-plot is worth this price alone.

Some Daily411 contributors and readers may remember playing an internet game NationStates few years ago. That game was based on Barry's last book, Jennifer Government, which I now must read.

Snakes on a Plane: The Airline Policies

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Here are some pretty funny crank calls made by nootropic to various airlines regarding their policies for snakes on their planes.

Southwest Airlines
American Airlines
Continental Airlines
Continental Airlines 2
Jet Blue

In retrospect, this sort of gag was inevitable. What stuns me is that none of the operators here seemed to get the joke. Jet Blue is my favorite.

PREVIOUS SNAKES ON A PLANE POSTS:
08/24/05 - Ssssssssssssss.....
10/04/05 - Snakes on a Plane UPDATE
11/08/05 - Snakes on a Plane UPDATE 2
11/24/05 - Snakes on a Plane UPDATE 3
11/30/05 - Snakes on a Plane: The Dialogues
03/17/06 - Snakes on a Plane: The Teaser
03/23/06 - Snakes on a Plane: The Artwork

Re-evaluating the Mets' offseason

Sporting Goods

In the last week, the Mets announced that the fifth spot in their starting rotation is going to go to a rookie, Brian Bannister, with no major league experience and only six games in AAA. In typical Mets fashion, this was a short-sighted decision that highlights the biggest mistakes of the Mets offseason.

At the start of spring training, the spot was assumed to be Aaron Heilman's. Heilman was given a locker next to the four incumbent starting pitchers. Heilman was so dominant as a reliever and effective in 4 out of 6 starts before being moved to the bullpen last year that it was only logical that the Mets would try to get more innings out of him this year as a starter. Both Bannister and Heilman pitched equally well this spring, but Heilman is being sent to the bullpen.

On its face, the reason given is a sensible one given some assumptions. According to the Mets logic, Bannister and Heilman are similar as starting pitchers (an assumption), but they know that Heilman is a dominant reliever. Moving Heilman to the bullpen thus greatly strengthens the pen while not significantly affecting the rotation. The only way this works is if Bannister is an effective starter. Presumably, if he stinks in his first few starts, Heilman can be moved into the rotation without too much problem. (I imagine his arm won't be too distressed by the change if it happens in the next month -- another assumption.)

But the biggest assumption, and one ignored by the decision, is that no current starter will miss time this season. What happens if one of the Mets starters goes down to injury? There is no option in the minor leagues that can step in and pitch in. Right now, the Mets are trying out Jose Lima, who could not have been worse this spring. And if it happens in more than a month, it will likely be difficult to move Heilman out of the pen (an assumption). So the biggest question is, what is the likelihood that a Mets' starter will get hurt, or will need another starter? Let's look at the starters:

Pedro - He's got a bad toe that kept him out of much of spring training and a partially torn labrum. Let's assume he'll miss a couple of starts.

Tom Glavine - He's 40 but he's never really been hurt. Let's assume he'll be fine.

Steve Trachsel - 35 year old pitcher who missed most of last season after having back surgery. Enough said.

Victor Zambrano - average 165 innings in the last three years. Doesn't bode well.

Brian Bannister - rookie.

Now how would Bannister in AAA help this? He would be the first guy up in case of injury. He would gain more experience in AAA. He would be insurance.

Now, I hear you saying already, insurance is nice and all, but if the bullpen stinks, you aren't going to win games anyway, so what is the point. Fair enough. That assumes that the bullpen stinks without Heilman. What does the Mets bullpen without Heilman look like? Billy Wagner, Duaner Sanchez, Jorge Julio, Chad Bradford, Heath Bell, Yusaku Iriki, and Royce Ring as Heilman's replacement. Good/bad? I don't know. But I do know that the Mets brass must not have that much confidence in this bunch if they are willing to preemptively cash in their rotation insurance plan.

You'll notice two bold names: Sanchez and Julio. The Mets traded started Jae Seo for Sanchez and starter Kris Benson (and his soon to be ex-wife, thanks Sergio) for Julio. The Mets made these trades to accomplish two goals: (1) to open a spot up for Aaron Heilman in the rotation, and (2) to solidify the bullpen. Given that Heilman now has to be in the bullpen to solidify it (obviously taking him out of the rotation), it is apparent that these trades failed to accomplish their goals. At the end of spring training, they now have an untested rookie in the starting rotation and so little faith in either Sanchez or Julio (from all accounts, they don't trust Julio) that they had to move a starter to the pen.

Moreover, the cover their asses argument given by the Mets that Heilman is so dominant in the pen that it just makes sense to have him there is ridiculous on its face. Pedro would be dominant in the pen too but since he can start effectively, he is more valuable there. The goal is to get your best pitchers to pitch as many innings as they can, so long as they remain effective. I'd rather have 200 innings of Heilman the starter than 80 of Heilman as a reliever because I think Heilman will be a great starter. Maybe I'm wrong and he turns out to be mediocre. What would happen then? Well, then you move him to the bullpen where he is a dominant force. Bullpen guys only become bullpen guys when they prove than can't be effective starters, e.g. Mariano Rivera, (or in Mets history) Jason Isringhausen. Heilman was never given a chance because the Mets blew a couple of trades. Unbelievable. Heilman gets screwed to cover up the front office's mistakes.

Look, I hope that Bannister is lights out this year. I love seeing young guys perform well. And, now I hope that Heilman is in the pen all year. If these things happen, the Mets will be in contention for the playoffs. And nobody will even look to Minaya to explain. But if these things don't happen, something bad happened. And the Mets have no plan B. Maybe I look like the biggest pessimist with this post. But I like to have a backup plan. I still think the Mets can be great this year. I'm still really excited. But I'm more nervous than I should be or needed to be.

Can we get her husband back now?

SPORTING GOODS

From Metsblog, Anna Benson has filed for divorce from her husband (and one time Met) Kris Benson. She has stated that the marriage is "irretrievably broken."

As you may remember, Chill reported a few months ago that it is believed the Mets traded her husband because of her many antics. If that is true, and many people think it is, this is really a kick in the shins to Met fans.

Good God is this woman a pain in the ass.

The Wizard

SPORTING GOODS

I owe my own baseball numbers obsession to two people: Rob Neyer and Bill James. So you could say I owe it all to James, since Neyer is his protege. And I'm certainly not the only one.

Anyway, there's an interesting article about James, his work life, and his relationship with the Red Sox, in today's Globe. It's worth a read if you're interested in James or the Sox.

And I'm going to go out and pretend that "great minds think alike," and assume that Bill James was talking about John Flaherty here.

Do they make moves you don't recommend? ''Yes, sometimes I'm filing a minority report," such as this spring, when James argued vociferously against one player and the Sox invited him to spring training nonetheless.

He's made a huge mistake

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Sorry all you Arrested Development fans, it looks like the series is dead. Creator Mitch Hurwitz has decided he will not be back to run the show if it is picked up by Showtime. Since he was the driving force behind the genius that was AD, it is highly doubtful Showtime is going to pay for it now.

Bow your heads in silent rememberance of one of the greatest shows in TV history.

What did I miss?

WHATEVER

Looks like the most exciting thing I missed while on my honeymoon was the SoaP excitement. UConn goes out with a whimper in the Big East tourney before scaring its fans in three straight rounds of the NCAAs and finally losing in a thriller. Sox pick up Wily Mo Pena and Hee Seop Choi, which I think are good moves. USA Baseball can't get into the semi-finals, at home.

I went 10 days with no phone, no TV, no internet and no newspapers, before having limited access last week. Having no sports was essentially cancelled out by having no George W Bush. I highly recommend it.

And I highly recommend Costa Rica as a destination.

NCAA

Sporting Goods

Anybody else notice that there are a lot of empty seats for these Men's NCAA games? Is this normal? I don't remember this from any previous years. I'll update if I find a story confirming lower attendence this year.

Update: I'm an idiot. The reason for the poor crowds has to due with the time the games start in their local area. Forgive me, I'm a little slow on Friday nights.

Snakes on a Plane: The Reshoots

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Today has been a wealth of new information about Snakes on a Plane. First the official artwork was revealed, now news of a reshoot. Today's Hollywood Reporter has a lengthy article about the background of the whole historic project as well as the skinny on recent reshoots that were in part a response to the overwhelming interest the movie has generated on the Internets. (I like to think I am part of this. After all, I do own a shirt.) Here's a Good Parts version of the story:

As film backstories go, this one is fairly serpentine. This month, New Line Cinema's Snakes on a Plane, which wrapped principal photography in September in Vancouver, went back before the cameras for five days of additional shooting at the Lot in Los Angeles...

...once production began, a funny thing happened. Movie fans...seized upon the title and started spontaneously creating fan sites, blogs, T-shirts, poems, fiction and songs. The title itself, sometimes abbreviated as SoaP, has emerged as Internet-speak for fatalistic sentiments that range from c'est la vie to "shit happens..."

In any event, Snakes-ophiles already were hard at work. Chris Rohan of Bethesda, Md., created an elaborate, R-rated audio trailer that lovingly mocks the title and movie. "It's a genius title," Rohan said. "It's so stupid it's great. It invites satire, but it's something you just love. It's something I can't explain. You either get it or you don't."

The audio bit uses a (Samuel L.) Jackson sound-alike shouting, "I want these motherf**king snakes off the motherf**king plane!" Soon, the growing legion of fans added their voices as they demanded that that phrase also appear in the movie.

Apparently, the studio got the hint. When (director David R.) Ellis assembled Jackson and others for the recent shoot, the filmmakers added more gore, more death, more nudity, more snakes and more death scenes. And they shot a scene where Jackson does utter the line that fans have demanded...the filmmakers do concede that the Jackson line will be in the movie for the sake of the fans.

Unfortunately I can't for the life of me find the "audio trailer" mentioned in the story. Neverthless, I've never heard of a studio shooting new footage based on fan suggestions. People are going to be cheering when Jackson utters his soon to be immortal line.

I know because I'll be one of them.

UPDATE (6:17 pm): The great Jeffrey Wells chimes and links to a great accoustic riff on the whole SoaP phenomenon. He also did a little digging and provides a priceless bit of info:

A New Line source told me this morning that they've added, for one example, a shot of "a guy being bitten by a snake on his Johnson." How does that happen exactly? He's taking a leak or...? "Mile-High Club," he answered.

He also reports there is a heavy debate about whether to move up SoaP's August release to the heart of the summer like June or July.

"(T)his is not a DVD thing," he writes. "Everyone is going to have to go to a theatre with their friends and bark like seals at the jokes and the shrieks and fangs-sinking-into-penis moments." And you, Daily411 readers, were hip to this from the beginning.

UPDATE (March 26):Here's a link to the aforementioned "audio trailer."

PREVIOUS SNAKES ON A PLANE POSTS:
08/24/05 - Ssssssssssssss.....
10/04/05 - Snakes on a Plane UPDATE
11/08/05 - Snakes on a Plane UPDATE 2
11/24/05 - Snakes on a Plane UPDATE 3
11/30/05 - Snakes on a Plane: The Dialogues
03/17/06 - Snakes on a Plane: The Teaser
03/23/06 - Snakes on a Plane: The Artwork

Naked Came the Vintner

INSERT JOKE HERE

Porn star Savannah Samson has produced a wine that has received a 90 to 91 rating (out of 100) from America's top wine critic. Here's a picture of the label.

Snakes on a Plane: The Artwork

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In an effort to keep everyone up to date on all things SoaP, here is the official art. New Line reveals "the inspiration initially came from the Internet after [fans] did their own art." Keep it up SoaPers!

PREVIOUS SNAKES ON A PLANE POSTS:
08/24/05 - Ssssssssssssss.....
10/04/05 - Snakes on a Plane UPDATE
11/08/05 - Snakes on a Plane UPDATE 2
11/24/05 - Snakes on a Plane UPDATE 3
11/30/05 - Snakes on a Plane: The Dialogues
03/17/06 - Snakes on a Plane: The Teaser

Save Our Bluths!

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Good news for Arrested Development fans from Defamer. According to Jason Bateman:

Showtime has picked up the show for 2 years at 12 episodes a year (maybe it was 13) with a third year option...The ball is in (creator) Mitch (Hurwitz)'s court and Jason said Mitch will be making that decision within the next 24-48 hours...

Does that mean we can all get in line for some more frozen bananas?

I didn't do it.

Manifesto

From the New York Times story about Karl Rove and Andy Card:

By most accounts inside and outside the administration, Mr. Rove is relentlessly cheerful, presenting himself as an optimistic face in a gloomy White House. One person who met Mr. Rove said he attributed Mr. Bush's problems more to external events, in particular Hurricane Katrina and Iraq, than to anything the White House did wrong.

Does anybody else find the second sentence to be the most depressing thing they have ever read? Katrina and Iraq are "external events" and not "anything the White House did wrong?" I don't know if I'm more depressed about the arrogance of the view expressed by the unnamed White House source (although unsurprising) or that fact that the New York Times has no problem reciting the characterization that Katrina and Iraq are simply "external events" that were imposed on the White House. In simple terms, so we don't have to keep repeating ourselves, nobody is upset about Katrina happened but people are actually upset about the piss-poor response that allowed people to die as a result of the storm, among a myriad other tragedies. As for Iraq, people are rightly pissed about both its occurrence in the first place and the incompetence with which the entire operation has been run. The fact that the White House is framing these as "external events" should give Democrats more spine to run on these issues. But perhaps is it hard to get more of something that you don't have in the first place, with rare exceptions. Anybody else of the view that the Democratic party needs a serious bloodletting? Getting rid of Lieberman would be a good start.

But Does It Come in HD?

WHATEVER

There was an interesting article at CNN.com today about rumors that Apple is about to discontinue the 60Gb video iPod. Why is this interesting? Because another rumor says they are going to be replacing it with a "wide-screen video iPod with Bluetooth headphones." According to Think Secret, "Apple's forthcoming "true" video iPod will feature a 4-inch display with a quarter-inch border." And here's the coolest part. "It features a digital click wheel, one that overlays the touch-sensitive display and appears when a finger touches it and disappears when the finger is removed."

Obviously, Apple is looking to do for video content what it did for digital music. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like CEO Steve Jobs is having any luck making a deal with movie studios that mirrors the so-simple-it's-genius $.99 a song/$9.99 an album plan he cut with the recording industry that literally changed the way people listen to music.

Expect an announcement around April 1, Apple's 30th anniversary as a company.

Snakes on a Plane: The Teaser

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There must have been something in the air today. I woke up on this lovely Friday morning and went I went to pick a shirt to wear, something told me to bust out my gold ol' Snakes on a Plane T-shirt. Not 30 minutes later do I receive an email that would change the course of my day forever.

It was from a friend of mine who is married to "Mike," whom you may remember as my sparring partner in the SoaP Dialogues. The subject line was intriguing. "Mike wanted me to send you this" was all it said. In the body of the message was a URL. Nothing has been the same today since I clicked it.

The official Snakes on a Plane teaser is finally here and it whets the appetite perfectly. There is no set up, no explanation about how or why the snakes are on the plane, just pure snake-driven mayhem. The immortal Sam Jackson opens with "Enough is enough. I've HAD it with these snakes!" as he cocks his pistol and commences to kill some motherf**king snakes. My favorite shot is the one of a snake entering the cockpit with a look on its face like it wants to fly the plane. Just the right amount of malice and humor. Well done, people at New Line. Bene.

Thank you "Mike;" you've literally made my day.

UPDATE: I've posted a new link to view the teaser. You must have Flash 8 installed to view. It is worth the trouble, believe me.

PREVIOUS SNAKES ON A PLANE POSTS:
08/24/05 - Ssssssssssssss.....
10/04/05 - Snakes on a Plane UPDATE
11/08/05 - Snakes on a Plane UPDATE 2
11/24/05 - Snakes on a Plane UPDATE 3
11/30/05 - Snakes on a Plane: The Dialogues

President Bush

Manifesto

Via Josh Marshall this video clip has to be one of the funnier things I've seen in a while. Don't forget to read the clip title.

So That Explains It ...

Here's your gold watch, now hit the road!

SPORTING GOODS

So maybe nobody cares in the wake of the Barry Bonds bombshell (brought to my attention by Sergio), and with the World Baseball Classic kicking off in the US today.

But the Mets and Red Sox have had two events hit the transaction wire that should be greeted with joy by fans, even though the teams themselves may have not really done anything to make these events happen.

1. Bret Boone retired
2. John Flaherty retired

The retirement of each player means the same for each team. It means that rather than waste at-bats and innings in spring training on players who are no better than anyone either team has in the high minors, the Mets and Red Sox will be able to evaluate the younger guys fairly and give them valuable experience. Perhaps more importantly, neither player will be occupying a roster spot on opening day for no good reason.

Perhaps Bret Boone had more potential to bounce back, considering he was a star just a few years ago, but it was looking unlikely. See Sergio's previous post about Barry Bonds for the most likely explanation, though I am not one to throw out accusations.

Flaherty was just old, but I have another theory after reading that he gave no explanation for his retirement. I just think that he realized that it would be no fun to be Tim Wakefield's personal catcher. Let some younger guy with fresher legs chase those floaters all over the park, while Varitek gets the cushy job of catching Schilling and Beckett.

John Flaherty had a nice career, with his most memorable moment being the game-winning hit in the wild affair at Yankee Stadium that led to Nomar being booted out of Boston - the same game where Jeter did his famous dive into the stands. My favorite memory of him will be the weekly feature in a free NY sports paper that is no longer published, in which they would do a side-by-side comparison of John Flaherty and various pubs named Flaherty's, to see who had a better week. He held his own in those contests.

PS - forgot to mention, thanks to reader O for the heads up on Flaherty

EXCLUSIVE! Barry Bonds Did Steroids!

SPORTING GOODS

Okay, so this isn't news to any sports fan that hasn't been living on Mars for the last few years. But this book with this much detail is going to be all we talk about for the next few weeks.

WBC? What WBC?

This is no joke. These guys have documentaion on everything.

A sad day.

R.I.P. Kirby Puckett. I loved watching you play baseball.

That may sound trite but Kirby made an indelible mark on my young life.

Oscar History (Revised)

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2006 is going to go down as one of the great misfires in Oscar history. Crash beating out Brokeback Mountain for Best Picture is going to be a black eye, will be a black eye, on Hollywood for the next 20 years. This is a shame. This is a tragedy. This is Florida in 2000 corrupt.

Sure, Oscar has made some major goofs in the past. Dances with Wolves over GoodFellas in 1991. Rocky over Taxi Driver, All the President's Men and Network in 1977. Shakespeare in Love beating Saving Private Ryan in 1999. But this is much, much worse. Brokeback Mountain dominated the movies this year. It won the most awards, it entered "brokeback" into the lexicon, and gave late-night talk show hosts more material than anything since Dan Quayle was in office. It was the movie everyone was talking about, period. And it was great. It was transcendent. It was everything a Best Picture winner is supposed to be. Crash was none of these things. It was a well-done story with major holes in logic. It was a movie than prompted conversation but changed no one's mind. It simply was not as good. I hate to be dogging it like this because I liked it but it is nowhere near the level of Brokeback.

And we all know why Brokeback lost. There have been whisperings of it for weeks. Jeffrey Wells had been calling it the "Tony Curtis Factor." Older Academy voters, particularly men, were rejecting Brokeback because of fear. Because of homophobia. And nothing makes homophobes more uncomfortable than the idea of two men getting it on. For all the crap Hollywood gets about being "out of touch" or "in a bubble," they showed they can be as intolerant as any neo-con. And they've made history doing it. Shame on them.

I'm not the only one upset:

Kenneth Turan, L.A. Times: "...you could not take the pulse of the industry without realizing that this film made a number of people distinctly uncomfortable. ... In the privacy of the voting booth, as many political candidates who've led in polls only to lose elections have found out, people are free to act out the unspoken fears and unconscious prejudices that they would never breathe to another soul, or, likely, acknowledge to themselves. And at least this year, that acting out doomed Brokeback Mountain...(Hollywood) likes to pat itself on the back for the good it does in the world, but as Sunday night's ceremony proved, it is easier to congratulate yourself for a job well done in the past than to actually do that job in the present."

Wesley Morris, Boston Globe:"The memo from Hollywood seems clear enough. Better to reward the movie about people who clean our closets than the one about the men who live in them."

Tom Shales, Washington Post: "Film buffs and the politically minded...will be arguing this morning about whether the Best Picture Oscar to "Crash" was really for the film's merit or just a cop-out by the Motion Picture Academy so it wouldn't have to give the prize to "Brokeback Mountain."

Jack Matthews, New York Daily News: "...enough Academy voters found the gay subject matter of "Brokeback Mountain" too uncomfortable to sit through, meaning they abandoned their professional responsibility and didn't watch all five nominated films."

Jeffrey Wells, hollywood-elsewhere.com: "Most of the pundits are going to try to sidestep or soft-pedal what happened, and if you're looking for that kind of thing you know where to find it. This wasn't a replay of Shakespeare in Love beating out Saving Private Ryan. It was worse...a whole lot worse. Crash is a good film -- an emotional, well-tooled, sometimes profound look at several racist and heavily bruised Los Angelenos who somehow manage to listen now and then to the better angels of their nature. They do this infrequently and haphazardly, but just enough at the end of the day (and the film) to earn our compassion. Nice movie message -- now welcome to real life. The fact is that last night a lot of good-hearted people, bottom line, were essentially cheering the fact that a bunch of retro-graders and hang-backers in the Motion Picture Academy voted for Crash for the wrong reasons...The very thing that Crash laments -- prejudice against people of different stripes and persuasions -- is what tipped the vote and delivered the Big Prize."

Echoing Wells, the most important thing to point out here is this is not the same as the Academy voting for a sentimental favorite like Rocky or Shakespeare in Love. It is the fact that they voted for Crash because too many of them were too uncomfortable to watch Brokeback Mountain at all. Not to get too crazy, but we witnessed something like a hate crime last night. It's only a matter of time before Paul Haggis and the other very talented people behind Crash are forced to confront the fact that they won a tainted election. Their "victory" will be forever tarnished. It's a shame that these good people are going to be in the crossfire of this particular Culture War.

The Best of the Best

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Of the 77 Best Picture winners, I’ve seen 43. (Not bad, could be better.) Here is my ranking of the ten best Best Picture winners. Incredibly, six are from the 1970s. What an amazing decade that was for filmmaking.

Note: All years denote the film's release. They all won Oscars in the following year's ceremony.

1. The Godfather (1972)
My favorite movie ever made and easily the best of the Best. The touchstone film in my movie-watching life. Getting up the courage to shake Coppola's hand a couple of years ago was one of the most nerve-wracking experiences of my life.

2. The Godfather, Part II (1974)
It is inconceivable to think of one without the other. Many think it is better than its predecessor, but I have to rate it a close second. You simply can’t overestimate Brando’s presence.

3. Casablanca (1943)
One of the most entertaining movies ever made. One of the few “classics” that still completely holds up today.

4. On the Waterfront (1954)
Brando's greatest performance in one of the best-acted films ever. His "contender" speech is probably the best monologue ever given.

5. The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
The greatest thriller with the greatest villain in movie history.

6. The French Connection (1971)
All cop movies made since have owed a debt to Friedkin’s gritty masterpiece.

7. Annie Hall (1977)
One of the few comedies to win Best Picture and still one of the funniest movies ever.

8. The Deer Hunter (1978)
One of the most devastating films ever. Emotionally shattering.

9. Schindler's List (1993)
No one thought Speilberg had it in him.

10. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975)
Classic Jack in a classic role.

Other True Greats: Unforgiven (1992), Platoon (1986), The Sting (1973), Patton (1970), Midnight Cowboy (1969), Lawrence of Arabia (1962), The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), Hamlet (1948)

I'm sorry there wasn’t more room on the bus for these. If there were an extra seat, it would have to go to The Sting. Redford and Newman remain the greatest duo ever.