Year: 2011

The Dodgers Are Broke (and that news isn’t breaking).

~ Chris Cocca ~ 1 Comment

I’m looking at you, CNN.


“Dodgers File For Bankruptcy Protection” was flagged as Breaking News a few minutes ago on CNN.  Okay, so the filing technically is news, but we all knew it was coming. It’s like a train that started crashing 100 miles ago and just kept sliding down a large, slightly inclined hill until it bottomed out. We’re not exactly at bottom yet, but we’re close.

Move the Dodgers back to Brooklyn?  That would be breaking news.  And also, awesome.

I should add that Howard Megdal, the author of the linked piece, makes some great points, one of which is NOT giving the Yankees a playoffs bye for giving up rights to block a Dodger move back to the New York market.  A bye into the playoffs is worse than the Wild Card.

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The Appeal To Charm: Mike Schmidt’s Case Against Interleague Play

~ Chris Cocca ~ 3 Comments
Philadelphia: Citizens Bank Park - Mike Schmid...
Image by wallyg via Flickr

Thank you, Mike Schmidt, for taking the public stance that interleague play has run its course.  I agree. And I LOVE your appeal to charm: once upon a time, the All-Star Game and the World Series really were the only showcase for the kinds of match-ups dreams are made of.  All of the reasons you cite for ending interleague play are right on, but your public allegiance to the idea of “charming uncertainty” as one of those unique, endearing baseball intangibles is, as it were, pitch-perfect:

“Isn’t something missing from the All-Star game and World Series? Think back to when they were played in an environment of charming uncertainty because the teams and players were from different leagues. What they knew of each other came from spring training games, television and scouting.

The buzz was always which league was better, how would a particular pitcher fare against the other league. One league was known for superior speed and power, the other for pitching, finesse and defense. The World Series was like those first Super Bowls, with little firsthand information. Hitters and pitchers had to feel each other out. None of that today.”

Now, to everyone else: Michael Jack Schmidt is absolutely right about this.  While he talks mostly about the unfair, unbalanced issues that come up because of travel, scheduling, and the DH, you can tell the heart of this issue for him is precisely historic and much more about feeling.  He wants baseball’s special moments to be as special as they were to him, both as a fan and as a player.  “Charm” and “charming uncertainty” are brilliant ways to name that special something, that anticipation of the novel and the new occurring only twice a year in sport so grounded in tradition.  It’s the top-of-the-roller-coaster-for-the-first-time feeling.  It’s a first kiss kind of thing.  The All-Star Game is holding sweaty hands.  The World Series is the agonizing bliss between when you start that forever-arc between were you are at present and where you’ll be when she/he kisses back or doesn’t.

Life is a game of diminishing firsts.  The institutions we bless with our time and fandom, then, ought to be dances of renewal, full of things we haven’t seen before and may never see again.  In the best sense of the term old school, the Old School understood this.  Mike Schmidt knows what’s up.

Did The AP Swipe a Line About World B. Free from Wikipedia and Violate the CC License?

~ Chris Cocca ~ Leave a comment

Ooopsy-daisy, AP. That line about where World got his nickname maybe should have been attributed, shared, and shared alike, don’t you think? (Click on image to embiggen.)

There are only so many ways to phrase how and why World got his nickname. And who knows, maybe the AP writer is the same Wikipedia editor who updated this page on the 19th before writing the AP piece yesterday. With that said, I should also attribute the CC image in the background of the graphic below right back at you, CC. Same for you, Wiki. AP, since you don’t do the CC deal, I’ll tread the fair use water with you and Shepard Fairey.

 

What’s In A Name? Ron Artest Picks Up On World B. Free, Updates the Message.

~ Chris Cocca ~ Leave a comment

Okay. Okay okay okay.  This is awesome.

When I was six, the Point Guard Formerly Known as Lloyd Bernard Free returned to my Philadelphia 76ers.  By then, of course, Free had legally changed his first name to World (having been so nicknamed as a youngster because of ultimate vertical skills), and I was introduced to a man named World B. Free.  A man. Named World. B. Free.  Could people really do that? We’re talking circa-Rocky IV, still-afraid-of-the-Russians, Red Dawn middle ’80s. After Scooby Doo and He-Man, World B. Free was the absolute coolest thing I could imagine. It was like me telling my kindergarten teacher, “yes, my name is Christopher, but you will call me Nemesis Enforcer.”   I should have.

Today I saw a headline that said Ron Artest wants to legally change his name.  First thought? Please, please, let it be to World B. Free II.  But the truth is even better.  When the ink dries, Artest shall henceforth be known as Metta World Peace.

I absolutely love this.  I also happen to think that “World Peace” is the perfect 2010’s analog to the “Free World” concepts of the 80s.  It’s not that I think we shouldn’t want our whole world to be free, but I suppose a truly peaceful world would also be a free one.  We’ve certainly seen that war has not necessarily wrought freedom abroad or even made it more secure at home these past 10 years. Am grateful that we haven’t been attacked here for a decade?  Absolutely.  Do the erosion of civil liberties and the overt wars we’re waging worry me?  Yes, of course they do.  But it just may be that freedom will finally come through peace and sustainability and not, as we have wagered, military force.  If the President is correct in saying yesterday that we have spent a trillion dollars on war since 2001, consider the kind of economic, educational, and nutritional justice an additional one trillion dollars given to the developing word could have done for stability, peace, and public relations.  I’m just saying.

Metta World Peace, welcome to the planet, crazy diamond.

I should also say this: if your birth name is actually Lloyd B. Free, and you’re called “World” as a kid because you can jump like you’re in zero gravity and you spin-dunk like planet, you’re pretty much going to make the legal change 9 times out of 10. You owe it to yourself and to the Lloyd.

Seriously, though.  Growing up I never knew that Free was World’s own given surname.  Given the context of American history and the importance of naming conventions, that’s a birthright legacy to begin with, and a so-much-more than poignant witness to the power of endurance, hope, and freedom.  May we have these things in abundance, and every kind of peace.

How All Literary Rejection Letters Should Start

~ Chris Cocca ~ Leave a comment

This lets you know right away that the rest of the email is not about your Pushcart nomination.

After the salutation, the very first word of the first sentence should be “unfortunately.” This saves writers from having to scan the rest of the text for the word. It also means that if the writer’s e-mail service shows body text previews, the writer doesn’t even have to open the email to know they’ve been slush-piled. I still recommend reading the actual rejections just in case there are specific comments or requests for more work.

This message has been brought to you by the editors of a review somewhere in the formerly industrial Midwest. Remembering which story I sent them four months ago is pretty tough, and it looks like they forgot the title, too.

Since many of you visit this blog looking for bits and pieces about the MFA process and the nuts and bolts of trying to get pieces published, I thought I’d share the secret hierarchy of rejection letters.

1: The standard form letter like the one seen here.  Not very gratifying, but don’t take it personally.  You’re busy, they’re busy, and that’s just how it goes.

2: The form letter with your name and the title of your piece.  Pretty standard practice.  I think I get more rejections with this level of personalization than without.

3: The personalized rejection letter with a personal note telling you how much they liked your story, even though it’s not for them, and encouraging you to send them more. In the super-competitive and completely subjective literary world, this can feel almost as good as an acceptance.  When you’re at this point with a specific piece or a specific market, you know that the editors really looked hard at your piece, thought about it, and saw enough promise (or whatever they look for) to personally encourage you as a writer.  No one owes you that, so when you get it, it’s a good thing.  Follow up with a thank you.

The most important thing to remember?  We’re talking about subjective responses to art.  You will “fail” often, especially in the beginning.  The thing is persistence and, very often, revision.