Joey Votto's OPS is now .939. Just Sayin'. Joey Votto Jersey Fund!

I have never bought a player's jersey in any sport. It's time to buy Joey's. Gonna start a savings fund. $10 every time Joey is responsible for 3 or more runs (runs+RBI) in a ball game. Today's win against the Astros primes the pump with $10! 1 run, 4 RBI!

Major League Soccer Power Rankings, Matchweek 8

They Were Idle. Why Should They Lose the Top Spot?

Biggest climbers? Vancouver Whitecaps, Colorado Rapids and FC Dallas Biggest drops? Houston Dynamo and Chivas USA 1) Sporting Kansas City (East)

2) San Jose Earthquakes (West)

3) Seattle Sounders FC (West)

4) D.C. United (East)

5) New York Red Bulls (East)

6) Real Salt Lake (West)

7) Vancouver Whitecaps (West)

8) FC Dallas (West)

9) LA Galaxy (West)

10) Chicago Fire (East)

11) Colorado Rapids (West)

12) Houston Dynamo (East)

13) Philadelphia Union (East)

14) Chivas USA (West)

15) Montreal Impact (East)

16) New England Revolution (East)

17) Columbus Crew (East)

18) Portland Timbers (West)

19) Toronto FC (East)

Major League Soccer Match Winner Predictions, Matchweek 8, 4/28/12

Time to pick a few winners based on this week's Major League Soccer Power Rankings.

Just winners. Note I also take into account the Major League soccer historical advantage to home teams in making these picks:

Montreal wins at home against Portland
New York wins at home against New England
San Jose wins at Philadelphia
Columbus wins at home against Vancouver
D.C. United wins at home against Houston
Real Salt Lake wins at home against Toronto
The LA Galaxy wins against FC Dallas at home

Major League Soccer Power Rankings-Matchweek 7

Sporting Kansas City is #1 in My First Major League Soccer Power Ranking This Year!

With every Major League Soccer team having played 5 matches at this point in the season, I'm ready to publish my first Power Ranking of the 2012 season.

Last year I published my philosophy in producing these rankings. It might need a little tweaking this year due to the unbalanced schedule, but for now I'll stick with last year's formula.

Here are my inaugural 2012 rankings:

1) Sporting Kansas City
2) San Jose Earthquakes
3) Real Salt Lake
4) Seattle Sounders
5) D.C. United
6) Houston Dynamo
7) New York Red Bulls
8) Chicago Fire
9) LA Galaxy
10) Chivas USA
11) FC Dallas
12) Vancouver Whitecaps
13) Philadelphia Union
14) Columbus Crew
15) New England Revolution
16) Colorado Rapids
17) Montreal Impact
18) Portland Timbers
19) Toronto FC

A Big Milestone for the Reds!

Woot!

Book Review-The Maltese Falcon (1930) by Dashiell Hammett

I have never seen the the movie version of The Maltese Falcon. Premiering in 1941, The Maltese Falcon is considered one of the greatest film noir/crime movies of all-time. The American Film Institute named it the 23rd greatest movie of all-time in 2007. It was John Huston's directorial debut, and Humphrey Bogart's first major role, starring as detective Sam Spade.

But this post is not about me being remiss in not seeing the movie. It's about the novel the movie is based on, The Maltese Falcon, published in 1930 and written by Dashiell Hammett.

I love independent bookstores. I have mentioned The Book Loft of German Village, located in Columbus, Ohio in past posts. A few weeks ago I was in Columbus on business and decided to run over to the Book Loft to kill some time.


On their discount book table in the courtyard was a paperback version of The Maltese Falcon on sale for $4.99. Of course I had heard of the movie, so I bought it.

This is a pretty amazing book. I was surprised at how compressed the time frame of the action in this novel actually was. Set over just a couple of days in San Francisco, the story revolves around a small statue of a bird and the characters' desire to obtain it.

Sam Spade is a local detective who finds himself in the center of the intrigue. My expectations were that the book would be a classic mystery, with clues revealing themselves as I progressed through the story. No doubt the mystery is there, but I found the book to be as much a morality story, as Sam Spade battles his own foibles to try to maintain his professionalism as a private detective and a human being throughout the story. Dashiell Hammett is successful in this book as he was able to produce a successful crime/mystery novel with characters that are both interesting and intriguing.

And of course, that's why The Maltese Falcon is considered a classic.

 The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

A classic mystery/crime novel that ultimately succeeds as a morality story. My full review: http://jiresell.blogspot.com/2011/10/boo...

View all my reviews

A Great Atmosphere, But the Crew Disappoint. LA Galaxy 1, Columbus Crew 0 9/24/11

It was great to see a sold out match at Columbus Crew Stadium. The Plaza in front of the stadium was packed. There was a huge line to get into the Crew store. The Nordecke was in full throat! And the weather was perfect.

The Nordecke Was Awesome Last Night!

I would like to think the crowd came to cheer on the Major League Soccer Eastern Conference leading Columbus Crew against the Western Conference leading LA Galaxy. But I do understand that the casual fans who came out wanted to see the Galaxy's Landon Donovan, David Beckham and Robbie Keane. As it turned out, David Beckham flew back to Los Angeles earlier this week as he was being rested, Robbie Keane had a minor injury that kept him out of the 18 for the match, and Landon Donovan didn't start.

But the fans were absolutely treated to a very exciting match that ended with the Galaxy scoring a second-half extra-time goal to give them a 1-0 victory. I hope the fans make it back to more Crew matches!

Crew Coach Robert Warzycha started the match in a 4-5-1 formation, which didn't make a lot of sense to me when the Galaxy's two best midfielders, Donovan and Beckham weren't in the match. Predictably the Crew couldn't produce quality chances in the first half, although they played very well defensively.

It was only when Coach Warzycha brought on Emilio Renteria in the second half, switching to a 4-4-2 formation that the Crew started getting great chances at goal. But ultimately they couldn't finish.

And when the Galaxy's Chad Barrett knocked in a deflected Landon Donovan shot in the 93rd minute (both were second half subs) the Crew were left with a home loss, and find themselves in 2nd place in the Eastern Conference.

Left defender Shaun Francis had a horrible match, giving the ball away on multiple occasions. The Crew also missed the injured Eddie Gaven as a stabilizing force in the midfield.

The Crew are in trouble and may not make the MLS Playoffs. They are currently playing worse than all of the other MLS Clubs based on their last five matches. They have four matches left, with only one of those at home. They will be lucky to get 4 points total out of those matches if they don't play better.

I'm an optimist when it comes to my favorite sports teams (the Columbus Crew, the Cincinnati Reds, Ohio State and Purdue football) but I'm not real confident we are going to see the Crew in the playoffs come the end of the MLS regular season.

Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T

New foursquare Badge, The Lufthansa Oktoberfest 2011 Badge!

I hadn't received a foursquare badge since August 29th, 2011 when I earned the ESPN Foam Finger Badge.

This past Thursday I decided to have a couple of beers after work with some co-workers at The Dingle House Pub in West Chester, Ohio. When I checked in on foursquare, I earned the Lufthansa Oktoberfest 2011 Badge!

So how do you earn it? Follow Lufthansa Airlines on foursquare and check-in to any German-themed location Worldwide between September 17th and October 3rd.

Don't know how an Irish pub qualifies as a German themed restaurant...but I'll take the badge!

Lufthansa Oktoberfest 2011 Badge

Lufthansa Oktoberfest  

2011

Prost! It's Oktoberfest time! Party on with a coupon from Lufthansa and sing along with some Bavarian songs from the Gstanzl-Parade. 

Unlocked by jiresell on Thu Sep 22, 2011 at 5:13 PM at Dingle House in West Chester, OH.

Moneyball? Meh...Movie Review - Moneyball (2011)

I love baseball. I am a statistics freak. I've been known to keep a scorecard at baseball games. I have a formula that I use to determine weekly Major League Soccer Power Rankings and predict Major League Soccer matches.

I monitor RottenTomatoes.com to see the critics' consensus on movies to determine if I want to see the movie in a theater. Rotten? Forget about it. Ripe? I might consider it, as long as the subject matter interests me.

So out comes a movie, Moneyball. A story about Oakland A's General Manager Billy Beane (played by Brad Pitt), who has to figure out how to form a team with a limited payroll to compete against the big money clubs in Major League Baseball. He hires an economics major as his assistant (played by Jonah Hill) who has the ability to analyze statistics to measure the value of baseball players, thus uncovering "undervalued" players to form a team.

This method of scouting goes against the cultural norms of baseball scouting, providing a great backdrop for the movie.

This movie was ready-made for me.

Baseball? Check.

Statistics? Check.

Great actors? Brad Pitt? Jonah Hill? Philip Seymour Hoffman (playing Manager Art Howe)? Check.

A 94% ripe rating on RottenTomatoes.com? Check!


This movie can't fail!

I was completely underwhelmed.

Don't get me wrong. The movie is OK. The premise is good.

However, I couldn't empathize with the Billy Beane (or Brad Pitt's portrayal of him) in the movie. Maybe it was his ego. The movie tries to show Billy Beane's vulnerabilities, but came up short.

Jonah Hill's character, Assistant General Manager Peter Brand, was somewhat funny. I just felt like I had seen it before, the stereotypical shy nerdy smart-type who is trying to make his way amongst the grizzled veterans in the sport. And how many times do I need to see Jonah Hill do the uncomfortable high five in a movie? Seen it before.

Moneyball misses the mark as it tries to be too many things. Is it a drama about the conflicts of work versus family, or an "us against them I'll be proven right" story, or a biopic on Billy Beane as the trailblazer in the application of sabermetrics to build a successful baseball team?

The movie seems to run too long. Heavy on dialog, as would be expected, but short on the interesting banter I would have expected in the interactions between the characters.

My expectations may have been too high. I can take responsibility for that. But for me Moneyball was, well, meh...

I'm 0 for 2 So Far This Week In Major League Soccer Predictions

Earlier in the week I picked DC United to beat Chivas USA and the Portland Timbers to beat the San Jose Earthquakes.

Both matches ended in draws, so I'm 0 for 2 so far this week. 13 for 36 on the year, a 36% success result.

After running my model, none of the Saturday matches show a definitive result, so I'm not going to pick any of them

Still looking at a Chicago Fire win over the New England Revolution on Sunday 9/25.