The Bibb finally bolted. Four plants produced almost exactly two pounds of leaves — right around 20 servings. The Bibb wasn’t transplanted until late April, which was way too late, so I’m ok with that yield.
The tomatillos are now almost six feet tall. The shorter of the two has a fruit about the size of a ping pong ball, pictured below.
The peppers haven’t been digging the rain, I don’t think. At least two of the fruits have extensive black on them, which I’m guessing is some sort of rot. One of the plants is struggling with wilted and blackened leaves. Not good. It may be that the least resistant of the ten varieties are struggling — hopefully everything else can shrug it off.
It is always exciting to try an IPA that is not from Washington or Oregon, but that usually means California living in Seattle and in general, California usually means it is coming from San Diego. In the case of Speakeasy, we get to try one made in San Francisco. Big Daddy IPA came in a 22 oz. bottle and runs around $5, and is available just about everywhere you can buy beer.
From the Speakeasy website:
No lightweight, Big Daddy IPA tips the scales with a huge hop flavor and a clean, dry finish that leaves the scene without a trace.
Big Daddy IPA is a hop-head’s delight, a generously dry-hopped yet surprisingly drinkable American-style India Pale Ale. Poured into a standard American pint glass, the beer is a golden straw color, with tight carbonation and a slightly off-white head that leaves a lovely lacing. The aroma is floral, fresh grass, pine needles, grapefruit and subtle notes of fresh bread.
Style: India Pale Ale
ABV: 6.5%
IBU: 55
Color: 5L – Golden
Barley: Two Row Pale, Light Munich
Hops: Columbus, Cascade, Centennial
Yeast: California Ale
The beer is golden in color with a white head. The nose is graced with mild hops, notes of grain and citrus and a slightly floral aroma. The beer is very grain forward on its first sip, yielding quickly to the hop character – slightly bitter with light citrus and significant floral notes, followed by a long, bitter finish. The alcohol was not a problem but the beer was a little too floral for my liking and that floral character seems to intensify as the beer warms. It seemed very out of balance between the bitter and floral notes and, while not unpleasant to drink, was nowhere close to being a great IPA.
Speakeasy Big Daddy IPA rolls down the window and shoot with a 2 tommy guns out of 5.
I am convinced that there is something wrong (an injury perhaps) with both Felix Hernandez and Tom Wilhelmsen. One of the benefits of having seats behind home plate is that you get a good look at a pitcher’s delivery, and in both cases, the delivery looks off.
Felix Hernandez – He got pounded by the Angels again on the 20th and has not looked all that dominating his last few starts. Felix started off the season yielding just 11 earned runs in his first 64.2 innings (ERA of 1.53) with 64 strike outs and 10 walks. Then came the game in New York on May 14th where Felix tweaked his back (that was the last game in the 64.2 inning stretch). Since then, Felix has posted a mortal 24 ER in 45 innings (a 4.80 ERA) with 10 walks and 48 strikeouts. His strike out rate is up, but he has been getting hit with much more frequency.
I looked at fangraphs.com to see what kind of pitches Felix has been throwing and it seems he is throwing more fastballs, which indicates to me that something is not right – in the 9 games before the injury, he threw the fastball roughly 53% of the time and only exceeded that rate twice in a game – against the Angels on 4/27 and the White Sox on 4/6. Since that time he is throwing it about 57% of the time, but has thrown it over 60% of the time in the last 3 games. When your back hurts, you don’t have the flexibility to throw a breaking pitch as easily or as effectively and that means you rely on your fastball more. When hitters realize this they sit on your fastball. No matter how good the pitcher, hitters have an advantage when they know the fastball is coming and it doesn’t move like Mariano Rivera’s pitches. My observations on Felix have been the same – he is not getting the breaking stuff over the plate like he used to and it is exposing the declining velocity on his fastball.
My guess – Felix makes one or two more starts before ending up on the DL and effectively sinking the rest of the season for the Mariners.
Tom Wilhelmsen – He has been terrible for the month of June (11 ER in 7 innings) after being borderline unhittable in April and May (2 ER in 24 innings). It to judge what is going on with a relief pitcher based on pitch breakdown because the sample size is smaller and subject to randomness, but my observation has been that Wilhelmsen hasn’t been getting the breaking ball over the plate and once again, teams are sitting on his fastball. This has led to more fly balls and more walks. I can’t think of a specific point where he seems to have gotten hurt, so it might just be that his mechanics are messed up and it is all in his head, but whatever it is, he needs to get it squared away soon – the M’s bullpen does not have many effective weapons in their arsenal these days.
The baseball draft has passed, and, while it will be a few years before you know how well your favorite team did, there are a ton of great “hindsight” stories that have come out of the draft. Dave Schoenfield hit on a few of them in a recent article. Here are a few of my favorites:
1966: Reggie Jackson falls into A’s lap
In one of the more famous draft blunders, the Mets’ had the No. 1 pick and passed on Arizona State outfielder Jackson to select a high school catcher named Steve Chilcott, who would battle injuries and never reach the majors. “It was a position pick,” said Joe McDonald, a Mets executive at the time. “We did not feel we had an adequate catching prospect in the organization.”
Position pick my butt – the real story behind this was that the Mets were concerned about Jackson (who is actually half black-half Mexican) having a white girlfriend. Keep in mind this was 1966 at the height of the civil rights movement.
1966: Braves draft Tom Seaver
The Braves? Yep. Atlanta selected Seaver in the now non-existent January secondary phase of the draft (for players who had previously been drafted). Seaver, pitching at USC, had been drafted the previous June by the Dodgers, but didn’t sign after the Dodgers turned down his $70,000 asking price. The Braves took him with the 20th pick of the January phase, setting off a weird chain of events. The Braves signed Seaver for $40,000, but commissioner Spike Eckert ruled Seaver was ineligible to sign because USC had already played two exhibition games (Seaver didn’t pitch). But the NCAA then declared Seaver ineligible, because he had signed a pro contract. So Eckert ruled that any team willing to match the Braves’ offer would enter a lottery. The Mets, Phillies and Indians matched, and the Mets won the lottery.
This one is little known. Talk about a big SNAFU – the signing disaster probably cost the Braves a couple of pennants and is directly responsible for the Mets winning a couple of them and for one of the most memorable teams ever – the 1969 Miracle Mets. Yes, Seaver was that good. It kind of made up for not drafting Reggie.
1976: Trammell and Morris … and Ozzie (sort of)
In 1976, the Tigers had one of the great drafts ever, selecting Steve Kemp in the January phase and then Alan Trammell (second round), Dan Petry (fourth round), and Jack Morris (fifth round). Trammell and Morris aren’t in the Hall of Fame yet, but both could get there someday. No team has ever drafted (and signed) two future Hall of Famers in the same draft. The kicker: They also drafted Ozzie Smith in the seventh round, but he didn’t sign, and the Padres selected him the following year.
I had no idea about this one. That is one hell of a draft even if Ozzie did not sign. I don’t think Morris is a HOFer, but he was one heck of a 5th round pick.
1988: Dodgers draft Mike Piazza … in 62nd round
Maybe the most famous late-round pick, Piazza was the Dodgers’ final pick that year — the 1,390th pick overall out of 1,395.
Yep, 5 players drafted after him and the Dodgers only picked him as a favor to his father. Spent 4 seasons in the minors raking the ball and got called up in late 1992 and stuck around the majors for another 15 seasons. Had a career 59.2 WAR according to baseball-reference.com, and posted a higher career WAR than any player taken in the first round of the 1988 draft. Only Robin Ventura was close at 55.9. The next highest was Brian Jordan at 32.7. How did no one scout this guy?
I have long lameted that, amid the recent explosion of breweries in Ballard, we could use a few more wineries and a distillery. Well, looks like we can cross the distillery off the list: welcome to the neighborhood Old Ballard Liquor Co. It is located on 14th and Shilshole Ave, not too far from Maratime Pacific. That makes (soon to be) 10 breweries (and maybe 11), 1 winery and 1 distillery in a one square mile area.
The delicious Mocha Stout. You can even see the famous Iron Chef Leftovers beer notebook in this shot.
With the frequency that that review beers from Reuben’s Brews, you would think that the brewery is paying me to do it. I can assure you that is not the case. I review so many of their beers for a variety of reasons, mostly because the brewery is less than a 10 minute walk from my house. A few months back, they put on a Mocha Porter – I love coffee based beers and this one I had to try. Oh yeah, it also included a nice dose of cocoa nibs – so it really got my interest. It was available on nitro when I had it. It clocked in at a healthy 8.4% ABV and 34 IBU.
The beer poured jet black as expected. For a beer that had both cocoa and coffee in it, the nose was fairly restrained. There are definite notes of both coffee and chocolate, but you were still able to pick out hints of both grain and malt in between them – this was a huge surprise to me for such a big beer. The palate is also very restrained – there are distinct flavors of light roast coffee with hints of sweetness to start out, followed quickly by a pleasant maltiness which then transitions into a moderately intense chocolate finish with hints of bitter coffee. The finish is extremely long and you still get hints of dark chocolate well after you take a sip. It is not as intense chocolate as most chocolate beers and the coffee is more restrained that I would have expected, but the beer is extremely well balanced and you can actually taste the beer.
While most coffee beers are like drinking a good espresso or cappuccino, this one is more like heading down to a coffee shop and ordering a light roast drip with no milk – you know you are drinking coffee but you taste more of the complexity of the bean than the roast of the espresso.
If this beer ever comes back, you need to head to Reuben’s and have one (or two).
Reuben’s Brews Mocha Stout percolates in the pot with a perfect 5 coffea arabica out of 5.
The delicious Mocha Stout. You can even see the famous Iron Chef Leftovers beer notebook in this shot.
With the frequency that that review beers from Reuben’s Brews, you would think that the brewery is paying me to do it. I can assure you that is not the case. I review so many of their beers for a variety of reasons, mostly because the brewery is less than a 10 minute walk from my house. A few months back, they put on a Mocha Porter – I love coffee based beers and this one I had to try. Oh yeah, it also included a nice dose of cocoa nibs – so it really got my interest. It was available on nitro when I had it. It clocked in at a healthy 8.4% ABV and 34 IBU.
The beer poured jet black as expected. For a beer that had both cocoa and coffee in it, the nose was fairly restrained. There are definite notes of both coffee and chocolate, but you were still able to pick out hints of both grain and malt in between them – this was a huge surprise to me for such a big beer. The palate is also very restrained – there are distinct flavors of light roast coffee with hints of sweetness to start out, followed quickly by a pleasant maltiness which then transitions into a moderately intense chocolate finish with hints of bitter coffee. The finish is extremely long and you still get hints of dark chocolate well after you take a sip. It is not as intense chocolate as most chocolate beers and the coffee is more restrained that I would have expected, but the beer is extremely well balanced and you can actually taste the beer.
While most coffee beers are like drinking a good espresso or cappuccino, this one is more like heading down to a coffee shop and ordering a light roast drip with no milk – you know you are drinking coffee but you taste more of the complexity of the bean than the roast of the espresso.
If this beer ever comes back, you need to head to Reuben’s and have one (or two).
Reuben’s Brews Mocha Stout percolates in the pot with a perfect 5 coffea arabica out of 5.
With the Heat facing elimination at the hands of the Spurs, Miami is changing its game-plan to try to stop Danny Green and his 66% shooting percentage from beyond the arc. Bosh’s comments:
“He has a knack for shooting, but he won’t be open tonight,” Bosh said Tuesday. “We’ll see how he shoots with somebody always on him.”
Congratulations, Chris Bosh, it took you and your coaches 5 games of getting lit up to finally figure out what a casual basketball fan could tell you – if you let a guy who regularly shoots 43% from long distance have open shots, he is going to kill you.
Shane Battier was much more articulate in his comments:
Most of [Green’s] shots come off of defensive breakdowns on our part. So it just goes into our overall game plan of playing with a sharper, clearer mind and just doing our job.
“He’s done a good job of watching our guys who are ball-hawks. We have a tendency to do that. He just goes to the open space. He utilizes the oldest trick in the book: the old blind spot.”
So the Heat’s plan is to not collapse on Tony Parker to try to cover Green. I just don’t see this ending well for the Heat.
The tomato and tomatillo plants are growing in every direction, so they got some twine to try to organize the chaos. The cabbage worms look to be at least briefly defeated, but the aphids have now found the purple basil. The lettuce and dill are gradually fading, though it was still a good harvest this week. The cilantro and parsley went ballistic and received big haircuts. The first peppers have made their appearance.
GNOIF #8 Recap – The Good, The Bad, And The GNOIF (Outlaw Theme)
Games That Got Played: Bang!, Betrayal At House On The Hill, Cards Against Humanity, Pirate Fluxx, Pirate’s Cove, Run For Your Life Candyman!, Rocketville
Games That Didn’t Get Played: Black Rock City, Dead Fellas, Family Business, Stoner Fluxx, Gloom, Last Night On Earth, Mr. Jack Pocket, Mr. Jack NY, Mystery of the Abbey, Poo, Revolution
Playing fast and loose with the “Outlaw” theme. It was obvious that there weren’t enough cowboy and gangster themed games in the closet, so the theme expanded to include undead, politics, and feces-throwing monkeys. The turnout was excellent; it looks like it’s time to add another table.
Cards Against Humanity was a huge hit again. We played Pirate’s Cove for the first time and had a lot of fun with it. (Though I got completely screwed by the dice. My awesome pirate ship was completely crippled by a couple of bad rolls of the dice. I’m not bitter or anything.)
Bang! was a big hit too. It’s a card game where every player plays a random role in a stereotypical spaghetti western. From BoardGameGeek:
There are 22 different types of cards in the draw deck. Most common are the BANG! cards, which let you shoot at another player, assuming the target is within “range” of your current gun. The target player can play a “MISSED!” card to dodge the shot. Other cards can provide temporary boosts while in play (for example, different guns to improve your firing range) and special one-time effects to help you or hinder your opponents (such as Beer to restore health, or Barrels to hide behind during a shootout). A horse is useful for keeping your distance from unruly neighbors, while the Winchester can hit a target at range 5. The Gatling is a deadly exception where range doesn’t matter – it can only be used once, but targets all other players at the table!
Every “role” is secret except for the Sheriff’s. The Sheriff and Deputies try to shoot the Renegade and the Outlaws. The Outlaws try to take out the Sheriff. The Renegade basically tries to shoot everybody — if the Sheriff dies while any Outlaws are still alive then the Outlaws win. The issue, of course, is that nobody can really be sure who they’re supposed to be targeting. Another catch is that initially you only have enough range with your Colt .45 to shoot the person sitting next to you, but as you get better weapons you can shoot further around the table. It’s a fun, noisy game.
I also heard about some epic fights in Run For Your Life, Candyman!, though I was at the other table getting my ship blown to smithereens.
FlatbreadGarden 