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.
A few months ago, I posted a link to a video by the folks at Epic Meal Time where they kidnapped Jamie Oliver. Well, Oliver gets his revenge. This may actually be funnier than the original and is a great parody. My favorite part is “Vegan Muscles” at about 55 seconds in.
A few months ago, I posted a link to a video by the folks at Epic Meal Time where they kidnapped Jamie Oliver. Well, Oliver gets his revenge. This may actually be funnier than the original and is a great parody. My favorite part is “Vegan Muscles” at about 55 seconds in.
Next up in the Stone Collaboration series is the Highway 78 Scotch Ale brewed in conjunction with Green Flash and Pizza Port – making this one an all-California affair. This one came in a 12 oz. bottle for $4.99. I couldn’t find the product page on the Stone website, but I did find their press release, so here is what they say:
Green Flash/Pizza Port Carlsbad/Stone Highway 78 Scotch Ale (named after the 18 mile stretch of asphalt that unites us) is an atypical creation for all three breweries. It’s a very malty (read: NOT HOPPY) style of beer that we formulated with three different crystal malts, chocolate malt, and English pale malt to provide a rich, bready body. East Kent Goldings and Target hops provide a very modest backbone of peppery hops, but the flavor is unequivocally malt-driven. Scotch Ale yeast and a touch of raw sugar called sucanat add a distinctive complexity to this hefty 8.8% abv beer.
I should make the disclaimer now that I am really not a big fan of the Scotch Ale style of beer – I tend to find them heavy and syrupy and not really all that enjoyable. That being said, I really did review this beer with an open mind.
The beer pours ruby in color, lighter than I was expecting from a Scotch Ale. Lots of malt and slight notes of peat and smoke show on the nose – this beer is definitely not going to be confused with any other style. The beer is very malt forward, as you would expect, with a slight sweetness and a long finish with notes of smoked malt and grain. Not as overpowering as many Scotch ales and lighter on the malt than I was expecting, I just wish that there was more hop character present than I got – the hops were barely noticeable. There was balance though and the beer did not drink like the 8.8% ABV that it is. Overall, this beer was pretty darn tasty, especially for the style.
Stone Collaboration Highway 78 Scotch Ale drives down the road to the pizza shop and flashes us with a solid 3 kilts out of 5.
Jim Caple runs a section of his Off Base column on espn.com titled “Box Score Line of the Week”. Each week, he picks and interesting performance and writes about it. It is usually some pitcher absolutely getting his head beat in. This week, he had tons to choose from:
Arizona starter Ian Kennedy allowed 10 runs last Thursday (4 IP, 13 H, 10 R, 10 ER, 2 BB, 4 K), while Pittsburgh’s Jeff Locke allowed just one hit but also walked seven batters on Sunday (5 1/3 IP, 1 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 7 BB, 6 K). But it’s the relievers who put in the real effort this week, thanks in large part to all of those extra-inning marathons.
Mariners reliever Blake Beavan faced the minimum number of batters in 6 2/3 innings Thursday (6 2/3 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 4 K), which might have been the winning line had it not been for the Rangers’ Ross Wolf, who also pitched 6 2/3 innings of relief (6 2/3 IP, 7 H, 1 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 1 K) on Saturday. Which also might have won had Miami’s Kevin Slowey not pitched seven scoreless innings in relief on Saturday (7 IP, 8 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 8 K).
But even he lost because of the Mets’ Shaun Marcum, who pitched eight innings in relief the same game. He lost the game, but he wins this week’s award:
8 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 7 K
That was the longest relief outing since Scott Sanderson in 1989.
In case you were wondering, Sanderson came into the game in the 10th inning against the Pirates after Calvin Schiraldi, Steve Wilson and Mitch Williams failed to hold the lead in the 9th. Sanderson’s line was 8 IP, 7 H, 1 R, 1ER, 2 BB, 5 K. He lost the game on a HR by Jeff King in the bottom of the 18th.
Interesting to note in that game – the Pirates managed to tie the game in the 9th without a hit, thanks to 4 walks, a wild pitch and a sac fly.
Either way, it was a freaky week for relief pitching.
If you order an Ursus and get this, you might be in trouble.
Out in tiny Poulsbo, Washington, there is an unlikely large grouping of breweries. One of them is Sound Brewery, a brewery that is probably best known around these parts for their use of Belgian strains of yeast. You may not realize it, but they also do a pretty fantastic job with other styles of beer. Ursus Americanus, better know as the American Black Bear, is an American stout. As described on the Sound website:
Ursus Americanus American Stout – 6.5% ABV
Dark, strong, smooth American stout bursting with coffee and dark chocolate aroma and smooth velvety texture.
Availability: Draft only
The beer, as expected, pours jet black with a creamy brown head. There are strong notes of chocolate and roasted malt dominating the nose. The first sip is surprisingly slightly sweet with a healthy dose of chocolate slowly fading into nicely pleasant roasted malt; almost reminding me of a malt ball candy. The beer isn’t done; fading back into a long and lingering chocolate finish. I was surprised by this beer – it smells like it would be heavy and roast dominant, but there is very little in the way of bitterness or heavy roast flavors; they are still there, but they are moderate – this is still by no means a light beer. The beer is extremely well balanced and easy to drink despite its higher alcohol content and dark and malty nature.
What you really should get is something that looks like this.
This is one that I really wish Sound would put into bottles – I would drink this a lot more often if they did.
Sound Brewery’s Ursus Americanus saunters into your camp and steals your food with a sneaky 4 cute cubs out of 5.
Food festivals can be great or terrible, depending on how they are handled. Portland has one that does it right – Feast Portland. It runs this year from September 19 – 22nd and gets pricey since all of the events are ticketed, but check out the chef lineup here, then tell me if it isn’t worth it. Those names are some of the biggest in the US and it made me realize that Portland may have once again passed Seattle as the dominant culinary power in the Northwest.
Everything has been staked. The layout got spread out somewhat. Aphids (on the lettuces) and cabbage worms (brussels sprouts) made their first appearances and were rewarded with a dose of this organic solution. [pic of cabbage worm from itsnotworkitsgardening.com]
Evil!
Marigolds are supposed to be a very beneficial companion plant, so twelve got spread around in the earthboxes. Scallions deter aphids, so some of those got pulled from the main bunch and distributed in with the lettuces. [wikipedia list of companion plants here. Companion plant theory is here.] In the early ’90’s I had read about companion planting in an old Mother Earth News Almanac (1973 edition, 1977 printing), I’ve been meaning to try it whenever I got around to planting vegetables. It only took me 20 years to put it into practice.
First picture, a view of the earthboxes on May 3:
June 9 view. The zucchini got a “throne” to lift it higher off of the ground. The little spots of color are marigolds. Note the new pvc supports for the tomato cages:
Progress!
June 9 view from the back garage door looking toward the back yard:
FlatbreadGarden 