Month: December 2022

That’s a whole lot of words to say “because we suck”

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

lol’d heartily: San Francisco Giants GM Farhan Zaidi tries to explain the difficulty of signing free agents because nobody likes the city

I remember when my baseball travels took me to San Francisco, I looked forward to the trip.  Years of watching stuff like Full House and Mrs. Doubtfire made the city seem like a pretty cool place, but at the same time, as a sports fan, I was a little skeptical, because as far as baseball was concerned, it became pretty common knowledge that San Francisco was the city that was 69F all year long, and their sports fans were among the most insufferably obnoxious ones in existence.

All the same, I looked forward to the trip as I did most all of my baseball trips, because regardless of the preconceived notions, it was still a place I’d never been to before, and I always relished the opportunity to see new places.

After my trip was over, I had decided that it was a good enough trip, but as a whole, I really wasn’t that impressed with San Francisco.  Everything everywhere was ridiculously expensive, the weather really was static, and it was just a difficult city to traverse in general.  As far as ballparks were concerned, I thought Oakland’s decrepit mausoleum of a ballpark was the better place to watch a game, and the sports culture was everything I had expected before going there.  Giants clearly cared more about the scene than they did the team, and even when they were getting stomped by the rival A’s, the fans still went ballistic for the Fist Pump Cam, and I’d never felt more embarrassed for other human beings in my entire life.

Despite the hype and perception and the self-importance from those in the Bay area, San Francisco was not a city I am that fond of, and I have little motive to want to visit again without good reason.

So I was quite tickled pink to read this article where the Giants’ GM Farhan Zaidi maybe said a little too much in an interview, because he basically said that free agents don’t want to sign with his team because the city kind of sucks.  He cited a couple of things that were not at all sports-related, and the author of the aforementioned story injected a little bit more of their own opinion into the article trying to smokescreen it as Zaidi’s.

But they mention stuff like homelessness and drug problems in the city, and although they don’t expressly say it, their use of sociological factors is basically trying to skirt around the fact that San Francisco is pretty well known to be one of the gayest cities in America, and I don’t say that with any hint of criticism or animosity, after all I’m in Atlanta, which is probably right behind them in population of the LGBTQ+.

Ballplayers probably don’t care about homelessness or drug use in the city, what they’re more likely to care about it the fact that it’s an expensive as fuck city to live in, and even the biggest of superstars are going to have a hard time trying to find a place to live, having to compete with all tech millionaires and billionaires that live in Silicon Valley.  Over the last few years, there have been numerous professional athletes who have turned away opportunities to play in New York and Canada over anticipated tax costs, and gone to places like Texas and Florida where tax laws aren’t as costly, they get that granular with their money.  San Francisco and the highest real estate costs in the country aren’t very likely to be that attractive to anyone, much less professional athletes.

Maybe the more country bumpkin athletes might have an objection with living in a blue state full of the gays, but it’s more likely that what will drive them away is a city with horrendous traffic and mountainous hills where they can’t drive their sports cars around in and have any fun, but it really was hilarious that the author of the post cited being the home to Nancy Pelosi as a potential reason why Aaron Judge wouldn’t sign there.

The thing is, no life-long Bay area resident would ever publicly decry their hometown to anyone other than other Bay area lifers.  Hometown criticism is like mom jokes, as in only we are allowed to make them, but coming from outside us, fuck you.  So it makes it that much more entertaining to me, that a notable representative of the city in the form of the hometown baseball club’s general manager goes on the record to point out all the faults why free agents wouldn’t want to sign there.  I’m sure he’s going to be a popular fellow until the next shiny distraction emerges.

Naturally, at the time I’m writing this, word drops that the Giants succeeded in signing shortstop Carlos Correa to a 13-year megadeal worth $350 million.  Most interestingly about the initial details is that I’ve noticed that there are no opt-out clauses, which means I really hope Correa likes the city, because he’s going to be there for quite some time.  Hopefully he knew what he was getting himself into, otherwise it’s going to suuuuuck.

Either way speaking of suuuuuuuck, suck it, San Francisco.  Y’all are an overrated city that nobody outside of it likes.  I relish in the fact that coronavirus exposed the town more than any other in America and their ridiculous real estate market took a notable hit, and it almost nearly gets some blood flow to hear that the Giants’ own GM think the city sucks too.

With all due respect to the Dream

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

I can’t get on board with the trophy for best defensive player of the year being named after anyone but Dikembe Mutombo. 

I love Hakeem Olajuwon, the man is an incredible champion, fantastic human being, and easily one of the greatest players of all time.  And although I’m a little surprised that the stats and numbers don’t support my argument, I think what it really boils down to is the fact that in terms of knee-jerk perception, when people think of legendary defenders, there’s no way Hakeem comes to mind before Dikembe Mutombo does.

I get the NBA’s decision and logic, Olajuwon made more All-Defensive teams than Dikembe did (9 vs. 6), averaged more blocks, had more total blocks, and was vastly the greater steals threat.  But the thing is, Hakeem Olajuwon was outstanding at pretty much everything in basketball, defense and offense.  For god’s sake, he’s one of the only guys in history to ever have a quadruple double.  If not for the existence of Michael Jordan, Hakeem Olajuwon would probably have more MVPs and more championships in his career, and the MVP trophy would’ve been named after him.

When you say the name “Hakeem Olajuwon,” probably the first thing that will come to anyone’s mind is him completely humiliating David Robinson in the 1995 playoffs.  Sure, Olajuwon was statistically the better defender than Mutombo was, but he was still a prolific scorer that was a tremendous offensive force that the Houston Rockets relied upon to carry the team.

But when you say the name “Dikembe Mutombo,” probably the first thing that comes to mind aside from the GEICO commercial, is the countless number of blocks he rejected throughout his illustrious career.  There was a best-of-five playoff series in 1994 where he blocked 31 shots in five games, which is complete insanity, and through his pure defense, his #8 seed Denver Nuggets upset the #1 Seattle Supersonics in one of the greatest upsets in the history of the game.

Mutombo wasn’t a terrible scorer, but it was never his priority to be the man on offense.  All the teams he’s been on have always had a primary scorer aside from him, because his job was always, defense. 

Dikembe Mutombo was defense.  And no disrespect to the Dream, who may have all of the better numbers, but when people think of defense, they’re probably not thinking of him first.  They’re thinking of the finger wagging, the swag, and the guy who built his entire career on being able to alter entire offenses just by being on the court.

I get why the NBA went with Hakeem, but I genuinely think they missed a great opportunity to really make a tsunami instead of a wave.  If it were the Dikembe Mutombo Defensive Player of the Year, the trophy could easily, easily have been a trophy of a hand wagging a finger like Mutombo used to do.  Doing so makes the trophy have swagger and a bit of edge, and players in the league might actually want to step it up defensively if they thought they could win some baller hardware.  Next thing you know, we’re back to the NBA of the 90s of 86-74 final scores, where any action inside the arc usually results in a block or a steal, resulting in all games becoming the glorified three-point shootouts they’ve evolved into anyway.

But all sports fan know the saying, defense wins championships.

Dad brog (#103): Dad’s solo blow off trip

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

I think any of my zero readers might have been able to tell through tone and topic, especially in these dad brogs, that parenthood has been challenging throughout the last year or so.  Two kids at their ages in the conditions we are in societally, have taken their toll on me, and I’ll be the first to admit that since the start of COVID which coincided almost perfectly with the birth of #1 have put me into a bubble that I often struggle to get out of and it’s up for debate on whether or not I’m even out of it at all.

I know that I’ve struggled tremendously with keeping my cool, and that I will never accept the perceived shortcomings of the rest of the world as being the norm now, as reasons for my mental wellbeing, or lack of it.  I’m extremely irritable, little makes me happy, I struggle to enjoy just about anything and I’ve basically forgotten how to live for myself because so much of my life is spent being a parent and taking care of just about everything but myself.

It’s hard for me to really let go of things and unwind, when I’m constantly in this state of feeling overworked and taken for granted.  That if I don’t do things, things don’t get done, at work or at home, and that there are many instances where if the result of me taking any sort of time off is just a backlog of bullshit for me to have to deal with when I get back, then I question having taken it in the first place.

The last few trips I’ve taken with my family have been challenging, because two kids as young as my own are a tremendous handful and I’m always trying to be cognizant of their safety and wellbeing to the point where I can’t enjoy myself at any point.  Any time I am afforded to have to unwind always feels inadequate and too short and I’m left wondering why bother, like an ungrateful ingrate.

Regardless, what this all amounts to is the very obvious need for me to have some time away from dad mode, even if it’s on my own.  An opportunity to where I can not be a dad for a few days and try and hope to unwind and relax and recharge just a little bit.  Stare at a walls or screens and not have to worry about clocks or the schedules of other people for a few days.  Let other people feed my kids and hope that they don’t fall victim to their pickiness and that it’s really just dada’s shitty cooking they’re tired of and not really hating things.  Not being the only one cleaning my house on a nightly basis, preparing for the next day when it all has to get done all over again.  Go to sleep with no alarms on, and hope I can actually stay asleep for at least eight hours.

Yes, dada needs this little break.  If it were any more overdue, it would have already been fully foreclosed upon, and being prepared for demolition and the property already sold to CubeSmart.

And in true burned out dada fashion, I slept through my morning alarm to get to the airport, and if not for the Lyft driver to call me at 5 am to ask me where I was, I probably would’ve fucked everything up and everything would’ve been 690% worse.

Better believe I tipped my driver well this morning.  Here’s hoping the rest of my weekend will be successful.

Ho hum, just more Korea > Japan

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Not surprising when you think about it: Korean webtoons surpassing Japanese manga in terms of popularity, profitability

Usually in my friends’ group chat, we talk about politics, futbol (right now), and an inordinate amount of conversation about fried chicken.  But out of the blue one of my friends posts this story, and it’s definitely the type of story that chubs me up, about how Korean webtoons are surpassing Japanese manga.  And when you stop and think about the state of the world and how in spite of what I primarily do for a living, everything is advancing towards a digital medium, it’s a pure no-brainer and not at all surprising.

Everyone has a phone, Korean or Japanese.  Or French, Portuguese, German, American or Canadian for that matter.  And regardless of one’s attitude about such a notion, among everyone who has one, the vast majority of these users are probably looking at their phones way more than they should be.  That being said, at least in Asia, it’s not a surprise that Korean webtoons are passing Japanese manga in popularity and profitability.

It really does boil down to the adage that the medium is the message, and that if you’re not using the right medium, the message might as well not exist.  The fact that webtoons are accessible on mobile devices that everyone already is carrying in the first place, will always make them more appealing than the need for a physical edition, or worse of, having to go hunt down the physical edition and risk not getting it.

But what I love about the article is the also-obvious observation of Japan’s tendency to be too Japanese, and always try and justify instances where they’re falling behind in the world under a bullshit veil of traditionalism and art.  Sure, there is some weight to the argument, but in the sheer rat race of the world and business, printed manga isn’t going to be able to keep up with the rise of artists who learn how to cater their art style to a digital medium.

If someone tells me about the next Squid Game or Itaewon Class and I’m interested, I’m going to want to check it out immediately.  Sure, it would be cool to have a physical edition of something, but as far as a customer experience goes, being unable to get it will definitely sour me on the property, even though such was out of their control.  But being able to hop on my phone and download it immediately and be immediately able to check it out, that’s the very definition of convenience and an immediate win for webtoons.

I understand the tradition argument, and there is merit to having physical shit.  But what all this really boils down to is the obvious conclusion that is the title of this post: ho hum, another instance where Korea has shown their superiority over Japan.  No matter how much all the fucking weebs of the world try and defend it, it’s hard to compete tangible evidence of dollars yen won.

Sports have too much fucking money, vol. 1,369: feat. the New York Mets

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

I’m not going to pretend like I pay a tremendous amount of attention to baseball news these days, but I know enough of what’s going on to know that the Mets are dumping a tremendous amount of money to try and become a championship contender.  I knew they already had Max Scherzer, and that they were paying him an inordinate amount of money for a guy that effectively plays once every five days, so it was somewhat head-scratching when I heard that the Mets went out and “won” the Justin Verlander sweepstakes, signing him to a 2-year, $86-million dollar contract, I’m thinking damn, the Mets are really locking up $86 mil a year on just two pitchers?  I’m pretty sure the Oakland A’s entire payroll next year isn’t $86 mil.*

*at the time I’m writing this, 11 teams don’t have a payroll that cracks $86 mil including of course, the Oakland A’s

Of course, on paper this has all the pundits thinking the Mets are now the odds-on favorite to win it all, seeing as how they have two of the game’s best pitchers, even if they’re going to be paying them an entire team’s payroll on top of the other 38 guys on the roster they’ll have to pay, including the $54 million to two other players in Francisco Lindor and the freshly re-signed Brandon Nimmo, so if we’re keeping count already, the Mets are paying $140 mil to just four guys for 2023 alone.

[Repeat the title of this post with me here]

They won 101 games in 2022 without Justin Verlander, and if not for an epic, late-season collapse against the Braves, should have won the division, but that still didn’t stop them from choking in the first round against the Padres.  Regardless, the addition of a talent like Justin Verlander theoretically should make a good team like the Mets even better in 2023.

Who knows, maybe the 2023 Mets, in spite of the criticism of their historic $300M+ protected opening day payroll will win 102 games, win the division and avoid having to play in the wild card round and actually have a successful playoff run?

But who are we kidding, this is the New York Mets we’re talking about, they of the LOLMets meme of history.  They could have Max Scherzer, Justin Verlander, Clayton Kershaw, Nolan Ryan and Sandy Koufax as their starting five, and they’d still probably find a way to fuck things up and fail, as they always do.  They could spend $500 million dollars and have 4+ WAR players in every position in their lineup, but they’ll still find a way to shit the bed in the playoffs and get bounced by the Cardinals or Padres or Phillies.

And the biggest thing is that teaming Verlander and Scherzer up is no guarantee, because as many casual baseball fans probably might not be aware of, this has already happened before, as both of them were on the Detroit Tigers together between 2010 and 2014.  Five years of Verlander and Scherzer in the same rotation, and zero World Series rings to show for it.  They even had help from guys like David Price and a resurgent Anibal Sanchez in some of those years.  Sure, they made the playoffs four times, but the one time they made it to the World Series together in 2012, they got swept by the vastly less-talented Giants, getting victimized by guys like Pablo Sandoval and Marco Scutaro.

What I think is funny is how just about everyone the Tigers once had all achieved success outside of Detroit.  Max Scherzer got his ring with the Nationals in 2018, Justin Verlander won twice with the Astros in 2017 and this past year, and even David Price got a ring in Boston and Anibal Sanchez was also lights out for that 2018 Nationals playoff team.

So the point is, if a young and spry Scherzer and Verlander couldn’t get the job done ten years ago, Father Time is kind of betting against 40-year old versions of Scherzer and Verlander doing it, especially when they’ll be trying on a team as accursed as the New York Mets.

If me writing about it is a temptation of fate and I end up being completely wrong, hey I’ll be glad to revisit this if I notice and care in the future and admit being wrong, no shame in that.  But if I’m a betting man, I’m siding with Father Time, and going to take the bet against the Mets.  I know you have to spend money to make money, but, and I hate to sound all corporate Braves-ey, but allocating as much money that the Mets are to just two and four players just doesn’t sound what’s best for business.

Re: Lensa, AI artwork and theft

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

In most cases, I don’t have much idea of what’s going on in the world other than what I see people talking about on social media.  I simply don’t go out of my way like I used to, to seek out information and the happenings in the world as I occasionally did in the life before children.  However, over the last few days, the topic of some AI art generator, Lensa, has been noticeably a hot topic as far as my digital eyes can see.

Mostly because it’s been determined that Lensa’s art database in which it pulls its art generation from has been built up from billions and billions of images of photos and artwork from the internet, mostly with no sense of consent or permission, which ultimately concludes with the notion that they are using a fuckload of stolen artwork to feed the database.

In this debate, I’ve noticed that there are two very prevalent sides, both of which like in so many cases, have their feet firmly implanted in the mud and neither seemingly willing to yield a single digital e-inch on their opinions.  There’s the side of the creators, the people who have been creating, artwork, or rather content, whose creations have been absorbed and usurped into Lensa’s database without any sort of authorization, and feeding a machine that is spitting out AI-generated results at the beck and call for its increasing base of users.  This is the side of the equation that is unhappy, angry and calling for the cancellation of a service that has stolen the work and creations of countless artists, for use in a, for now, trendy art generator.

On the other side are, what I like to call, are the consumers.  These are the people who have been using Lensa to entertain themselves by creating all sorts of modified images of themselves or whomever they want to process through the Lensa AI.  All of these people are pretty much completely okay with Lensa and where they get their content from, and wish for people to leave Lensa alone and let them have their fun photo generator, regardless of negative perception of what their database is being fed from.

From what I’ve been witnessing, creators are furious because in most cases, many of them can cite examples of their work having already been fed into the Lensa database.  Understandably, they are very unhappy with some AI hoovering up the things they’ve created, and really wish that people, including their friends who fall into the other side to stop using Lensa, and try to educate them to why they shouldn’t.

However, the consumers, are in no rush to stop being Lensa, because regardless of education and regardless of how their artist friends may feel about it, they’re in no rush to stop using it.  It’s giving them entertainment, it’s giving them amusement, but most importantly, it’s giving them content in the form of digitally altered images of themselves in fun and kooky ways, in a variety of art styles generated by AI.  I’ve noticed that these people aren’t the types to just quietly use Lensa and hope nobody judges them for it, but instead are usually the ones who defend it, tell their artist friends to let it go and chill, and we all know how well that goes with people, especially on the internet.

If it wasn’t obvious, I’m of course on the side of the artists.  Out of curiosity, I floated some example images of photos of mine that I’ve known are pretty well seen, and sure enough, they’re populating in the Lensa, which means that I’m also “a victim” of AI theft.  I don’t want to delve deeper, because I know of the thousands of photos and images that I’ve uploaded onto the internet over the last 24 years, lord only knows just how much of my shit has already fed some AI.

I’ve concluded that it’s not really a situation where it’s artists versus Lensa, but really artists versus the narcissism of consumers, and when the day is over, that’s truly an unwinnable battle for those who create.  It’s like cockroaches, you can kill 99 out of 100 roaches in a home, but as long as that 100th cockroach lives, infestation is inevitable to occur again.  Artists can beg and plead with all of their friends and followers to stop using Lensa, but as long as they have the few people who will quietly use it, they’re never going to get any sense of victory in the matter.

Because that’s really all it is, at the root of things.  Consumers like getting fun pictures of themselves and they don’t really care where they’re coming from, and Lensa has, whether by design or not, tapped into a human behavior that is their biggest ally in getting their service off the ground.  The consumers are doing the defense for them, and the artists are exhausting themselves screaming into the aether, and Lensa is quietly growing and spreading without any consequence.

Whether it was intentional or not, it is an ingenious, albeit shithead execution.

Well, that was not unexpected

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Saw that coming: Brazil trounces Korea 4-1, eliminating them from the round of 16

I’m not mad, just disappointed.  Nominally.  I actually had predicted the score would’ve been 5-1, with Korea’s one goal being some garbage time pity goal in the 92nd minute.  Not out of pessimism, but a realistic guess based on the fact that Brazil is in a class way above Korea, and the friendly they played back in June ended in a similar score, I saw no reason why it would be any different during the World Cup.

They weren’t playing a Portugal squad who had already secured their position and really had no reason to play their best.  They weren’t playing a squad with a bitch of Ronaldo in body protect mode and being more of a liability than a threat.  They were playing fucking Brazil, a country routinely ranked 1st or among the top four countries in FIFA rankings, like all the time.

To me, a monumental win would’ve been if Korea could’ve held Brazil to a 0-0 by half, but in reality it only six minutes before Brazil got on the board, and two minutes later, Neymar was notching a PK for a 2-0 score that basically ended the game after it barely started.

The real question was just how much gas was Brazil going to put on the rout?  Having won the game in 15 minutes, there was little reason for them to really risk Neymar or any of their starters.  But unsurprisingly the topic came up in numerous forums of the complete humiliation Brazil endured in 2014 against Germany, losing 7-1, and taking their history out on Korea seemed like a very realistic possibility, and it looked like my 5-1 score might become a reality.

Fortunately, Korea played with integrity and played out the rest of the game cleanly, not fouling like crazy, while still trying hard, forcing Brazil’s goalkeeper Alisson to really work, deflecting numerous shots.  And when Paik Seung-ho crushed his 30 yard smash into the net, that was good enough for me, to be satisfied with the result.  At least we went down fighting and didn’t get shut out, and this goal was most definitely no charity, lazy backup GK goal, it was a screamer and it was earned.

Ffrom what my amateur eyes witnessed, Brazil’s in a class of its own with their touch, as in the ability to so perfectly tap the most intricate light passes in between defenders to get them into prime scoring position.  Son Heung-min is really the only guy on the Korean team with a similar ability, and it’s that finesse that basically won the game against Portugal with his perfect, between-the-legs pass to Hwang Hee-chon before he kicked the game winner.

Like I said, I’m not surprised or mad about the result, but it’s always a little disappointing to see your teams lose no matter the circumstances.  The reality is still that Korea already had a tremendously fine showing in the World Cup that shouldn’t have been in Qatar, by notching a memorable win against Portugal and advancing out of groups.  Those alone are huge achievements for a country oft-ranked among the lower quartile of World Cup teams historically, and no matter the result of the Brazil game, I’m so fucking proud of Korea’s World Cup run, and we’ll always have the fine memories of the win against Portugal.