One New York Life

Fernando Tatis – 2008 salary – $560k. 2009 salary – $1.7M: Did you know that Fernando Tatis wanted to build a church for his home town in the Dominican Republic and the only way he could afford it was by returning to baseball? I do. In fact, I heard the inspiring, feel-good story a bajillion times last year. I don’t want to sound bitter, because it actually WAS a cool feel-good story. I can’t find it in the archives at the moment, but I’m pretty sure I said something like “I’m very happy for Tatis and good job by the Mets for scouting him. Now, let’s hope they let him walk and allow someone else to overpay him for his decline.” Well, at least they only signed him for one year. Tatis is going to wind up platooning with either Daniel Murphy or Ryan Church depend on who gets off to the slowest start or who hits lefties worse. I don’t really expect Tatis to duplicate his .297/.369/.484 in 273 at-bats, but here’s hoping.

Alex Cora – 2008 – Boston Red Sox. 2009 – $2M: For some reason, Mets brass decided that paying Alex Cora $2M for one year was better than paying Alex Cora with power $3.5M for one year. This must be part of Omar Minaya demanding Luis Castillo get playing time so Minaya looks less foolish for the rapidly-approaching-absurd $24M contract. Nothing like sacrificing the good of the team to prove you’re right. I’ll go out on a limb and say that Cora will probably get as many starts at 2b as Castillo does this year — either due to injury or terrible batting. Thank god we have another left-handed bat off the bench.

Angel Pagan – 2008 salary – $401k. 2009 salary – $575k: Pagan was having a nice little year coming off the bench last season until his shoulder sidelined him for the remainder of 2008. This year, he was supposed to be a front-line bench guy again until bone-spur surgery in March put him on the DL until at least May. Whether Pagan is any good for an extended period of time remains to be seen and might end up moot if he winds up being one of those guys who just can’t stay healthy. His bench spot will probably be absorbed by Nick Evans, who was called from AA Binghamton to take his bench spot last year.

Nick Evans – 2008 salary – $403k. 2009 salary – $403k: Nick Evans was called up last season from AA and hit three doubles in his first game. Then he crashed back down to Earth as pitchers realized he was an easy strike out. He ended last season hitting about .250 and leaving his future on the Big Club in doubt. He’s been killing the ball in Spring Training and his .308 average will probably be good enough to play his way on to the 25-man roster as his trial by fire continues at the major league level. Considering the Mets success doing this with Mike Pelfrey (who had a cup of coffee in the minors before joining the Big Club) and Daniel Murphy’s surprise success last year, it seems as if the Mets’ new plan is to have their prospects skip Triple-A and just see what happens. This should be fine so long as it doesn’t crush the soul of 20-year-old kids like it almost did Pelfrey.

Marlon Anderson – 2008 salary – $1.05M. 2009 salary – $1.15M: Anderson is a guy who I have defended as an OK signing because, for whatever reason, he’s good at what he does. Over his career, he carries .275/.340/.413 as a pinch hitter vs. a 2008 league-average .232/.318/.350 at pinch-hitter and his own career line of .265/.314/.391. I know the full-on stathead crowd doesn’t believe that situation matters and that you’re either a good hitter or a bad hitter. For whatever reason, Anderson performs better than average as a pinch-hitter and in a league where you have to pinch hit two or more times a game, I’m fine with this guy having a roster spot.

Corey Sullivan – 2008 Colorado Rockies, 2009 salary – $600k: I didn’t really understand this signing when it happened and I still don’t. The last thing the Mets really needed was a fourth outfielder who bats lefty and who doesn’t bat particularly well. I presume he was supposed to fill Endy Chavez’s role as late-game defensive replacement for Daniel Murphy, who’s still defensively green in the outfield. As of yesterday, Sullivan has been banished optioned to Siberia Buffalo. I probably shouldn’t have included him for that reason but I’ve been dying to get that joke in to this preview and I’m going to wear it out for the next few seasons.

Jeremy Reed – 2008 Seattle Mariners. 2009 salary – $925k: Reed was a toss-in in the JJ Putz deal. Considering the Mets’ good luck with “throw-ins” I’m going to go ahead and be happy about this. With Sullivan’s demotion to Triple-A, it seems they’ve decided that they’ll go with this particular lefty fourth outfielder instead of the other lefty fourth outfielder for the bench. This should work out smashingly considering the two starting corner outfielders are also lefties. If only there had been an incredible right-handed corner outfielder available in the offseason.

Ramon Castro – 2008 salary – $1.85M. 2009 salary – $2.5M: You know your bench is built somewhat poorly when your best right-handed bat off the bench is your backup catcher. The sad part about this whole thing is I’m pretty sure he’s our better catcher. He calls a better game, has similar defense, and is a better hitter than Brian Schneider. Unfortunately, his — uh — portly frame renders him pretty much unable to be the every day catcher. On the positive, I get another full year of Trap Jaw jokes.

Daniel Murphy – 2008 – minors. 2009 salary $401k: Really, I would not want to be Daniel Murphy. The organization has essentially said “We don’t need Manny. We got Murphy.” Not a good place to be, really. Not for anyone. Murphy appeared in 49 games last season and got a ridiculous amount of home-grown player love. He finished the season with a respectable .313/.397/.473. Fans fell in love with him for his desperate attempt to win the division against the Cubs with a lead-off triple. I had a Mancrush. Everything was great. Unfortunately, if reports are to be believed, the Wilpons actively blocked Omar Minaya from signing Manny in the offseason — stating “we don’t want his clubhouse baggage” instead of “we lost $300M with Bernie Madoff”. Because of this, the organization has sold Daniel Murphy as the reason the Mets didn’t need to sign Manny. Good luck with that, guys. Really. This won’t come back to bite you in June when you’re down 3 games as the Kool-aid drinkers finally realize the team desperately needs a good right-handed bat and you had the opportunity to sign the best in the league 3 months ago. But, yeah, the rookie should be fine.

Prediction: Murphy isn’t quite what we thought and “We Should Have Gotten Manny” stories appear by June 1st. Murphy is next year’s opening day 3B starter when David Wright replaces Carlos Delgado at 1B.

Carlos Beltran – 2008 salary – $18.5M. 2009 salary – $18.5M: There’s not a whole lot to say about Beltran. There are still insane Met fans who root against him because his first year was bad, he struck out looking in the NLCS, and owns poodles. These people are hardly worth talking to because they can’t ever offer a plan of what to do when he’s gone — you know, because power-hitting center fielders are so easy to come by. These are the people who would tell you they’d rather have a fiery player than a good player. They want Beltran to care when he strikes out in one of his 600 at-bats. He doesn’t. Get over it and realize he’s about the only guy who delivered clutch hits down the stretch last season.

Prediction: Beltran finally puts everything together and has a 30/30 year. Chris Russo says he still isn’t that impressive and talks about trading him for Nate McLouth.

Ryan Church – 2008 salary – $2M. 2009 salary – $2.8M (avoided arbitration): Before the organization tried to permanently injure Ryan Church’s brain during his concussion, he was putting together quite the year. In his first 49 games, Church showed Omar was somewhat justified in shipping Lastings Milledge off for Church and Brian Schneider. A .903 OPS through 187 PA was outperforming most expectations. The media really didn’t believe that a guy who historically could not hit lefties would suddenly figure it out. Church did. Then his brain got rattled and the Mets proved to be completely inept in dealing with head injuries. After getting concussed, Church was allowed to play a couple days later because he “felt fine” and then was sent on a cross-country flight. When his doll’s eyes at the plate weren’t enough to go on, his eventual vomiting fits were and he went on the DL. When all was said and done, Church was absent (physically or mentally) from May 26th to August 22nd. His September was somewhat disappointing. Since I have no real idea what to think of Church, I’m going to give him the benefit of the doubt until he gives me a reason to do otherwise. He seemed to have no problems hitting lefties last year and I’d guess the right field job is his until he proves otherwise. I’m not going to hold last September against him or his rattled dome.

Prediction: Church gets off to a slow start because of the Mets’ dogged insistence of batting Luis Castillo second. When Castillo finally gets demoted to eighth and Church goes back to hitting second, all becomes right with the universe.

As always, salary info courtesy of the awesome Cot’s Baseball Contracts and stats courtesy of the awesomer Baseball Reference.

C – Brian Schneider: 2008 salary – $4.9M. 2009 salary – $4.9M. Walk year: One of my favorite, least talked about statistics from this past season. Mets pitchers with Schneider behind the plate: .254/.334/.407. Mets pitchers with Ramon Castro behind the plate: .238/.307/.366. The organization is in love with Schneider. I guess he’s the best option at the moment. Castro’s knees would explode if he was asked to squat for 120 games.

Prediction: Schneider walks next year. The Mets resign Ramon Castro and a Molina.

1B – Carlos Delgado: 2008 salary – $16M. 2009 salary – $12M. Walk year. I don’t know what to make of Carlos Delgado’s 2008. He had one of the better 2nd halves that I’ve ever seen. From the day Willie Randolph was fired through the end of the season, Delgado appeared in 92 games, hit 27 home runs, 102 RBI, and put up a line of .291/.374/.597. It’s a somewhat disconcerting thought that Delgado dogged the first 70 games of the season because he didn’t like Willie Randolph, but there it is. Regardless, as power hitting 1B go, Delgado’s a bargain at $12M and even if he can spread his 27 home runs and 102 RBI out over the season instead of 90 games, he’s well worth what the Mets are paying him. I expect a pretty huge year out of Delgado. In spring training, at least, he seems much more willing to check his swing and go the other way when teams play the shift. I still find it baffling he isn’t told to put the ball down the third base line when every infielder is playing on the right side of second, but I guess that’s some sort of baseball insult I don’t understand.

Prediction: Delgado has a great season and returns to the AL as a designated hitter in 2010.

2B – Luis Castillo: 2008 salary – $6M, 2009 salary – $6M, $18M guaranteed through 2011: I find it necessary to again fully disclose that I’ve defended this contract. They are pretty much locked in to this guy so much that they let the better-in-every-conceivable-way-and-some-inconceivable-ways Orlando Hudson go to the Dodgers for an embarrassingly low $3M. This contract will sit on Omar Minaya’s head every offseason until 2012. It’s gone from head-scratching to terrible to borderline unconscionable in about 18 months. It’s way too much money for what Castillo brings to the table and is completely untradeable without the Mets eating most of it. The only possible bright-spot in this otherwise awful situation is that hopefully Jerry Manuel will threaten his life for going off on his own to sacrifice bunt with no out in the first inning. Manuel also seemed much more willing to stick Castillo in the 8-slot where he generally belongs instead of wasting him in a 2-slot that much better populated with Ryan Church or Carlos Beltran.

Prediction: The Mets make a trade-deadline bid for Orlando Hudson and send Castillo, half his salary, and a pitching prospect to the Dodgers when they’re out of it by mid-June.

3B – David Wright: 2008 salary – $5M. 2009 salary – $7.5M: Mike Francesa lit a fire under Met fans after last season by calling Wright unclutch. Most of the argument stemmed from one at-bat in last season’s second-to-last series. Against the Cubs, game tied, rookie Mancrush Daniel Murphy leads off the bottom of the 9th with a triple. Everyone in the universe is thinking “we take this, season’s over.” Wright comes up with the building rocking… takes to 3-0… foul, foul, done. It’s completely and totally unfair to put a 2nd late season collapse on him — but it was then that I knew the Mets weren’t going to get in the playoffs. Francesa fueled the fire by saying the Mets should explore trading Wright or Reyes, which kicked off the predictable phone calls, which kicked off the theme “he’s not the best young player in the league. If you were offered Chase Utley or Ryan Howard for him, you’d take it in a second.” The problem Mets fans have is the not-so-distant memory of Derek Jeter breaking in the league and winning four World Series. They got agonizingly close in his second year. What everyone immediately forgot was that Wright was The Collapse away from winning the 2007 NL MVP. He was a one-man wrecking crew in The September That Never Happened. That August and September saw him hit 12 HR, 40 RBI, 40/27 BB/K, with a line of .372/.474/.628. He’s a fantasy stud who just doesn’t hit in the last three innings. We’ve convinced ourselves that the team choked the season away (again) because the bullpen gave up lots of runs. They also did it because the team didn’t score after the 6th inning. The team OPS in innings 1-3 is .840, .761 in 4-6, .690(!) in 7-9, and .636 (166 PA) in extra innings. We can dishonestly put it all on the bullpen, but the offense fails as a team late in the game. Argue demoralization because of the terrible bullpen? Maybe… but let’s not pretend the entire problem is one-sided.

Prediction: Wright strikes out in the bottom of the ninth in one at-bat and Met fans declare that he’s a choker who we’ll never win with. The more reasonable among us ask who we’re replacing him with.

SS – Jose Reyes: 2008 salary – $4M. 2009 salary – $5.75M: I’m going to go ahead and use the same paragraph I used in the postmortem: Met fans have to understand that Jose Reyes is the over-celebrating douche that you hated in some league you played in at some point in your life. A guy bouncing around the bases, dancing, and being obnoxious is going to raise everyone’s ire. This Mets’ team has to realize that if this guy is going to be annoying that every single team in the NL East is going to get up to play them. If you’re unstoppable (like the 1986 team) that’s one thing. If you’re mediocre, people are going to revel in destroying you. The Cardinals in 2006 did not start a “JOOOSEEEEEEE JOSE JOSE JOSE” chant in the locker room because they hated the fans. The Marlins did not mistakenly come to Shea with nothing to play for the last week and kick the Mets for fun. The Phillies did not put a picture of Jose Reyes on Shane Victorino’s locker following his celebration along the basepaths with “Calm down, Jose” written on it as a joke. If you want to be dicks, that’s fine… just understand that you need to play at 125% every night and no one is going to give you an easy time of it. With that rant done, Reyes isn’t going anywhere nor should he. Also, if someone could figure why he precipitously drops off in September, it’d go a long way toward fixing the team’s problems.out his precipitous production drop-off in September.

Prediction: Reyes and K-Rod create a save dance involving props and noisemakers. Someone comes out of the crowd in Citizen’s Bank Park and spears one of them.

Bohemian Pilsener
Brewed By: Matt Brewing Company
Brewed In: Utica, NY
Type: Pilsner
ABV: 4.8%

What They Say: Saranac Bohemian Pilsener is a medium bodied Pilsener crafted like the original Pilseners of Czechoslovakia. Brewed with the finest Pilsener malt and Saaz hops, you will find this beer has a crisp, clean taste and leaves you wanting another. Enjoy!

Website: Saranac passes my muster for a good website. Navigation on top, everything easily noticeable and findable without much work. Well done, guys.

Why I Picked It: Another new beer making it’s debut in the 12 Beers and the third of a six-part series. This new apparently eliminates their Scotch Ale, of which all trace has been removed from their website and may now only exist in my head.

—–

Presentation: The Bohemian Pilsener goes for the relaxing light tan hue with a painting of mountain, pine trees, and whitewater. I will say — kind of an odd selection for a winter sampler pack. Pilseners seem somewhat spring/summery to me, so I don’t know. 3

Originality: I don’t think originality is what they’re going for with this beer. It’s a Pilsener. A standard, golden, tasty pilsener. 2

Taste: I’ve never really gotten the whole pilsener thing. Like, it tastes fine. It’s inoffensive. It’s got a crisp, clean flavor and finishes plain. Nothing fancy — just a watery kind of almost American-type ale deal. It’s tasty and satisfying without that weird sort of tinny aftertaste found in some pilseners. I like it, but it’s kind of boring. If you’re a pilsener guy, though, this is a pretty good one. 7

Body: As previously mentioned, the pale straw flavor and decent head starts and finishes crisp and clean. It’s refreshing, if a little boring. I’m having trouble with the pilsener in a 12 Pack that’s supposed to have winter beers, but isn’t really something to penalize here. 7

Efficiency: They claim 4.8% ABV. I am right on the border of calling shenanigans on that claim. While I’m usually one to rate beers that you can drink all day pretty highly for efficiency, when they literally go down like water, with the same effect. Not a lot of points here. Boring beer with low ABV is not something I’m going to go out of my way to drink. Ever.4

Versatility: Start drinking this at five o’clock and you’ll still be going strong at five the next morning. I used the two of these in the sampler pack as palette-cleansing buffers between the other heavy beers. This feels like a beer you could drink until you got bored. It’s even called “Bohemian” so you can show your snobby friends how edgy you are. 10

The Snob Says: The pilsener is good. I really don’t like its inclusion in the 12 Beers Of Winter. I expect this case to be filled with stouts, porters, and dark ales. This would have been much better suited as a premiere in their 12 Beers Of Summer. Just not a winter beer for me.

Final Grade: 33 (of 50) – Good beer.

An entire 90 minute movie and a trip to Germany based on the premise that someone blocked your E-MAIL address? F*ckin… really? Who wrote this movie? A 95-year-old retired coal miner?

Other than that — nothing says funny like a movie that hits on every good European stereotype.

On Friday night, I was out with the Big Show to watch the Siena game. A text message came in at 11:17pm:

Last BSG was great. It was happy, sad, and hopeful(?) all in one. Not since All Good Things am I sad a series ended. I want that quoted in your blog.
– Dapper D

Most people who’ve read this space for any amount of time know that I consider All Good Things… probably the best series finale of all-time. I’ve been known to express drunken mobile love for it. Putting it up on that pedestal, for me, is high praise. I had a chance last night, finally, to set aside two hours and watch it.

Masterpiece.

It hit all the points it had to as a finale. One final battle between the humans and the Cylons for control of the future. A last siege against the enemy. One final mystery to solve. And finally the resolution of the prophecies we’ve been being fed since season one. Galactica herself was the dying leader that heralded humanity to its new home and died of a wasting disease before making it to Earth. Kara Thrace did lead humanity to its end. Humanity, as they knew it, died out on Earth. Hera’s descendants, the Colonial and Cylon mix, are the ones who went on. It’s a very specific message. Survival depended on both races coming together and compromising. The result of that compromise, Hera’s bloodline, is what survived. For a series that seemed to pride itself on being morbid, the finale delivered hope. I don’t think the episode’s name is a mistake. After years of death and doom and darkness, a new day — a new beginning — finally broke.

The final episode was filled with iconic moments that I’ll remember. Adama sitting on the hillside with Roslin’s tomb describing the cabin he was going to build. Lee and Starbuck having a final conversation before she moved on. Sam bringing Galactica into its funeral pyre. Cavil finally deciding the jig was up and ending it. Boomer’s redemption and final words. Roslin and Cottle’s good-bye. An absurdly-teary, happy moment when Helo made it — a nod to the one guy who unquestionably followed his principles and judged people on their character instead of their species. The completely and totally believable evolution of Gaius Balthar — a scientist who aggressively didn’t believe in God at the beginning of the show, earnestly and honestly delivering a speech about angels to the Cylons attacking Galactica. He couldn’t have delivered that speech at any other point in the series with it not seeming totally out-of-character.

I knew there would be plenty of places for negative opinion. This is the Internet, after all. The complaints fell in to two major categories: 1) The writers copped out and went with a deus ex machina this was all magic closing. 2) The finale took the the series out of science fiction and brought it in to religious fiction.

To the first — I don’t think you can complain about the magical Hand Of God guiding the ending when you’ve been invested in a show that’s flat-out referred to the magical Hand Of God as a major plot point. Inner Six told Baltar in Season One (I think) that she was an Angel sent from Heaven to guide him. Just because we assumed, at the time, that she was being less than honest doesn’t mean we can pretend she never said it. While I’ve certainly complained about the religious sub-plots and overtones of the show I can’t honestly say the resolution came out of nowhere. Even worse, I’ve read a few folks comparing the “all this has happened before — this will happen again” cycle to the ending of the Dark Tower’s ending. It’s very rare one can prove they totally missed two points at the same time, but this is one of them. The Dark Tower was a work of meta-fiction that ended how it had to. Galactica was not. It’s not even in the same ballpark.

Ironically, I just mentioned The Hand Of God as a horrific cop-out in relation to The Stand. It’s not the same thing here. In The Stand, the only character who believed God was involved was Mother Abigail. God took no side and everything else was easily explained by biology. In the last 50 pages, God decides to nuke Vegas so the good guys win. It was a cop-out. Galactica, on the other hand, has been telegraphing this ending for most of the series. The people complaining about deus ex machina are ignoring the fact deus ex machina has been a running theory on the show for the entire run. Inner Six and Inner Baltar WERE deux ex machina made characters. The idea that God was guiding the humans and Cylons has always been there. Starbuck’s body was on Earth One and she was still on the show. Anyone who didn’t want to see the Hand Of God were just actively ignoring it.

As for the argument that the finale brought it over to religious fantasy. So? I understand that the The Cult Of New And Stylish Internet Atheists And Agnostics have to trash everything that remotely comes close to suggesting there COULD be a God out there. Sorry you spent five years watching a show beating you over the head about the existence of God and gods and then, surprise, turns out to be about an entity not of the Earth. It has never NOT been partially religious fantasy. Whether you chose to notice is on you.

All that said, I could have done without the final scene with Gauis and Six walking around New York City talking about the universe. I understand the point was to communicate that the world is descended from Hera, but the whole thing seemed goofy. A better ending, for me, would have been Adama at Roslin’s grave. Regardless, calling this finish a cop-out when The Sopranos redefined the cop-out not five years ago is absurd.

I’ve only watched it once. I saved it along with the penultimate episode (Islanded in a Stream of Stars) so I can watch it all in one three-hour block. I lived and died with TNG for many very important years. One of the first television cliffhangers I ever called someone to talk about was The Best Of Both Worlds. I was twelve years old. My inner nerd circle wasn’t very large in 1990 but had I been of the age to blog about it (and blogs existed) I probably would have written about it. I spent the next five years religiously watching TNG and trying to convince my father it was the far-superior show (he agrees now). TNG’s finale was the first television show after which it felt like my life had changed. Not in some philosophical sense, but the idea that the show was out of my life. It made me sad. I didn’t have that experience with BSG because I turbo-watched the series over the last six months. I’m not ever going to have that idea of looking forward to next season. All of that said, if pressed, I couldn’t tell you which finale was more satisfying. That’s a huge admission for me. All Good Things… has held up tremendously well for 15 years. Daybreak might but we won’t know for a few years. A mark of good sci-fi/fantasy is that it’s timeless. BSG and its finale has that feel.

If I do have a complaint, it’s with the decision to include a longer, uncut version of the finale on DVD. I don’t mind alternate endings with movies. But when you create a finale this well done, this should be what you go off in to the sunset with. I don’t want their to be a second, longer “director’s cut” of the finale. I don’t care about it. I want the series to be put to bed with what you decided was right for television.

Amazing job. Great series. Thanks, Doug.

I finally saw this on the train coming back from Boston. I remain one of the only people on Earth that doesn’t get the whole Gwyneth Paltrow thing.

I was never an Iron Man fan (I followed X-Books and Superman almost exclusively) so I can’t argue any specifics about how well it follows canon or anything. But from what I know of Tony Stark, it seemed like a great portrayal. If I had one complaint it was that Robert Downey Jr played Tony Stark a little too close to Christian Bale’s Bruce Wayne. Downey, however does the character much better than Bale. I don’t buy Bale’s rich playboy as much as Downey’s… probably because Downey’s been that guy for quite some time.

In a show of either how quickly things slip my mind or how little I was in to this show, I completely forgot my intention to Netflix the final season when it became available. I finished season three last April and season four sat in my queue for quite some time. As it’s tax season, stuff gets watched. The last three seasons can be found right here.

I made a surprising number of notes while watching the final 13 episodes.

The Good

• One of my ongoing themes is that this show perfectly analyzes what the government response would be if suddenly human beings started to develop super powers. The xenophobic response from most of the country and politicians trying to build careers on it is done very, very well. They would continue to push until a 4400 responded and then use that person as a scapegoat to push though Patriot Act-esque legislation. It took 133 issues of X-Men to develop Senator Kelly and 141 issues to conceptualize the Mutant Control Act. Our government would be much more efficient.
• A perfect example was the outlawing of and strict penalties for taking the promicin shot. If you recall from season three, Messiah character Jordan Collier helped develop a shot which would either allow a person to develop a 4400-like ability or kill them. The government response (another excellent theme explored by the show — the ineffectualness of drug laws) is to outlaw the possession of promicin and to make testing promicin-positive a crime in itself. The registered 4400s must present themselves to NTAC (the federal government branch of Homeland Security tasked with preventing 4400 related crime), register their ability and, if it’s deemed a danger, go on a regiment of “inhibitor” or be imprisoned. The idea of our government not grasping the fact they are effectively creating a prison deterrent for a product that will immediately kill half the people who use it is completely and totally believable. Like, maybe someone should put together a profile of people who are willing to toss a coin where heads means “kill yourself” and compare that to the promicin legislation. Just a thought.
• When Shawn uses The 4400 Center to develop a test better indicating whether a person will survive the promicin shot, the central conflict of the season finally comes up. Collier believes for everyone to be equal that everyone on Earth must take the shot. He believes Shawn’s path creates two classes of people (positives with abilities and negatives without) who will always be at conflict. This seems to be what the bad guys (The Marked… more on them later) want. While we never really get a definite answer, the future seems to be a burnt out husk where people with abilities lord other people without them. This is the future the bad guys want to maintain. Which means that the viewer is supposed to either root for Magneto Collier’s “kill half the people on the planet” genocide or Professor Xhawn’s “live in harmony but maybe with mass slavery” theory. If you find yourself rooting for Collier, you’re really sort of rooting for a holocaust. Collier’s entire movement is based on killing off everyone who, by accident of birth, doesn’t display a gene mutation allowing them to survive the shot. AND HE WAS KIND OF THE GOOD GUY. Getting away with that is a great bit of writing and I tip my cap. It’s a really good moral-gray-area conflict.

The Bad

• The 50/50 chance between death and superpowers, while cool on paper, ended up an unimpressive plot device. Because of the nature of television, NO ONE important who took the shot died which made it come across as a free ticket to power for everyone other than the character who died in season three to establish that it killed people. I don’t think the viewer was able to properly grasp the whole “genocide” thing. NTAC display lots of righteous indignation about how the promicin shot will kill half the people who take it, but the whole idea of 150 million dead Americans and 3 BILLION bodies world-wide is never driven home. The series finale is the ONLY episode that properly addresses the body count. Shawn’s annoying little brother takes the shot and his ability creates an airborne virus version of the promicin shot. Half the people around him, including his own mother, start dropping dead — coughing blood and bleeding from the eyes. It’s the first and only time they really address the body count. It should have been addressed way sooner.
• Speaking of Shawn’s brother… the show uses a Heroes-esque “You develop a power you subconsciously want” thing. Since Danny wanted to take the shot but didn’t have the stones until he knew it wouldn’t kill him, the power he develops is to take that choice away from people. Perfectly fine. When they put him on inhibitors, the promicin builds up in his body and will eventually kill him. He asks his brother to put him out of his misery and Shawn inexplicably agrees. Now, we know Jordan Collier’s 4400 ability is to remove abilities from people who got them via the promicin shot. We know Collier has no intention on forcing promicin shots on people (his whole movement is based on making a choice). It doesn’t even cross Shawn’s mind to say “hey, Danny, hang out here in a secure room for a bit while I ask Collier to suck the ability out of you”? His go-to is “yeah, I lost my mom today but, f*ck it — we’ll get all this out of the way now”? I think it was supposed to be a powerful death scene but one of two things came out of it: Either 1) Shawn didn’t want to help his brother because he was upset about Danny unintentionally killing their mom or 2) the viewer ends up more confused then Nathan having to fly away with Peter in the Heroes season one finale. It might be the most pointless “we need to kill some people in the finale” deaths since Anya’s demise in the Buffy finale.
• Diana Skouris’s sister April remained barely less annoying than Kim Bauer. She developed an ability that forced people to tell her the truth. She used this to blackmail people. And she thought it a good idea to blackmail someone who was trying to kill someone else. This ended about as you can imagine. And again — she took the shot, got a really helpful power, was an idiot, and was drafted by the government in to a high-paying a job. The bodies weren’t exactly piling up.
• The Marked. OK, so the bad guys in the future create a process by which they can take over people’s bodies. The process leaves a tell-tale mark behind the left ear of those who have been “Marked.” In perspective, the good guys on this show can inject people with superpowers and send them back with no outward signs. The bad guys leave a creepy mark indicating that they’re bad guys. Of course, instead of injecting the person and keeping him out of the way until the takeover is complete, they inject him in a horrifically obvious way and let people get really suspicious before the takeover is complete. And it was never really adequately explained why the Marked can only travel back in time while the good guys can go in both directions. On my evil warlord list is to develop a process by which the only tell-tale mark of takeover is on the taint. They can look there, but who’d want to?
• To continue, it’s established that the Marked, when discovered, kill their host bodies and are later injected in to a new host. If that’s the case, why didn’t Baldwin kill himself immediately after he knew his cover was blown?
• As a note to all future sci-fi/fantasy writers: there doesn’t always HAVE to be a prophecy. Really. Sometimes, stuff just happening can be sufficient. Especially when the prophecy doesn’t show up until the fourth season. Kyle’s ability to see a hot redhead who delivers him prophetic messages was just… kinda dumb. It was never really explained either. Which side was she on? Was she in his head? Was she delivering messages from the future? And why and/or how did someone in the 1920s write a book foretelling everything? Did the future send someone back who knew? It seemed like a silly side-story that added nothing to the overall theme other than giving Kyle something to do. And really, he just ended up seemingly like an easily-manipulated dummy. If that was the point then huzzah; mission accomplished.

The Rest

The biggest knock on this series is that a lot of the acting was really, really bad. I don’t think it’s a mistake that much of the cast doesn’t have a ton of IMDB entries after this show. It’s soap-level acting bad and, my friends, that’s bad.

On top of that, the finale left me kind “meh.” The promicin virus halved the population of Seattle and Collier’s people had to bring order to the city. At the end, Collier takes over Seattle. Now, I can suspend my disbelief pretty far, but I find it really hard to believe that this declaration lasts more than like 30 seconds. We know the government has already developed a Super Soldier program — is it that unreasonable to believe they haven’t figured out Shawn’s test considering they have entire teams of scientists instead of one kinda-crazy guy who’s hung up on a schizophrenic girl? At some point, don’t you pretty much come to “the US Government drops a nuke on Seattle” or “The government invades Seattle with an army of Super Soldiers”?

I don’t know. I feel like an act of high treason followed by Maya’s statement that “we’re in charge. It’s better this way” was a bit over the top. At the end of season three, I mentioned I’d avoid the series. In retrospect, that’s not entirely true. The good parts were good. It’s just some of the plot holes and bad parts were so bad and now, knowing there isn’t a very satisfying end, it just leaves me kind of empty. I’m not sure how I’d end it — I just know it wouldn’t be with a 4400 takeover of Seattle.

India (style) Brown Ale
Brewed By: Saranac Brewery
Brewed In: Utica, NY
Type: Brown Ale
ABV: 6.0%

What They Say: Taking an India Ale to the next level, Saranac India Brown Ale has the malt backbone to carry the hoppiness you expect in an India Ale. Carefully selected malts from North America and Europe are decoction mashed to highlight their character and the brew is complimented with generous amounts of citrusy Columbus, Cascade and Centennial hops. Cheers!

Website: Saranac passes my muster for a good website. Navigation on top, everything easily noticeable and findable without much work. Well done, guys.

Why I Picked It: Part two of the 12 Beers of Winter series. This is another new beer making its debut in the 12 Beers. We’ll say this replaces Oatmeal Stout since they’re trying to sneak the same label painting past us. Quick aside, this is one of the reasons I love Saranac’s Winter and Summer Samplers. They actually use it to debut new stuff. The 12 Beers Of Summer this year will debut FOUR new beers. Compare this to Sam Adams’s sampler packs which offers two Boston Lagers and two Sam Lights. This almost makes up for the decision to drop from one each of 12 beers to two each of six beers. Don’t they realize that having one each in a 12-pack could get me through THREE MONTHS of columns?

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Presentation: Saranac goes for the brown label here with a autumn looking brown scene with a lovely little stream with the mountains in the background. In the foreground is two cute lil bears. 3

Originality: I am sure someone else has done this beer. The idea of “let’s take an IPA and mess with it and try to make it beer” can’t be new. Regardless, I’m pretty sure it’s the first time I’ve seen someone market something as an India Brown Ale, so points there. 3

Taste: It’s funny how things work out. I was really excited by the Vanilla Stout and ended up indifferent to it. I was really not excited about the IBA and loved it. The deep maltiness totally counteracts the brutal hoppiness that makes me hate IPAs. The hoppiness is still there, but it isn’t the first, last, and only taste. All the stuff I like about browns is enough to kill off the hint of pine-coney awful that I don’t. 7

Body: This beer’s body isn’t setting the world on fire. It’s thin and hoppy like you’d expect from an India-style Ale but has the brown malt’s strength. The problem I have is too much of it sticks around too long because of the India Style. I’m not a huge fan of the dry-mouth IPA factor and this has all that combined with dry-mouth brown ale feature. Not a huge fan of either, but points for trying. 6

Efficiency: The beer is a sneaky 6.0. Sneaky because it’s really tasty and really easy to drink and it’s right on the edge of being a Big Beer. The problem is the India style hoppiness is present enough to give you that annoying IPA dry-tongue. The strong ABV isn’t quite enough to counteract the lingering IPAness, but it’s close. 7

Versatility: If anything, this beer would make a good punchline if you could buy it in a six-pack. You could bring it in to a room of snobs and when they ask you about your IPA, you can laugh at them and tell them you don’t drink that crap. Then you can laugh maniacally and reveal that you actually have an IBA and smugly tell them if you wanted a pinecone, you’d go outside and eat one. 6

Final Grade: 32 (of 50) – Good beer.

Like everyone, I do a bracket. Up until six years ago, I tried to research. That year, my mom won our bracket pool by picking colleges in better vacation locations (Syracuse over Kansas because of its proximity to wineries). That same year, I did two brackets. A researched one, and one constructed by a series of rules that make no sense to anyone but me. The stupid rules did better (in fact, it also picked Syracuse as the winner that year and my bracket hit 25th in ESPN’s Bracket Challenge). These rules perform better than I ever did. For the first time ever, I’m going to try and encode them.

Midwest
Round 1

• Louisville over Play-in: 1-seed in the first round rule.
• Siena over Ohio St.: Two rules come in to conflict here: Siena wins at least one rule vs. playing in their home state rule. For the first time, I’ve had to decide that the Siena rule trumps.
• Utah over Arizona: Schools from cold-weather climates play better in the tournament than schools from warm-weather climates. Cold schools have had nothing to do for months.
• Wake Forest over Cleveland St.: When no other rules apply… higher seed.
• West Virginia over Dayton: Never take a school named after a B-city.
• Kansas over North Dakota St.: Don’t trust schools with “State” in their name.
• BC over USC: Geographical rule: Northeast over California
• Michigan St. over Robert Morris: Never trust schools named after people.

Round 2

• Siena over Louisville: Siena gets in to the Sweet Sixteen.
• Wake Forest over Utah: Geographical rule. South over midwest.
• Kansas over West Virginia: States known for big cornfed white boys over the south.
• Boston College over Michigan St.: Choose the city that would be more enticing and never trust schools with State in their name.

Sweet Sixteen

• Wake Forest over Louisville: Closer college road trip.
• Kansas over Boston College: Geographic. Middle of the country over Northeast… especially when being played in the middle of the country.

Bracket Winner
Kansas over Wake Forest: When in doubt and there’s a college within road-trip distance… road trip.

West
Round 1

• Connecticut over Chattanooga: 1-seed in the first round rule.
• A&M over BYU: Colleges named after people.
• Purdue over Northern Iowa: Never trust schools with geographic disclaimers in their names.
• Washington over Mississippi St.: State and Road Trip rules.
• Marquette over Utah St.: Schools with “state” in the name.
• Missouri over Cornell: Never trust the Ivy League over the south.
• Maryland over California: It’s far too nice in California to worry about basketball. It’s not nice in Maryland… ever.
• Memphis over Cal St: See above… without the Maryland thing.

Round 2

• Connecticut over A&M: Weather rule.
• Washington over Purdue: Road trip rule.
• Marquette over Missouri: Geographic… cold and north over warm and south.
• Memphis over Maryland: When conflicting rules apply and the seeding is more than 5, go with the seeding. I’m not a crazy man.

Sweet Sixteen

• Connecticut over Washington: Geography. Northeast over the West Coast.
• Marquette over Memphis: Weather. Cold over warm.

Bracket Winner
Connecticut over Marquette: Seeding rule.

East
Round 1

• Pittsburgh over East Tennessee State: State. Geographic. Weather. So many rules
• Tennessee over Oklahoma State: State rule.
• Florida State over Wisconsin: Schools that generally care more about sports than academics get exempted from regional rule and the state rule.
• Xavier over Portland State: State rule. Professor X rule.
• UCLA over VCU: “Commonwealth” counts in the State Rule.
• Villanova over American: Playing in your own state rule.
• Minnesota over Texas: Weather rule.
• Duke over Binghamton: As much as I’d like to adopt a SUNY rule… Duke in Greensboro? Really?.

Round 2

• Pittsburgh over Oklahoma State: State rule. Road trip rule
• Xavier over Florida State: Professor X rule.
• Villanova over UCLA: Home state rule.
• Duke over Minnesota: Home state rule.

Sweet Sixteen

• Pittsburgh over Xavier: Road trip rule.
• Villanova over Duke: Road trip rule.

Bracket Winner
Pittsburgh over Villanova: When you got nothing, go with the seeding.

South
Round 1

• UNC over Redford: 1-seed
• Butler over LSU: Geographic. Middle America over south.
• Illinois over Western Kentucky: Geographic and State rule.
• Gonzaga over Akron: Gonzaga always wins two rounds.
• Temple over Arizona State: Weather and geography.
• Syracuse over Stone Cold Steve Austin: Schools named after people.
• Clemson over Michigan: The geography falls apart when facing the south in the south.
• Oklahoma over Morgan State: State rule.

Round 2

• UNC over Butler: Home state rule
• Gonzaga over Illinois: Gonzaga rule.
• Syracuse over Temple: I heart Syracuse rule.
• Oklahoma over Clemson: Geography rule.

Sweet Sixteen

• UNC over Gonzaga: UNC in the south.
• Syracuse over Oklahoma: I heart Syracuse rule.

Bracket Winner
Syracuse over UNC: I heart Syracuse.

Final Four

• Kansas over Connecticut: Geography.
• Pittsburgh over Syracuse: Sadly… road trip rule.

Bracket Winner and National Champion
Pittsburgh over Kansas: Road trip rule.