Author: D. Buffa

A regular guy who feels a journalistic hunger to tell the news. I blog because its wired into my brain to write what I think in print. I offer an opinion. A solo tour here. Take regular stories and offer my spin on them. Sports, film, television, music, fatherhood, culture, food, and so on. Commentary on everything. A St. Louis native and Little Rock resident who wants to write just to keep the hands fresh and ready.

Kevin Siegrist: The Comeback Kid of the Cardinals Pen

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I had a problem during Sunday’s game. Kevin Siegrist was in to pitch the 8th inning against the Milwaukee Brewers, and the Cardinals had a 4-3 lead. He allowed a hit, got the next hitter out on a sacrifice, and then Mike Matheny pulled Siegrist for Jonathan Broxton before Khris Davis took his swing. This infuriated me. One reason? Kevin Siegrist shuts righthanded hitters down, better than anyone on the team, including Broxton. Why was Matheny doing this?

The tale didn’t end well. Brox threw a first pitch fastball and Davis planted it in center field. Brewers win. Questioning the move got me some heat because it’s apparently illegal in the Midwest to question a 71-40 team. It just didn’t sit well with me. It also showed something that some mainstream writers have been missing. The brilliant comeback season of Siegrist.

Remember 2013? Siegrist couldn’t be touched. He struck out 50 in 39.1 innings. His WHIP(average walks/hits allowed per inning) was a scintillating 0.88. Siegrist was the bridge of chaos before hitters the ring of fire in the 9th. He was another reason that the Cardinals were revered. Along with Trevor Rosenthal, the bullpen was stacked. After a decent 2013 postseason where Siegrist seemed to finally wear down a bit and the roller coaster started to slip off the rails, it fell off in 2014.

The lefty was stricken with a forearm injury that never went away and sucked up months of his season. He was out of action from May 23rd to July 25th and when he came the results weren’t pretty. Siegrist allowed 15 earned runs in 10.1 innings the rest of the season, striking out 10 but walking 8. His fastball was flat and his breaking pitches sat on a tee. He had lost it and going into the 2015 season, nobody knew if he had it back. He was healthy but was the sizzle from his fastball forever lost.

Siegrist answered quickly. He was firing heat past wooden bats again. The contact was gone. Hitters had no clue, having studied that 2014 tape too much and forgetting what the kid could do. In May and June, Siegrist struck out 17 batters in 12 and 12.1 innings. His walks were down. He wasn’t allowed much. He held games in check for Rosenthal, and also took a few rounds in the 9th inning himself. Siegrist was the everyman for this brutally stout Cards pen. When the rotation needed help, Siegrist helped lead the charge to pick up innings. His 53.2 innings are tied with Rosenthal for the bullpen lead. With Jordan Walden out since late April, Siegrist has forged his role into a multi-faceted attack. He’s done so on the strength of a recovered four seam fastball, a circle changeup and a slider(per Brooks Baseball).

Not too bad for the 1,235th pick in the 41st round in the 2008 draft making 518,000 dollars. Siegrist didn’t disappoint in his June 6th, 2013 debut against Arizona. In 1.2 innings, he struck out 4 batters. Two years later, fans expect that dominance out of the 6 foot 5 215 pound Buffalo, New York native. After a stormy 2013 season, Siegrist is back in a big way.

Sunday, here’s why I wanted Siegrist to stay in there, just so I am clear. In 133 at bats against righthanded hitters this season, the lefty has held them to a .150 average(20 hits and 1 home run) while striking out 51 and only walking 8. Against lefties, Siegrist is much more human, allowing a .316 average and walking 11 in less than 60 at bats. The decision to bring in Brox to face Davis was dumbfounding due to Siegrist’s ability to get the job done.

Wednesday night, Siegrist recorded more than 4 outs for the 7th time this season, pitching the 7th and 8th innings to hold the Pittsburgh Pirates at bay for a 4-2 victory that pushed the challenging Bucs team 7 games out of first place. Just the latest example of the man doing his job in a big spot against a great team. The latest appearance in a season that rivals, if not shines brighter, than Rosenthal’s work.

How good is Kevin Siegrist? He has 65 strikeouts in just 53.2 innings, an average of 10.9 strikeouts per 9 innings. You may point to his 11.0 strikeouts per 9 last year, but unlike in 2014, Siegrist isn’t getting clubbed along with the whiffs. His fielding independent ERA(take away his defense) is 2.58. It isn’t the greatest statistic for a reliever, but shows how dominant he has been.

Siegrist isn’t arbitration eligible until 2017 and isn’t a free agent until 2020. He’ll keep doing his thing, deadly style, for another season on the cheap. While he isn’t exactly an unsung hero of this pitching staff, Kevin Siegrist doesn’t get enough credit for the transformation he’s shown this season.

-DLB

Will John Lackey pitch in St. Louis next season?

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imageedit_1_6878099780Ask any saloon owner and the last thing you want to do is lose your best cowboy to another town next season. With the way St. Louis Cardinals starter John Lackey is pitching right now, the question remains swirling around my head. Will he come back and pitch for the Birds next year?

The Texan has turned back the clock in 2015, reaching 10 wins for the 12th consecutive season he’s pitched in. He’s more efficient than ever, racking up a 2.87 earned run average and a 1.18 WHIP with 116 strikeouts in 159.2 innings this season. He’s only walked 38 batters. He scatters singles, allows a lot of singles and the occasional home run but for the most part Lackey has stepped into the Chris Carpenter role since he joined the team last July. He’s an angry man on the mound and lets his emotions fly. He commands respect that other pitchers can only dream of. He’s more than just a talented arm. He’s a simple man with a plan who hasn’t added a pitch in years yet remains efficient.

Is it enough to bring him back next year? Sure it is. I just don’t think Lackey will want what the Cardinals offer him. I don’t see John Mozeliak offering a soon to be 37 year old more than a 1 year deal with the fleet of young pitchers coming up through the minor leagues like a locomotive carrying silver bullets into town. Put yourself in Lackey’s position. If you are pitching this well, and doing it for the bargain price of 500,000 dollars(Cards slipped him a bonus at midseason to enhance the earnings), would you accept a lesser deal at this point in your career?

I think Lackey will look for a parachute deal, something to float away into retirement on top of. He won’t go pitch for the Marlins or anything, but other contending teams will pay him good money and guarantee it for 2-3 seasons. I think of the “who comes back” ordeal to center around Jaime Garcia and Lackey. Right now, brittle body or not, Garcia has a better chance of returning simply because he has half the leverage that Lackey does and he needs to prove he can start 25-30 games in a season again.

I’d love to have Lackey stout back for another round of drinks. He’s tough. Once Waino fell down and Lance Lynn struggled a bit early on, Lackey’s role became enhanced this season. With his fine work Saturday night, John Lackey has hurled 12 quality starts in a row, nine of them covering 7 innings or more. He has been one of the most impressive if not the biggest bright spot in the league’s best rotation.

Enjoy him while he’s here folks. Lackey is exactly the guy the Cards need in the postseason, a guy who has closed out two teams on two different teams to win the World Series(including the Cardinals in 2013). As a competitor taking the ball every five days, Lackey is one of the best. As the oldest starting pitcher on the Cards, he’s hanging with these younger guns just fine.

While he may not be a Cardinal past 2015, John Lackey has proven to be worth every penny and then some this season. I think that’s enough to sleep on for Cardinals fans.

Hey Cardinals, let’s sign Jason Heyward!

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usa-today-8672658.0(In case you missed it on KSDK)

When the news of the new TV deal between the St. Louis Cardinals and Fox Sports Midwest landed, the first thought that hit my head was simple. It’s time to sign Jason Heyward to a long term deal.

If there was hesitation before, the extra money that kicks in during 2018 demolishes the doubt. As John Mozeliak told KMOX last week, he’s seen enough to know that Heyward belongs in St. Louis for a very long time so let’s wrap it up. He was being brought in to be the cardholder in right field and be the future face of this franchise. He has delivered the play in the field to prove he is worth the big contract.

Heyward turned 26 years old on Sunday, so signing him to a long term deal would be a fine present. Why not? What has Heyward not shown you through four months that was expected?

If you are looking for more power, look elsewhere. No one ever labeled Heyward a home run threat. You don’t see him competing in home run derbies, do you? He’s hit 20+ homers one time, so stop looking for gold there.

Through 107 games and 384 at bats, Heyward is hitting .286 with a .342 on base percentage and a .430 slugging percentage. His strikeout rate is only 17 percent. He has drawn 32 walks. He has 9 home runs and 37 RBI. Heyward has gotten better every month. He has been hitting since May 1st.

Here is his OPS and batting average per month.

April-.611/.217

May-.783/.284

June-.881/.326

July-.806/.312

August-.740/.290(8 games)

In case you have been blinded by the light, Heyward also plays a mean right field, and that includes a missile for a left arm and an ability to make run saving catches. According to Fangraphs, Heyward has saved 13 runs in right field and has an UZR(ultimate zone rating) of 11.8. Adam Jones and Nick Markakis won a Gold Glove with lesser numbers in both categories last season. Heyward’s overall WAR  of 3.8(highest on the team) is powered by his gold glove caliber defense. It’s no lie that his greatest asset is his ability to take hits and runs away in the field, through physical action or reputation. For a team that relies on great pitching being aided by great defense, Heyward is a nice asset to have out there.

He can hit anywhere in the lineup. Clean up, move up to 3rd or slide down to 6th. Did I mention he’s only 26 years old? The capabilities for this guy haven’t reached the roof offensively either, so the baseball card mafia can still hold out some hope for some more boom in that stick. Yes, I’d like a home run from Heyward sometime soon(his last came in Miami on June 24th) but that’s not where his true value is.

Heyward’s value comes in a versatile tool set. He has 18 steals in 20 attempts and he has 24 doubles. He has recaptured the ability to hit lefties this year(.286 in 105 at bats) and hit the ball to the opposite field. When Heyward did display the power back in 2012, he was a big time pull hitter, almost to where teams would shift on him. These days, he’s refined that part of his hitting approach and its fits right in with the Cardinals. Whitey Herzog would have loved to coach Heyward, right?

The time is now to sign Heyward because he is getting more expensive by the week. The closer he gets to free agency the higher his price tag goes. The free agent market this winter will include Heyward, Yoenis Cespedes and Justin Upton as their premier young bats. If the Cardinals let Heyward reach November without a contract, his price will sky rocket. Don’t get into a bidding war with the Yankees. If the money is there, sign Heyward now. The promise of this movie trailer of talent hasn’t disappointed over the first 2/3 of the season. Mo has seen enough, so I expect a deal to get done before the start of September. There’s no reason to wait.

With aging players like Matt Holliday and Yadier Molina reaching their final contracts and their bodies wearing down, it’s important to secure a big piece in the future in Heyward.

How much for his services? The Cards traded a big piece in Shelby Miller to acquire Heyward, so Mo knows the market and the price. A deal like seven years/161 million carries an annual average value of 23 million doesn’t sound bad for either side but it could be higher. That’s a place the Cards could start with at least. Who knows? The next few weeks will tell the tale.

Heyward has shown me enough to want him here long term. Has he done enough for you? Tell me in the comments below.

Is Mark Buehrle Hall of Fame worthy?

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(In case you missed it at KSDK) At the ripe age of 36 years old, Toronto Blue Jays lefthander Mark Buehrle is having a career season. The St. Charles, Missouri native is 13-5 with a 3.31 ERA in one of the toughest divisions when it comes to power bats and high scoring in the Major Leagues. The stat that has marked the time for Buehrle in this league over his 15 year career is durability. Since his first full season as a starter in 2001, he has won at least 10 games every season since and 11 seasons of 13 or more wins. Buehrle has also pitched 200 innings or more in every full season as a starter. All of this considered begs the question. Is Buehrle a future Hall of Famer?

He won a World Series with the Chicago White Sox in 2005. He threw a perfect game on July 23rd, 2009 against the Tampa Bay Rays, which holds a lot more weight than a no hitter these days with the lack of frequency. Buehrle also has 212 wins and counting with 3-4 years left on his career. If he averages 12-13 wins the rest of his career, he’ll end up with around 245-250 wins. His career earned run average is 3.79 with a decent overall WHIP of 1.28. Once again, with the exception of 2012 with the Miami Marlins, Buehrle has amassed these numbers in the tough American League Central and East divisions.

He’s also done it without a power arm. In 155 innings this year, he only has 73 strikeouts. For his career, 3,239.2 innings pitched, Buehrle has 1,852 strikeouts. His strikeouts to walks ratio is around 2.5/1, which is solid and consistent. He has 33 complete games for his career. He doesn’t strike out a lot of guys or allow many walks. He pitches to contact, which may hurt him with the voters who love them some K’s. Efficiency shouldn’t be graded on a curve that supports pitching mound fascism though, right? Over 15 years, Buehrle has gotten the job done. But is it HOF worthy?

Let’s compare it to the latest Hall of Fame inductee, John Smoltz. Some were baffled Smoltz got in but let’s take a look. Over 21 years, Smoltz amassed 215 wins and an earned run average of 3.13 with a WHIP of 1.18 and 3,084 strikeouts in 3,473 innings. Smoltz put together 53 complete games. However, in 6 of those seasons, Smoltz wasn’t a full time starter. He saved 55, 45, 44 games from 2002-04 for the Braves. In the other three, Smoltz only started a combined 25 games. A wrinkle, if a successful interesting one, to a very long career that included a World Series appearance against The Minnesota Twins in 1991 that included a Game 7 duel with Tigers ace Jack Morris. Smoltz flirted with a no-hitter in 2007 but lost it in the 9th inning. Smoltz also won a Cy Young award in 1996.

While Smoltz has the dual sided career as a starter and great yet brief closer with the strikeouts to back it up, Buehrle has been a durable arm with the big career highlights(including four Gold Gloves and five All Star appearances to boot) that has stretched over multiple teams in a tough hitter’s league over 14 seasons. Smoltz was part of the outstanding 1990’s Atlanta dynamo with Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine(also inducted this year), and Steve Avery. Buehrle has anchored many pitching staffs himself.

When Buehrle reached his end, he will have a lot more wins and maybe another World Series title. While he isn’t a lock to be inducted today, if he keeps up this work, Mark Buehrle will demand a fair look at the end. The argument is there.

One more thing. Over his 16 seasons, Buehrle’s WAR(wins above replacement) is 60.8, which comes out to an average of 4.05 per season, an above average mark for a pitcher. Smoltz’s WAR over his 21 seasons is 66.5(an average of 3.16). If you just take Smoltz’s 15 full starter seasons, his average is up to 3.9. If you go old school or new school sabermetric, the numbers don’t put Smoltz too far in front of Buehrle, and it must be pointed out once again. The southpaw isn’t finished yet.

Is Mark Buehrle a Hall of Fame Candidate? Yes he is, especially if he remains consistent. Is he a lock? No.

What do you think?

Should Cardinals fans worry about the Randal Grichuk injury?

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071815-MLB-Randal-Grichuk-LN-PI.vresize.1200.675.high.54Any time a theme park ride closes down, the people waiting in line get mad and depressed. What it would have been like to ride that thing? Right now, across a hot St. Louis, St. Louis Cardinals fans are disheartened by the idea of the Randal Grichuk experience being closed until September. The talented 25 year old rookie of the year candidate is going on the disabled list with a right elbow strain. The complete severity of the injury is unknown, but the warning signs are enough for the team to act quickly after the MRI this morning. Should the fans freak out?

The answer is no. Grichuk, while impressive and durable with the bat, wasn’t powering this offense singlehandedly. This moderate attack doesn’t operate on one boom stick anymore. Grichuk was essentially a sniper in a band of versatile weapons that scratch out just enough runs to help out the best pitching staff in baseball. They still have Stephen Piscotty and Jason Heyward out there(who combined for three home runs Sunday), and Matt Carpenter and Jhonny Peralta have handled business this month.

Grichuk’s power will be missed. The kind of pop that can turn a silent Friday game into a quick Cardinals lead like he did with a 2 run home run against the Marlins. A bat that had grown more lethal over the course of the season. One that accumulated 43 extra base hits(21 doubles, 7 triples, 15 home runs) and a .561 slugging percentage. Sure, he had 97 strikeouts(at least 3 multi-K games every ten game set) but he was drawing more walks as the weeks passed by. Grichuk’s lethal ability to crank baseball 100 mph was only improving so the spectacle will be missed.

What happens next? Tommy Pham will come up, be inserted into the roster and have another chance to showcase his skills. Brandon Moss isn’t going to improve sitting on the bench, so the loss of Grichuk gives him renewed time in left field. Jason Heyward, by the looks of today’s lineup, will get some time in center field while Stephen Piscotty moves to a place he is most comfortable at and that’s right field. The next man up mentality will persevere here.

Why should fans not worry? Remember that great pitching. The pitching that the Cards have built their success on this year didn’t lose an arm today. The starters may have lost some run support with the Grichuk injury but the performance doesn’t expect to be diminished.

After all, look at the losses this lineup has faced this season. Matt Adams since late May. Matt Holliday, except for 10 games, since early June. Jon Jay for the past two months(or all season). Peter Bourjos…oh I forgot, he just doesn’t play that much. Grichuk is the latest blow to a team that knows how to roll with the punches.

While the hottest theme park ride in town heads to the disabled list, guys like Heyward and Piscotty can step up and take over now. Aging AAAA talents like Tommy Pham can rise to the occasion. Kolten Wong, rest or not, can hopefully find comfort in the #2 spot. An offense that struggles to score runs no matter who comes or goes will soldier on top of the best pitching in baseball.

Randal Grichuk isn’t gone for good, folks. He’s just hurt and needs time. Keep your head up and enjoy Cardinals baseball. If any team knows how to endure, it’s the Birds.

The Fog Lights will lift you up on the darkest of days

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Fog Lights 5“Met you a thousand years before…seems like yesterday. Time is like walking through a door. Go through but never go away.”-Lead The Way

The greatest musicians are honest on the stage. They sit or stand, and they play their hearts out, leaving nothing to chance. For they are brittle individuals when they step away from the stage, on it they are kings and queens. Listening to The Fog Lights heart and soul, Justin Johnson and Jim Peters, the immediate connection is forged due to that instant chemistry and honesty. Their debut album, Manhassett, is an album to own and not just rent. It’s a CD you will need on the highest of good days and the lowest of darkest ones as well.

The musicians built a folky pavement for their 12 songs to ride on and it’s an easy going familiar yet potent sound. When folk is done right, it instantly takes you back to a memory in your lifetime. It’s not just about driving down the highway with the window down. Manhassett takes you right back to your high school days, when you didn’t know who you were or what you wanted to be yet. The mystical emptiness that everybody gets sucked up into at some point in their life.

The regretful bluesy “Fear” is a street with littered doubts shaken all around. “Fear is in your heart. That’s the place to start. Second time around. The walls are coming down. If you feel nothing, then it meant nothing at all.”

“I had a dream”, which could be the mantra for all independent fighting musicians, drifts through that moment of grasping an idea and feeling relief. “I felt the breeze, seemed to put me at ease, I can sail the seven seas.”

In what is easily my favorite song on the album(which means it got the most replays and even had my three year old son singing along), “Wait” can be the mountain of contempt we all face on a daily basis. “Running down a stream, change your name for me, those that believe float away. Look out below. The tears of fallen snow is more than we can do or say.” Peters makes “wait on me now” sound like a rally cry for everybody who feels the need to run but are constantly stuck in neutral guarded by cement. Simple acoustic support is all that is needed on this golden track that will sound as crisp and pure in 50 years as it did on a calm Tuesday.

The scared Say Anything ballad “The Real Me” takes you down the time where you first wanted to open up to the one you love but didn’t know how to trust or give a piece of yourself away. “I don’t see the light in you. Other say its shining through. You know I want to treat you right. It’s just most nights I am so tired. Want to finally be, want you to see…the Real Me.”

Johnson and Peters’ biggest weapons here are their soulful voices and acoustic guitars that they swing like samurai sounds across your eardrums, slicing away the harsh reality of your condition while they explain how they came to be.  A banjo, harmonica and backup players may surface here and there, but it’s more or less these two fellas strumming along. That’s all great music is. Someone telling what they are and where they came from through via a tune.

My belief is that in order to give an album a fair shake, a person must listen to it at least three times. It’s like riding in a car. You must take it out for a variety of drives. Test the engine, brakes and see how it makes you feel. When I slipped this disc into my player, I didn’t want to take it out and that’s because Johnson and Peters are storytellers first and foremost. They aren’t fancy, don’t wish to stand toe to toe with U2 or The Rolling Stones. They just want to play music, give you an experience and make you remember what honest good music sounds like. Along the way, you may relax and forget about your problems for a short while.

If you need to see The Fog Lights live in order to truly buy what they are selling, you are in luck because they are playing all around St. Louis in the next few weeks. This Friday, August 7th, they are playing in The Open Highway Music Festival at the Off Broadway Music Venue. On September 5th, they are playing inside the Music Record Shop along with Emily Wallace. On September 8th, they play GadellNet Saturday Sessions at Tower Grove’s Farmer’s Market as part of Twangfest.

You can purchase their CD at any of their shows but first, get a taste by listening to their lead single. When it comes to these guys, it’s simplistic yet potent music that instantly makes you feel. That kind of music doesn’t need a genre. It just takes over. As the band said after their album release show at Blueberry Hill on July 25th via their Facebook page, “Thanks for being a part of this journey. Thanks for believing in music.” The Fog Lights make you believe in music again.

A year later, I miss Robin Williams…a lot

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I miss Robin Williams, a lot, and I’ll tell you why.

There aren’t many actors who could transition seamlessly between comedy and drama. I am talking about inside the same movie, not separate projects. Inside one scene, Williams could go from smiling funny man to hyper serious monologue delivery guy and it was impressive. He cared about the films he did and the people he worked with. He was a 63 year old kid right down to the very end, which came a year ago in his home in California. After battling drug addiction, depression and a new foe in Parkinson’s Disease, Williams took his own life. He did this mere weeks after completing work on an indie drama called Boulevard, with director Dito Montiel. His loss stings a year later.

A month ago, Williams’ often forgotten political satire film, Man of the Year, came on during the morning. What was meant to be a 5 minute glance turned into a 90 minute sitdown with a film I came to admire through multiple viewings. It was about a comedian accidentally being voted President of the United States and the fallout from it. It had Lewis Black, Christopher Walken, Jeff Goldblum and Laura Linney. It wasn’t supposed to work. Williams made it work, with his signature blend of sarcastic comedy and sharp wit.

The best actors aren’t the ones who can mix into an All Star cast and shine. The best ones are the performers who can take an ordinary looking piece of crap and turn it into gold. Williams did with Man of the Year, which was directed by Barry Levinson. There weren’t many actors who could have played this role so well. I felt the same way about another critically maligned film, Patch Adams. It wasn’t supposed to work but Williams made it watchable. He was magnetic, an actor who had a desire to connect with his audience through any means necessary.

In the end, Williams will often be remembered for his work in three films and for good reason. 

1.) Good Morning, Vietnam

2.) Dead Poets Society

3.) Good Will Hunting

Sure, Mrs. Doubtfire can sneak in there but those three are the cornerstones of his long reaching career. He also dueled with Al Pacino in Christopher Nolan’s Alaska thriller, Insomnia. He played Teddy Roosevelt in the Night at the Museum films. He was The Fisher King. The voice of a genie in Aladdin. The doctor in Hugh Grant’s Nine Months. The outrageously funny host in The Birdcage.

When it came to Williams, diversity in the roles he took wasn’t just a factor in his career, it was a necessity. He aimed to try different things and thrill you in different ways. For the moviegoers who hate actors playing the same role over and over, Williams was the opposite. He challenged himself all the way down to the very end. The whole family could enjoy his work.

It’s just so sad that in the end, the actor felt a huge gushing pain in his own life so badly that he chose to end it. Close the curtain early. Stop the show. I wanted more and so did others. I didn’t lie awake at night waiting for another Williams gem, but I was confident in the way the actor could surprise me.

I’ll never forget his character sitting on that park bench, which has now become a memorial for fans, in Good Will Hunting. Looking at Matt Damon’s character Will and slowly healing the kid. I’ll never forget his character, Sean, telling Hunting about his late wife and how he ditched a World Series Boston Red Sox game to go “see about a girl”. That movie will play well for decades and Williams’ performance will always be the anchor in its genius.

Do yourself a favor tonight and watch a Williams film. Skip the sequel, reboot, remake, and latest horror adventure at the cinema and stay home. It doesn’t have to be a classic film from the Williams anthology. Jumanji(which ironically enough is getting a sequel soon) is a great family film. For a couple needing a quiet night of escapism, take a shot with Cadillac Man or Awakenings, both signature Williams gems. As is the case with anybody after they pass, instead of mourning them, celebrate their life and their work.

The best and most endearing thing about the movies is they never die and are accessible right next to you on your smart phone or neighborhood resting DVD player. Decades later, they are right there waiting to be watched.

While it is brutally sad Williams chose to exit stage left too early, his greatest hits will be with us forever. Take a couple hours tonight and spend it with Robin Williams. I guarantee he’ll make you laugh and cry all at once.

True Detective’s Season 2 Finale: A Giant Mess

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(In case you missed it on KSDK)

Picture yourself ordering a big juicy ribeye steak and you get a dried up bland T-bone steak cooked by a cook who hates his job. That’s what I got after 8 hours of heavy handed drama on HBO’s season 2 of True Detective. The finale stunk up the room and it left me with a bad taste in my mouth. How did golden boy Nic Pizzolatto round up all this talent and mess this up? Next time, Nic, buy a diaper and unload in that instead of all over people who pay top dollar for HBO and went into this summer expecting something better.

I gave this season time to grow on me. Think of spending a few hours with a VERY serious kid at a playground. He’s cool and wants to have fun but can’t stop talking about philosophical meanings and boring layered narratives. That’s True Detective in 2015. Overwrought and overcooked and just too much in the end. Worst of all, its creator lost his compass. Pizzolatto can write twisty seedy stories about the rugged battles we fight within our subconscious on a daily basis but believe me he had better than this assortment of characters running around with their heads cut off in the middle of this mystery plot.

Hey, there’s Vince Vaughn, trying to recover some dignity from a career that fell straight down the soft comedy rabbit hole. Vaughn was trained on theater and came up in Hollywood through dramas like Clay Pigeons and Return to Paradise. What happened to that magnetic presence from Swingers? Vaughn was miscast here as a former criminal trying to go straight and a stupid one at that. He couldn’t handle the dialogue and never seemed comfortable except for a handful of scenes. Maybe he bit down too hard on the comedy bug or maybe he wasn’t meant for this gym class.

Look at Taylor Kitsch, playing the most doomed closeted gay cop of all time. So serious, never smiling and tormented beyond belief. The main recipe this season was inner torture. Look at me, I am pale, unhappy and out of cigarettes. Show pity on me. Taylor’s Paul, an ex-soldier trying to ride a patrol bike who gets sucked into this crime investigation set to explode. He never seemed right for the job, the same way the actor never knew quite how to play his character. When he found his step, it was overacting. So visible and forced.

Same for Rachel McAdams, the beautiful talented actress who is working so much right now she may need a break. Sometimes, when actors work at much as she has in the past year, I wonder if they don’t know how to handle a big role like this. Her overprotective, damaged, knife wielding badge started out like someone we could like in a dirty cool way, but quickly her character boiled too much and the goods spilled out. By the end of Sunday’s finale, I really didn’t care what happened to her character because I never felt like I knew her.

Colin Farrell’s Ray was the only character I felt had a complete base to work off of. A cop whose wife was brutally raped, a crime that set Ray off on a revenge trail that left him thinking he had killed his wife’s attacker but spending the rest of his life not sure if his son was really his. Farrell adopted this deep slightly Southern drawl and assortment of plaid shirts and funky facial hair to rip into Ray. It was like his Miami Vice character went to Texas and came back a changed much more tormented dude. A sad one but a character we cared about. Farrell can visually project 80 emotions on his face but in the end, the showrunners did him wrong, at least in my eyes. They walked him into a trap. I didn’t expect characters to find happiness at the end, but I expected they’d read something better than what they found.

One character needed his comeuppance and didn’t get it. You’ll know if you watch.

Season 1 was brilliant because it had a sexy confidence, was extremely well written and felt fresh and rightfully gloomy. People were sad, drinking too much, way too violent, but they had a purpose throughout the misery. The season had a vibe and a pulse. It was a wild guitar solo that seemed to last for 7 hours before encore sprung this culmination of all the plot threads. It also had a white hot can’t go wrong Matthew McConaughey meeting the character of a lifetime in Rust Cohle. A man who preached about a flat circle. Maybe Pizzolatto should have stuck with that circle and brought him back, along with Woody Harrelson’s Marty Hart.

To me, the biggest missing element from Season 2 was a foil for the seriousness of the main characters. Season 1 balanced McConaughey’s madness and wrenching monologues with the bewildered humor and light presence of Harrelson. Season 2 was missing a Woody Harrelson. Something to balance all the depressed folks out. Too bad.

Another missing element from Season 2 was director Cary Fukunaga, a maverick world creator from Season 1 who turned Louisiana’s swamp into a gothic lost and found crime zone. The rift between him and Pizzolatto split the marriage they shared via True Detective and deprived Season 2’s players of a great director. Without his compass(Fukunaga’s camera), Pizzolatto was lost this go around.

Maybe Season 3 brings back Cohle and Hart. Go back to what worked and what put you on the map, Nic. Season 2 found you without a purpose. Season 2 felt like leftovers in a broken refrigerator. It was the little brother trying to be as cool as the older star athlete and coming up short. Maybe fans were set up to be disappointed.

True Detective Season 2 tried to go big with a larger cast and wide spreading mystery plot. It misfired, badly. You can go back and watch it again, and I’m sure the effect wouldn’t be better. Only worse.

Nice try, Pizzolatto. Next time, find a worthy story, characters worth caring about and something fresh. Take some time my friend. You need it after that strikeout.

In the meantime, go catch up on Cinemax’s Banshee, a show that DOES NOT disappoint. Like ever.

A Good Year: The Quiet Russell Crowe and Ridley Scott gem

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Welcome to the midnight movie parlor temptation, where important sleep disappears and minds drift into the land of weird television. There are times when the bed never calls and the couch always has a bottle of whiskey and a barstool ready for you to put a dent into, and that is when midnight movie temptations come into play. The movies you’d never watch during prime time but somehow get sucked into like an average interpretation of Poltergeist in the middle of the night. For me this week, it was the forgotten Russell Crowe-Ridley Scott French estate fairy tale romance, A Good Year.

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Missing my friend Troy Siade

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I don’t get sentimental here often. I try to post 50 regular articles for every semi sentimental or personal piece. However, today I am going to talk about my late friend Troy Siade.

Manual Scoreboard
Manual Scoreboard- Manual scoreboard operators Troy Siade, left, and Danny Buffa take in the Cardinals-Giants game from their favorite spot behind the manual scoreboard at Busch Stadium Wednesday night.

Troy Siade would have been 50 years old today. He was an Italian prince in a white t-shirt and short blue jean shorts that made the manual scoreboard a place to be. You could have been as cold as the North Pole, and Troy would make you laugh. He had a way of cutting though the bullshit in life and made you happy to be around him. He would bust my chops because I was like a younger brother to him. I took it in spades and with a fair measure of pride. There were days where an hour would go by on the board and we would just give each other shit or bust each other’s balls while mixing in serious things to talk about. With Troy, it all came free and easy. 

I’ll never forget him driving our supervisor Joe Graman crazy by hitting on his pretty daughter when she came to visit the board. Joe was a military veteran so Troy would go all the way down to the National League or a decent distance from Joe and say something like, “Man, I just want to settle down, marry a girl, whose dad has a boat.” Yes, Joe had a boat. Troy would cut the tension in the room like a knife would slice through a warm slab of butter. He was fearless, hilarious and treated his friends like family.

I’ll never forget him getting sensual with a picture of Art Holliday in a suite at Busch after a game. He gave cocky flamboyance a brand new name every night downtown. Troy would walk down the ramp at Busch and say out loud, “Hey ladies, I drive a JAGUAARRRRR!” and “Man it sucks being RICH!” All a friend could do was laugh. You had to dig the guy. He was a one of a kind.

I looked up to him like the older brother I was deprived of during those days. Every year since he has been gone I feel this pain some nights when the Cards win big or a Jim Edmonds highlight is shown. Every August 14th I get my ass kicked emotionally and I hide it well because no one needs to see a bearded bald dude cry. I just miss him and wish he was still here.

The saddest thing in life is regret. A little while before he passed, Troy surprised my wife Rachel and I for a dinner. It was out of the blue and caught me off guard. We had previous plans with my parents and you don’t break those off. So we turned him down. I wish I would have brought him along. My dad and the two of us may have been asked to leave the restaurant because of how loud we would have gotten, but it would have been worth the trouble. Troy talked a lot, just like me. Nobody could shut him up. They couldn’t contain him. Only hope to try. That’s why I loved him. There are certain people you meet in life that you can be your 100 percent self around. Troy was one of them.

As humans we always think we have more time. That there will be another time. It’s a flaw. With Troy, there wasn’t. He got sick soon afterwards with Non Hodgkins Lymphoma and was gone soon afterwards. He would die before his 39th birthday on April 23rd, 2004. That shiny black hair gone and that unbreakable spirit somewhat tinted.

I just wish I had more time. I just wish I had more time with my friend. My brother from another mother. Someone who never made me feel the need to change or watch what I say.

Just another reminder that Cancer really fucking sucks.

Rest in peace my good friend. Troy would have loved to watch this moment from his favorite player, Jim Edmonds.