Trevor noah lost in translation

1. Everyone hates the Houston Astros. This hatred is not necessarily undeserved. Since hiring general manager Jeff Luhnow in 2011, the Astros have become notorious for being the McKinsey of baseball, prioritizing ruthless efficiency over all else. (Luhnow himself worked for McKinsey for five years.) They’re also known for having a bro-ish Wall Street vibe, perhaps best displayed by former executive Brandon Taubman, who, after the Astros beat the Yankees to clinch a trip to the World Series this year, mocked three female reporters in the locker room by screaming “Thank God we got Osuna!” at them. (The Astros acquired closer Roberto Osuna after he was arrested for domestic violence.) Taubman was fired a week later, but not until the Astros public relations team sent a taunting statement claiming the reporter who wrote the story about the incident had made the whole thing up. They’re not the best people. … [Read more...] about A Baseball Expert’s Guide to the Nutty MLB Cheating Scandal

4. The Mets already faced two Cy Young candidates, and now they’ll see a third.ERA, respectively this season, and the Mets faced them a combined four times in the NLDS, going 2–2 in those games. Now the Mets will face another Cy Young candidate in Jake Arrieta, who won a league-best 22 games and had the second-best WAR (wins above replacement, a stat that aims to sum up a player’s overall value in one number) in the league. For what it’s worth, Arrieta was unspectacular in his one NLDS start, allowing four runs in five and two-thirds innings in Game 3. That said, he was spectacular in the Wild Card game against Pittsburgh, throwing a complete-game five-hit shutout. … [Read more...] about 10 Things to Know About the Mets-Cubs NLCS

And indulging it, he is. Late Friday night, Jeff Sessions fired Andrew McCabe — just 26 hours before the G-man was set to qualify for his pension. McCabe immediately alleged that he’d been fired for crass political reasons — Trump was trying to discredit him as part of a broader attempt to obstruct and delegitimize the special counsel’s investigation. Trump promptly confirmed this charge. In a tweet celebrating McCabe’s firing, the president did not refer to any findings from the inspector general’s report that had officially triggered the deputy FBI director’s ouster, opting instead to denounce McCabe for his ties to James Comey, and complicity in “the lies and corruption going on at the highest levels of the FBI!” … [Read more...] about Donald Trump Has Never Been More Dangerous Than He Is Now

Last week at the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts, cellist Matt Haimovitz and pianist Simone Dinnerstein paired Beethoven cello sonatas with solo works by Philip Glass. A few nights later at Monday Evening Concerts, the series founded eight decades ago on the premise that both long-forgotten early music and new music are to a modern audience unknown and thus equally new, premieres were interspersed with pieces by old guys few of us had ever heard of. … [Read more...] about Commentary: Beethoven 2020: The 250th birthday tributes start, with mixed results

I was like, “How am I going to direct Dame Judi Dench?” One of my favorite movies is Notes on a Scandal, and she’s so great in that. What am I going to say to her? But she wanted to be directed. With Michael, he was helpful in working with Woody and Matthew on True Detective because I’d never had to contend with a guy my age before. It was this cat-and-mouse game of, “Who’s in charge here?” because I was this young filmmaker and he's not a young, untrained actor [like on Sin Nombre]. I learned a lot by that. Michael is a great actor. I thought he was brilliant in 12 Years A Slave. … [Read more...] about ‘True Detective’ Director Cary Fukunaga’s Journey from Pro Snowboarder to Hollywood’s Most Wanted