Hey now, you're an all-star

Strolling through America's past

Greetings from Kingston, New York! Before we get into it, here’s a couple of things before we go any further:

First, I want to share a conversation I had with Andy McCullough about his new book The Last of his Kind: Clayton Kershaw and the Burden of Greatness. McCullough is a former LA Times beat writer and a senior writer at The Athletic. He’s also one of us: while setting up the interview McCullough revealed he’d read Corporate Rock Sucks.

Second, I have some thoughts about what happened last weekend and what it all means, but I don’t comment on shootings until all the information has come out and the facts are verified. One thing I learned from living through the murders at Sandy Hook Elementary is the reality on the ground is often very different from what’s reported in the media.

Third, this coming Monday is my birthday. If you’ve been thinking about upgrading your subscription, I encourage you to do so. And if you recently renewed—thank you! Message from the Underworld is directly supported by readers like you.

Fandom and failure

I have plenty of opportunities to write about books and music, but I rarely get to geek out about sports, namely the Los Angeles Dodgers (and also the New York Giants, but more about that some other day). I sometimes feel that being a punk rocker and a writer means being a member of not one, but two communities that look down on sports. So I mostly keep it to myself.

But that’s not the only reason. It’s scary how often fandom tips into obsession. If I were to count the time I’ve spent watching sports, gathering information about the players or the games, and dwelling on the outcomes, I could have taught myself how to play the guitar or read all of Shakespeare, etc. Fandom, when taken to extremes, is embarrassing.  

The Dodgers are my team and while I rarely watch the games I either listen to them through the MLB app or follow the games online. Some years I barely pay attention (usually when I have a deadline and a book is due) and sometimes it’s all-consuming, like the pandemic-shortened season when the Dodgers won it all.

So I came to McCullough’s book with baggage. I was super impressed with the scope of the book and as a fan it was a bit of a rollercoaster reliving the ups and downs of Kershaw’s storied career, especially the meltdowns on the mound that contributed to the Dodgers early exits from the postseason and Kershaw’s reputation as a choker.

Here’s an exchange that ended up getting cut from the piece:

Having the benefit of hindsight, is there one moment that could have changed the narrative about Kershaw’s performance in the postseason?

I think the one decision that feels the most puzzling even years later was in 2019 when he was sent back out for the second inning against the Nationals. I don't think that it necessarily would have changed the narrative, because the narrative was already fixed at that point. I think what happened in 2017 against the Astros in the World Series did that.

Kershaw is interesting to me not because of who he is or what represents but because of the way he handles failure. Ultimately, all sports are about failure, but baseball is brutal in this regard. All players, even the all-stars, fail more than they succeed. At the beginning of his career, when Kershaw was beginning to distinguish himself, he was playing with or competing against the best players in the world. Most of them didn’t make it out of the minor leagues. They got hurt. They couldn’t hit a certain pitch (or add a new one to their arsenal). They couldn’t adapt. And now virtually all of them are out of baseball. It must be hard to fail over and over again at the thing you’re supposedly great at.

Honus Wagner, Jackie Robinson, Fernando Vallenzuela

An American idyll

All 30 teams are off this week for the All-Star break and the Dodgers limped into the break looking banged up and very mediocre. Last night the American League defeated the National League in the All-Star Game for the tenth time in the last eleven years. In Dodger news: Shoe Ohtani blasted a three-run homer and the night before Teoscar Hernández won the Home Run Derby—the first Dodger to do so.

On Monday, we drove up to Cooperstown to visit the National Baseball Hall of Fame. It’s something I’ve always wanted to do but have never been close enough to make the trip. I assumed Cooperstown, which is located on Lake Otsego, had something to do with barrel-making, but its named after one of its founding fathers, William Cooper, whose son James Fennimore Cooper was an early American novelist who wrote The Leatherstocking Tales, a series of five novels that includes The Last of the Mohicans. Even if it didn’t have the Hall of Fame, Cooperstown is loaded with Americana.

The National Baseball Hall of Fame has a little bit of everything: tributes to the greats, the uniforms they wore, displays of baseball cards, baseball art and merchandising, and deep dives into the stats, which were at times overwhelming despite the fact that I love how every baseball game is a narrative in numbers.

Satchel Paige, Sailors from the USS Maine, Jackie Robinson

My favorite section was devoted to the Negro Leagues and early examples of integration, and it’s something I want to learn more about. Everyone knows about Jackie Robinson, and his importance to the Dodgers, the sport, and American history, but I was fascinated by other examples of Black players who played on or against white teams. I was especially moved by a team photo of players from the USS Maine that included a black sailor and ball player. The USS Maine, you may be aware, was a battleship that exploded in 1898, killing 268 sailors. Somber stuff.

It was the Second World War that brought an end to desegregation in baseball. The public could no longer stomach the fact that Black Americans were compelled to fight alongside whites in the war, but prevented from playing a game together when they got back home.

Overall, I enjoyed my experience at the Hall of Fame, but it was very crowded. I’d like to go back when it’s not baseball season, eliminating all the little league teams that visit en masse. I loved the “scorecard” they give you at the entrance so you can look for items from your favorite team. I also loved the baseball card generator. What do you think?

Not an all-star

Later today we’re headed down the Hudson to Brooklyn and on Friday we’re going to Yankee Stadium—another first—to see the New York Yankees play the Tampa Bay Rays. I’ll be keeping an eye on the scoreboard for the results of the Dodgers game. Then on Saturday I’ll be back to our regular punk rock reporting with OFF!’s penultimate show on the Lower East Side.

Thanks for reading. Be safe and have a great week! If you liked this newsletter you might also like my latest novel Make It Stop, or the paperback edition of Corporate Rock Sucks: The Rise & Fall of SST Records, or my book with Bad Religion, or my book with Keith Morris. I have more books and zines for sale here. And if you’ve read all that, consider preordering my latest collaboration The Witch’s Door and the anthology Eight Very Bad Nights.

Message from the Underworld comes out every Wednesday and is always available for free, but paid subscribers also get my deepest gratitude and Orca Alert! on most Sundays. It’s a weekly round-up of links about art, culture, crime, and killer whales.