Red Sox Obtain Rutschman from Orioles; Send Mayer to SF

The Boston Red Sox, who have gone 28-5 since June 24th, did not rest on their laurels during the trade deadline.

This afternoon, the Bosox acquired catcher Adley Rutschman from the Baltimore Orioles along with fellow catcher Jake Rogers in exchange for catcher Carlos Narvaez and minor league prospects Enddy Azocar, an outfielder along with two righthanded pitchers - Anthony Eyanson and Kyson Witherspoon.

Rutschman, 28, was the number one pick in the MLB Draft by the Orioles in 2019 and runner up in AL Rookie of the Year balloting in 2022 behind Seattle Mariners slugger Julio Rodriguez. He has been named to three AL All-Star Teams in the past four seasons. 

It might be a while before Rutschman sees any action as he is currently on the IL with a wrist injury, his third IL stint this season. When Rutschman has been healthy, he has been productive hitting .251 with 8 HR and 47 RBI in 69 games played this season. Hence the decision to also acquire Rogers. 

Despite being only 2½ games out of the third AL Wild Card berth, the Orioles have chosen to be sellers at the trade deadline dealing starting pitcher Dean Kremer to the Minnesota Twins and outfielder Taylor Ward to the Seattle Mariners before parting ways with Rutschman.

Also of note, the Red Sox decided to give up on infielder Marcelo Mayer sending him to the San Francisco Giants in exchange for middle reliever Erik Miller. Mayer was the Red Sox's top draft pick in 2021 and the fourth pick overall in the nation out of Eastlake High School in Chula Vista, California, just outside of San Diego. However, in parts of two seasons, Mayer has hit only .223 with modest power, a propensity to strike out with very few walks.

I have heard stories that Mayer likes the nightlife. Mayer might get away with that if he was hitting better. Like Rutschman, Mayer is also currently on the IL since late June due to a forearm injury. The one thing Mayer has in his favor is that he is only 23 and can get a fresh start in San Francisco. Although things have been pretty chaotic this season and perhaps being teammates with former Red Sox player Rafael Devers might not be the best thing for him especially when the Giants come to Fenway later this month.

The impact of these trades won't be immediately known for the Red Sox but they may loom large as the season progresses.

There's Something Rotten in Montreal

Montreal was the cite of not one, but two anti-Semitic incidents over the weekend.

Early Saturday morning, arson destroyed Nöam, a popular kosher restaurant. Fortunately, there were no injuries.

Only hours later, during a soccer match at Saputo Stadium, fans of CF Montréal, jeered Israeli soccer player Dor Turgeman of the New England Revolution chanting "Death to Israel!!!" and "Free Palestine!!!". Turgeman got the last laugh by scoring a goal in a game which ended in a 2-2 tie. But that only seemed to aggravate Montreal fans who threw cans and lighters at Turgeman. 

Then yesterday, a visibly Jewish person was violently assaulted in Montreal's Outremont neighborhood.

I have warned that New York City will likely experience an October 7th style attack due to Mayor Mamdani. Sadly, I would not be surprised if such a thing were to occur in Montreal or Toronto (where two bagel shops had their windows shattered last week including one with gunfire). Indeed, the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs recently stated, "Canada remains one intelligence failure away from a mass casualty event, and that is something the Jewish community is keenly aware”.

Yet were such a mass casualty, anti-Semitic attack to take place in Canada, I would put Montreal at the top of the list.

Giants Deal Arráez, NL's Leading Hitter, to Phillies; Plays With 5th Team in 5 Seasons

Luis Arráez is on the move again.

The San Francisco Giants have traded Arráez to the Philadelphia Phillies along with pitcher Caleb Kilian in exchange for pitchers Ramon Marquez and Marty Gair. 

At the time of the trade, Arráez, 29, was leading the NL in batting with a .324 average. From 2022 through 2024, Arráez won three consecutive batting titles with three different teams. In 2022, he won the AL batting title with the Minnesota Twins hitting .316. In the off-season, the Twins traded Arráez to the Miami Marlins in exchange for pitcher Pablo Lopez. Arráez won the NL batting title in 2023 with a career best .354 average. Early in the 2024 season, the Marlins sent Arráez to the San Diego Padres in a deal which included Jakob Marsee. He won yet another NL batting title posting a .314 batting average.

Last year, Arráez spent a full season in San Diego though he slipped to a .292 batting average despite collecting an NL leading 181 hits. In the off-season, Arráez signed a 1-year deal with the San Francisco Giants for $12 million. At the time, I wrote:

What is fascinating to me is that Arraez is so well-travelled. You would think three batting titles would make one a fixture in someone's lineup a la Ty Cobb, Stan Musial, Rod Carew, Wade Boggs or Tony Gwynn. Alas, Arraez is viewed as a liability for not having sufficient power, drawing few walks and subpar defensive skills despite his three batting titles and rarely striking out. Evidently, MLB frowns upon contact hitters.

So even if Arraez wins his fourth batting title with the Giants, he will likely be on the move albeit with a lucrative free agent contract although that could be jeopardized by a lockout of the 2027 season when the present MLB collective bargaining agreement expires at the end of this year.

Have perennial batting champion will travel.

Well, Arráez did not last a full season in SF. Yet it should be said that Arráez has been one of the few bright spots on a team which, along with the New York Mets, is the most disappointing in all of MLB. Aside from pitcher Logan Webb, Arráez was the only other Giant named to the NL All-Star Team. 

One can only hope Arráez can find a home in Philly, his fifth team in five seasons. I'm sure Arráez will get along famously with manager Don Mattingly, who was once among baseball's purest hitters batting better than .300 seven times including an AL batting title with the New York Yankees in 1984. 

If nothing else, Arráez can give the Phillies a shot in the arm. Although the Phillies have the second NL Wild Card berth and have won three games in a row, they were only 9-15 in July finishing the month losing 8 of 9 games.

The arrival of Arráez enables the Phillies to move Bryce Harper from first base back into the outfield. 

Should Arráez win his fourth batting title in five seasons, it will be the second time in his career he will have won the NL batting title splitting his season with two teams. Prior to Arráez, the only other player to win a league batting title while splitting his season with two teams was Dale Alexander who hit .367 in 1932 with the Detroit Tigers and the Boston Red Sox. In 1990, Willie McGee won his second career NL batting title hitting .335 with the St. Louis Cardinals despite being traded to the Oakland A's prior to the trade deadline with just over a month left in the season to help the A's win their third consecutive AL pennant.

Luis Arráez is among baseball's best hitters. I just hope Arráez is finally treated like one.

Val Kilmer is as Mythic a Figure as Jim Morrison

 

On Saturday night, I went to the Somerville Theatre to attend a midnight screening of The Doors, the 1991 biopic directed by Oliver Stone and starring the late Val Kilmer as Jim Morrison.

I saw the film when it was released in theatres 35 years ago. A year later, I remember seeing it with nearly my entire dorm during my freshman year at Carleton University. It was one of those films which struck a chord with Gen X, which despite its cynicism, still had an admiration for the spirit of the late 1960s. Jim Morrison, of course, was a larger-than-life mythical figure who was a source of fascination.

I've probably caught it on TV a time or two here and there but thought it was worth another look a quarter of the way through our present century. To put it into perspective, The Doors was released a few months before the 20th anniversary of Morrison's death. More time has now elapsed between the time of the film and the present day than Morrison's 27 years on the planet. To some degree, I think Morrison and much of the 1960s has been lost to time. Indeed, most of the audience were Gen Xers & Boomers with perhaps a handful of older Millennials sprinkled into the mix. 

I should mention The Doors was screened on a 70 mm print. Somerville Theatre film projectionist David Kornfeld gave a brief introduction. I remembered him from the special screening of a 70 mm print of Apocalypse Now last year and thought it was kind of fitting given that film begins with The Doors' "This is the End", a song which is also featured prominently in The Doors.

Kornfeld didn't think much of the story and that many of the events depicted in the film simply didn't happen. But he did praise Kilmer's performance and that the remaining members of The Doors were awed a how Kilmer captured Morrison's essence. 

I share much of Kornfeld's assessment. I knew at the time of the release that certain things depicted in the film didn't happen in real life or at the very least didn't happen in the way they did in real life. To be specific, I am referring to The Doors only appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show. While the band was asked not to use the lyric, "Girl, we couldn't get much higher," Morrison didn't emphasize the word "higher" nor did the tv director accidentally show his crotch as depicted in the film. The only word Morrison emphasized was "fire". 

While some might argue that Tombstone was Kilmer's epitaph, one could certainly make the case that he made a career defining performance in The Doors. After Kilmer's death, Doors drummer John Densmore wrote on Instagram, "As an actor, Val’s channeling of Jim (Morrison) was so close, he gave me the creeps on the set of Oliver Stone’s biopic. He should have been nominated for an Oscar as Best Actor."

There was a certain melancholy in seeing Kilmer onscreen especially in his scenes with Michael Madsen (portraying Tom Baker, an actor Morrison met through Andy Warhol) who also passed away last year. On an eerie note, Madsen passed away on July 3rd - the 54th anniversary of Morrison's death.

Aside from Kilmer, the visuals remain compelling and the music captures the spirit of the time. I must say that I found the casting of Meg Ryan as Jim Morrison's girlfriend Pam Courson a bit peculiar. Her voice and physical mannerisms made me think of Sally Albright from When Harry Met Sally cosplaying a hippie.

The cameos were fascinating - John Densmore playing a recording engineer supervising a session of Morrison reciting poetry, Billy Idol, Crispin Glover (as Andy Warhol), Mimi Rogers (the first wife of Tom Cruise who played photojournalist and 16 Magazine editor-in-chief Gloria Stavers), Paul Williams, attorney William Kunstler and, if you didn't blink, you might have caught Eric Burdon from The Animals and War and Sky Saxon from The Seeds.

Now that Val Kilmer has recently passed, he has become a mythic figure in his own right. Perhaps his mythos can help carry that of Jim Morrison through the Doors of perception. R.I.P to both men.

Surprise!!! Surprise!!! Surprise!!! Skubal is Now a Dodger

Yesterday afternoon, I went to Quincy to meet up with my friend Gary to have our annual lunch at Cathay Pacific. 

Despite the fact that I do not follow baseball with the same fervor that I once did, we still discussed it. Our first topic of discussion was Tarik Skubal. I told Gary that Skubal would probably end up with the Dodgers even if the Milwaukee Brewers were prepared to give up their entire farm system for him.

Just about 12 hours later, as I was awaiting to see a midnight screening of The Doors at the Somerville Theatre, I learned that Skubal was heading to the Dodgers. In return, the Tigers receive three top prospects - outfielder Zyhir Hope and right-handers River Ryan and Brady Smith. Skubal is expected to make his Dodgers debut on Tuesday night at Wrigley Field against the Chicago Cubs.

Of course, Skubal has won back-to-back AL Cy Young Awards with the Tigers. However, Skubal was sidelined in early May as he required arthroscopic surgery to remove loose chips in his pitching elbow. Remarkably, Skubal was back on the mound in only five weeks.

After making the post-season in both 2024 and 2025, the Tigers struggled following Skubal's injury losing 21 of their next 25 games. However, given the weak state of the AL this season, the Tigers rebounded sufficiently to be a plausible contender for the third AL Wild Card berth. 

As of this writing, the Tigers are only 2½ games behind their AL Central rival Cleveland Guardians and Minnesota Twins for the third AL Wild Card berth. Alas, the Tigers decided it would be best to part ways with Skubal who is headed for free agency and unlikely to remain in Detroit and think beyond 2026. Of course, in 2024, the Tigers were sellers at the trade deadline only to earn a post-season berth. Perhaps they hope lightning will strike twice. 

Skubal's final appearance in a Tigers uniform was on Wednesday when he notched his 1,000th career strikeout but would not be involved in the decision as the Tigers lost 10-9 to the Baltimore Orioles in 12 innings.

When Skubal makes his debut for the Dodgers, he will join a rotation anchored by 2025 World Series MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Justin Wrobleski who each have 11 wins not to mention Shohei Ohtani. Did I mention that Blake Snell and Tyler Glasnow are waiting in the wings?

With the best record in MLB, the Dodgers have a chance to become the first NL team to win three consecutive World Series titles. The acquisition of Skubal made the possibility a lot more probable.

Stevens Calls Out El-Sayed's Anti-Semitism But It Might Be Too Little, Too Late

In Michigan's Democratic Senate primary, Congresswoman Haley Stevens finally took the gloves off against Abdul El-Sayed on Friday morning.  

In a post on X responding to a video of El-Sayed stating that AIPAC "picked the least capable candidate in America", Stevens responded in part by stating, "Everyone in America understands you want to blame all of your problems on Jewish Americans."

I wish Stevens had said this to El-Sayed's face during their debates.

Alas, it is probably too little, too late. Most polls taken since Mallory McMorrow dropped out of the race have El Sayed leading Stevens by double digits although a single poll conducted by the Detroit News had Stevens up by 7 points. Most likely this poll was an outlier. Indeed, what the polls indicate and what the actual outcome is are not necessarily the same thing.

Nevertheless, I think Stevens sees the writing on the wall. In the post, she also writes, "You lost by over twenty points to Gretchen Whitmer and you will lose to Mike Rogers by talking like this." For all intents and purposes, she it tacitly acknowledging she will not prevail against El-Sayed but that El- Sayed will not prevail against Republican Mike Rogers.

For his part, El-Sayed claimed, "At the end of the day, I love and revere Judaism and the Jewish people."

I do not believe him. In fact, I believe El-Sayed loves Jewish people about as much as I believe President Trump loves Haitians.

If El-Sayed truly loves the Jewish people, then he would have condemned the terrorist attack on Temple Israel in West Bloomfield Township earlier this year without equivocation.

Instead, El Sayed made excuses for the attacker whose brother was a Hezbollah commander in Lebanon claiming, "Hurt people hurt people." In so doing, El-Sayed made it clear that he views synagogues as legitimate targets for "hurt people."

So yes, Stevens is correct to say that El-Sayed wishes to blame Jewish Americans for all of our problems. Unfortunately for Stevens, a majority of Michigan Democrats may very well agree with El-Sayed come this Tuesday.

Dana Nessel, Michigan's Democratic Attorney General, Doesn't Feel Safe Among Fellow Democrats Due to Anti-Semitism

During a roundtable discussion yesterday with Jewish leaders and community members Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel disclosed she will not attend next month's state Democratic Party Convention on account of fearing for her safety due to anti-Semitism within the party:

I feel like my presence isn’t going to be welcome. I don’t want to get chased around. I don’t want to get harassed. I don’t want to get yelled and screamed at. I don’t want to get booed off the stage, irrespective of what I’m saying. And I believe that if I go, that is what will happen because it’s been happening to me.

I will speak as a member of the Democratic Party here in Michigan, that some things have changed. This cannot continue, and the fact of the matter is, we have to be able to be a society where we can have intelligent discourse and debate about ideas without people being threatened, and certainly without people carrying out those threats.

This statement is remarkable for several reasons.

For starters, Nessel has served two terms as Michigan's top-ranking law enforcement official. When a state Attorney General says it is unsafe for her to be somewhere on the basis of her religious faith then something has gone terribly, terribly wrong.

It is also worth noting that Nessel is openly gay. That she faces more danger as a Jew than as someone who identifies as a member of the LGBTQ community tells you how serious anti-Semitism has become in Michigan and across the country particularly in supposedly liberal enclaves of tolerance. 

While I understand Nessel's desire to be free from harassment and hatred, this also emboldens anti-Semitism within the Democratic Party. If they can intimidate the sitting Attorney General from attending her own party's convention, then it is only a matter of time before they go after the Governor be it Gretchen Whitmer (for endorsing Haley Stevens over Abdul El-Sayed in the Michigan Democratic Senate primary) or her possible successor Jocelyn Benson, Michigan's current Secretary of State.

At some point, some Democrat is going to have to go to a party convention and will have to stand up to their delegates and tell them to stop their nonsense and to stop helping Trump and MAGA. The first person who comes to mind is Pennsylvania Senator John Fetterman, but he is on the verge of switching parties due to its anti-Israel posturing and acceptance of anti-Semitism. Perhaps NY Congressman Ritchie Torres. Perhaps he could challenge Mamdani come 2029 but he would likely need to do so as an independent. 

Nevertheless, if it is too dangerous for Jews to participate in Democratic Party politics how long will it be before it is too dangerous for Jews to participate in American civil society altogether?