Hi Everyone —
So we binge-watched Season 4 of The Bear, and while I enjoyed it quite a bit and thought it was significantly better than last season for the most part — the highs on The Bear are about as high as television gets — it sparked this odd feeling, one that I couldn’t quite put into words until we as a family went to see the live action How to Train Your Dragon movie.
I actually enjoyed How to Train Your Dragon also … it’s fun, the music is cool, the scenery is nice, and so on.
BUT … there was no mistaking the feeling when I walked out of the theater. I vividly felt like: “WHY IN THE WORLD DID THEY MAKE THIS?” I mean, it was a shot-for-shot remake of the animated How to Train Your Dragon. Why did they make that — other than to make money? What value did it offer? What was the artistic vision? What was the hope of ALL THOSE PEOPLE who spent all that time and creative effort and skills that took a lifetime to develop?
Look, I’m not THAT naive: It’s about the money. But there should be a way to make money AND at least scratch that creative itch. There should be a way to make money and also to say something.
And I realized: That’s what bugs me about The Bear. The sheer brilliance of the first two seasons is that the show was always saying something — about food, about genius, about creativity, about dealing with tragedy, about dysfunctional families, about relationships, and so on. I just didn’t think this season had anything new to add. It’s pleasant enough, and the food looks good, and the acting is wonderful, and Sydney wears this awesome Negro Leagues Museum shirt that I HAVE to get* …
… and the cameos and returning characters are off the charts and all that. Like I say, it has been very enjoyable.
But I don’t quite get why they made it, other than it’s a super-popular show.
*Don’t worry! I have texted Negro Leagues Museum president Bob Kendrick to find out how we can get one of those shirts! I’ll report back!
Blylevens and Shutouts
On Monday, the Pirates beat the Cardinals 1-0, and while there’s plenty to say about the nonsensical fact that Paul Skenes pitched five shutout innings and DIDN’T get the win — while Isaac Mattison pitched one shutout inning with two walks, and DID — I want to focus on the Blyleven for a moment.
We’ll get back to the whole win thing.
As you might remember, we have started calling 1-0 games “Blylevens,” and this was the 34th of the season. That means already in 2025, we’ve had more Blylevens than we had in 2019 … 2017 … 2003 … 2000 … 1999 and so on. We’re just four Blylevens shy of all of last season, and the way things are going, we might race by last season by the weekend.
The proliferation of Blylevens is just part of an overall shutout trend — eight percent of games this year are shutouts. That’s the highest percentage in baseball since the early 1970s when the people running baseball were like, “Um, what if we just stopped having pitchers hit? Would that help?”
It’s wild. There have been 195 shutouts this year, which is record pace. The most shutouts in a season is 359 … and that was in 1915. Baseball was kind of different in 1915. The world was kind of different in 1915.
It goes without saying that 95% of the shutouts this season are team shutouts. Actually, that’s not quite true — it’s 96%. Only eight of the shutouts thrown this year are individual shutouts. Check out this ridiculous chart that includes the number of pitchers used in all 195 shutouts.
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