5 Things On My Mind: Blues get goal crazy, Arenado holding pattern, more Hackman remembrance
How many times can one hurt himself in a single morning?
Before I could take a single drink of coffee this morning, I acquired two injuries. The first was the kind of mishap that caused initial panic before subsiding into a harmless grace period of paranoia. Getting older only means the chances for injury become considerably higher. To push a cat food bowl out of the way, I yanked a door right over my toe, which caused a couple of cuts and some bleeding. Keep in mind this door was installed in 1921.
“IS IT BROKEN?”
The initial thought always rides towards the harmful end of possibility. Did I just break my toe during a stupid, abrupt movement? How can I explain this to my wife and boss if it is broken? How much endless shit will I receive for breaking a toe while opening a basement door? Next, my middle finger felt some pain, as if I had flicked a paperweight across the room using only a single appendage for an hour. Nothing was broken, only the already shaky confidence of a suddenly injury-prone man entering middle age.
The lesson here is that once you hit 40, everything seems to hurt without putting you on the injured list. We’re all day-to-day and hoping to get back out there the next day to play another game with life’s endless gathering of obstacles. Small, yet potent roadblocks that present themselves like the unwanted family member at Thanksgiving. Thankfully, I have a wonderfully patient wife who is always there to play a doctor with no medical degree. She shook her head before I approached the Rachel Urgent Care Center for a question. Gents, don’t undervalue your wives.
Here are four other things on my mind as Friday reaches record temperature highs in St. Louis.
STL WEATHER SHIFTS
In all honesty, please give me the cold without the blizzard conditions. The shifts are too crazy, even for a St. Louis resident. I don’t need 70 degrees a week after it was zero degrees. That is where people get sick and get others sick. It’s science without an explanation. Temp shifts cause colds, and then those dirty-handed folks touch other people’s hands, which results in sickness. Factor in the spread to at least three different people, and you have the issue.
Outside of being someone who doesn’t like blazing hot temps, the constant shift in weather is what I hate. Driving a truck and working in an open-air warehouse puts me next to whatever Mother Nature cooked up that morning—one of the many reasons why St. Louis doesn’t become overly populated is due to the crazy weather changes. A man named Chad once told me that. It’s enough to make someone ride out of town into warmer temps. Pick a station!
NADO TIME
Does one wish that honesty could roll out of an athlete’s mouth every once in a while? What do they have to lose by admitting a mistake? I think Nolan Arenado made one this offseason. He wanted out, got a quick opportunity that wasn’t his #1 spot, and now waits for a miracle.
Every once in a while, the candor would be refreshing. Everyone knows why Arenado won’t openly admit that he screwed up by not accepting a trade to Houston back in December. Admitting fault is nearly as hard as driving the speed limit for more than a few blocks. They were on his list of teams he’d be willing to go to, and the front offices were set up at the goal line for a deal before Arenado axed it.
“IT’S NOT THE DODGERS, THOUGH!”
What if he came out and admitted that at least half of the fault in the fact that he’s still a Cardinal is his own? Let me write his answer below to get the ball rolling.
“You all must be wondering why I’m still here, and the answer is fairly simple: I own some fault in the situation. If I had agreed to a deal put together by John Mozeliak at my request, we wouldn’t be here right now. I would be preparing my comeback tour in Texas and setting my bat up to hit 30 home runs with that short porch. If I had put my ego aside and just agreed to a deal early in the offseason, there would be time for my kids to find a new school and my wife to adjust. That’s too bad, though. It’s also too bad that neither of the other teams on the list wanted me either. All in all, I put myself here.”
I said it wouldn’t get awkward, but it already is getting awkward. Arenado owns a good amount of blame. Next time, only put teams on the list that you’re saying “YES” to at any time. We all know this will happen again with another team down the line.
Millionaire athletes, am I right?
BLUES, SAY HELLO TO GOAL-SCORING
It’s been a while since fans have seen the Blues score at this clip. The team wasn’t exactly Shitbreak in the non-scoring department, but it was holding things down. The defense is much better than last season due to the continued renaissance of Colton Parayko (14 goals!) and the additions of Cam Fowler, Philip Broberg, and Ryan Suter. Jordan Binnington has brought his Four Nations fire back with him and Joel Hofer kept Alexander Ovechkin scoreless last night in beating the Eastern Conference-leading Capitals.
But the scoring hasn’t been consistent enough, and that’s changing. The team notched their first winning streak of the season last night against Washington. The Blues sit three points behind the Canucks, who own the second wildcard slot and final playoff spot at the moment. That’s not a lot of ground to make up in 22 games. 3-4 more wins in a row would make things very interesting.
Playoffs or not, I like this team much more than when the season started. Future is brighter than it is a mile east.
UNDERRATED HACKMAN FILMS
Naming every good Gene Hackman film would require another article’s worth of writing. Following yesterday’s tribute, I still found that some were left out. He was the kind of talent who made every film much better due to his presence, even if the proceedings weren’t exactly Oscar worthy. In other words, Hackman could light up a fast food cinema restaurant. Behind Enemy Lines, with Owen Wilson playing a crashed pilot trying to gun his way out of enemy territory, is near the top of the underrated list.
The Replacements is another one. The Quick and The Dead sung due to his presence, not Sharon Stone or Russell Crowe. Hackman elevated anything he was in. When people talk about Daniel Day Lewis and Tom Hanks being the greatest actors, they shouldn’t forget about Hackman. He could hang with or pass up either of them.
The circumstances of his death, along with his wife and dog, become more bizarre with each passing day. I’ll just say when you’re that old, a fall can cause so much harm. Hopefully, the causes of death gives their families some peace. For the rest of us, his movies will have to fill the void.
Keep your head up and if you find a potion that makes life easier, pass it along.