Southern Bookman

Braves' Battery casts glow across American sports landscape

Battery fever rages among wealthy owners of pro sports franchises, who yearn to match the success of the Atlanta Braves' entertainment district besides Truist Park.

In the latest outbreak of Battery envy, Washington Capitals and Wizards owner Ted Leonsis has announced plans to move the hockey and NBA franchises from the aging Capital Center in downtown Washington to a site in suburban Northern Virginia.

Leonsis' plans to abandon the nation's capital for the Potomac Yard development in Arlington has outraged D.C.'s sports journalists, including Pardon the Interruption's Tony Kornheiser and Michael Wilbon.

Kornheiser and Wilbon's successors at the Washington Post have raised a chorus denouncing Leonsis, a Washington native who touted his loyalty to his hometown after the Capitals won the Stanley Cup in 2018.

The Battery's restaurants, bars and theaters draw fans even if they don't have Truist Field tickets. Crowds flock to the site in the off-season, especially during the holidays.

In an appearance with Virginia's Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin, Leonsis said he'd move the franchises by 2028, builng an arena among the suburban development's hotels and entertainment venues.

Leonsis has asked the city of Washington for $600 million to upgrade the Capital One Arena, located in Washington's struggling Chinatown and Gallery Place neighborhoods. Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser has offered $500 million.

Since the Covid pandemic, downtown Washington businesses have suffered from workers not returning to their offices. Stores have closed on once bustling H Street, beset by rising crime, drug dealing and homelessness. Streets around the Capital One Center suffer from the same urban decay.

Pardon the Interruption's Kornheiser diverted from his usual bemused comic persona to blast Leonsis' plans as "villainy" and a betrayal of Washington. The ESPN star and former Washington Post columnist called the plans a stab in the heart of the nation's capital.

Similar outrage rose when the Braves announced plans to move from downtown Atlanta to Cobb County.

While the Battery is criticized as generic, the Braves' development's success has made it a model for the sports world.  

 

 

 

Farewell Andre Braugher, who brought theatrical depth to TV, film performances

Headed for work in downtown Atlanta, I decided to stay on the train and head to the King Historic District.

Andre Braugher, one of the actors I most admired, was appearing that afternoon at the Martin Luther King Jr. memorial to deliver the civil rights leader's "I Have a Dream" speech on its anniversary.

Each Friday night, I admired Braugher's portrayal of the enigmatic detective Frank Pembleton on the Baltimore detective show "Homicide, A Life on the Street," the precursor to David Simon's "The Wire" and one of network television's forerunners of the cable "prestige TV" era.

On that sun-splashed afternoon at the King grave site, Braugher evoked the majesty of King's speech in 1963 to a huge crowd gathered at the Lincoln Memorial after the "March on Washington."

In his restrained presentation, Braugher gave full weight to the power of King's words. When Braugher finished, bowing his head, the small audience stood in silence, spellbound.

Braugher, who displayed controlled emotional depths in his TV, film and stage performances, died Monday at age 61 after a brief illness. His career was still flourishing; he had been playing a role in the strike-interrupted Netflix series "The Residence," produced by Shonda Rhimes.

Along with his Emmy-winning portrayal of the caustic, domineering Pembleton in  NBC;s "Homicide," Braugher was acclaimed for his performances in Ray Romano's "Men of a Certain Age" and the police comedy "Brooklyn Nine Nine." He also won an Emmy for his role as Nick Atwater in the miniseries "Thief."

Braugher's delivery of King's speech had none of the trappings of Hollywood fame. In his deep, recognizable voice, Braugher affirmed the timeless urgency of the civil rights leader's message.

 

 

 

Shohei Ohtani's $700 million deal a high-risk gamble for Dodgers

Shohei Ohtani's a nice guy and a special talent, yet I'm puzzled by his $700 million, 10-year deal with the Los Angeles Dodgers.

As New York magazine's Will Leitch points out, the hybrid pitcher-slugger is 30 years old, coming off his second elbow surgery and was only the fourth best hitter in baseball last year after ending his season in August.

Los Angeles' actors and writers went on strike to win moderate salary increases. Yet a frequently injured star who's never made the playoffs receives a massive contract for the years when baseball players usually decline.

Leitch in a New York magazine article observes that the Dodger's cable TV contract looks shaky, as broadcasters in other major league cities declare bankruptcy.

Bleeding subscribers, Disney's ESPN likely will  curtail a major league baseball deal. As World Series ratings plummet, Fox might not seek a new major league contract.

With the cable and network TV models dying, the Dodgers will need to sell a lot of hot dogs to afford Ohtani, who performs as a designated hitter when he's not pitching. With his latest elbow surgery, he won't pitch again until 2025, if ever.

Baseball needs Ohtani to rise even further as a global superstar. Perhaps Ohtani will prove the contract's value by breaking hitting and pitching records and leading the Dodgers to World Series championships.

Yet $700 million brings a lot of expectations for him to live up to.

Violence of "The Illiad" unbearable, despite excellence of Emily Wilson's translation

I was excited when the Fulton Country Library informed me that my hold on Emily Wilson's new translation of Homer's "The Illiad" had arrived.  

Soon after receiving the "pickup-notice," I headed toward the library, driving down congested Roswell Road through what I affectionately think of as "the imperial kingdom of Sandy Springs."

Anticipating my pleasure at again reading the ancient epic, I listened to songs from my youth on satellite radio's 1960s channel.

The stop and go of commercial vehicles, SUVs, pickup trucks, MARTA buses, school buses and passenger cars pushed through a suburban dreamscape of Mexican restaurants, strip shopping centers, ice rinks, sex shops, fast-food chains and high-rise apartment complexes.

As I crossed the I-285 Perimeter into the heart of Sandy Springs, I was again surprised by the city's diversity. The sidewalks are always crowded with people headed to a retail job, hurrying to catch the bus, walking their dogs or just sauntering by listening to music on headphones.

The former Republican enclave has evolved into a dynamic cultural center. An impressive theater and dazzling fountain shine as the centerpieces of the city hall complex on Roswell Road.  On the other side of Roswell from the city government building, workers recently completed a plaza honoring the nation's veterans .

Turning right at the corner of Roswell and Mount Vernon roads at the flag-decorated plaza, I head to the high-tech Sandy Springs Library, where I happily found my brand-new copy of Wilson's translation under my initials on the "holds" shelf.

Checking out my treasure at the automated machine that requires no librarian's assistance, I hurried across the parking lot and headed home.

As I drove down Roswell Road toward the Atlanta city limits, the traffic was as usual backed up at the I-285 entrance.A few storefronts remain vacant, along with a couple of empty restaurant spaces, but on the whole business appeared good. At the liquor store on the corner of Wieuca, I turned toward my neighborhood.

Sitting in my living room rocking chair as the bright December sunshine cast a rainbow spectrum across the floor, I opened Wilson's book. Her in-depth introduction conveyed how old the epic is, how long people have been living in this battered world.

Yet, I was upset by the story of masculine rage, the enslavement of women and the slaughter of war, still raging thousands of years after the Greek and Trojan heroes met their fates.

Despite the excellence of Wilson's translation, the story was too sad for me to continue.

 

 

 

Washington Post journalists on strike for a day

Washington Post journalists on a 24-hour strike Thursday asked readers to not look at the newspaper's web site and print edition, which company executives are producing.

While I sympathize with the newsroom workers, I'm uncomfortable with what appears close to prior restraint, a government action that the Post and The New York Times opposed in the Pentagon Papers case.

The walkout is the newspaper's first since 1975, when the late publisher Katharine Graham battled a violent strike by printing plant workers opposed to new technology.

Graham, who supported editor Ben Bradlee when the newspaper achieved national prominence with its Watergate reporting, had no inkling that the Internet in a few years would devastate the Post, leading to her family selling the paper to Amazon billionaire Jeff Bezos.

While The Post initially flourished under Bezos' rule and the editorship of Marty Baron, the media company now suffers losses expected to reach $100 million this year.

Striking reporters, editors and advertising workers accuse the company of bad faith in contract negotiations, which have dragged on for 18 months.

The Newspaper Guild seeks a minimum salary of $101,000, while the company offers $73,000. That's pretty paltry, considering Bezos' extreme wealth.

Another contentious issue is the staff buyouts recently announced by the company to reduce staff. The guild claims the company is pressuring workers to take the buyouts, with threats of layoffs.

Recently named Post Publisher William Lewis, a former Wall Street Journal executive, promises a Post renaissance when he takes over Jan. 2.

But he told staffers in an introductory meeting that he supports the buyouts. He'll take charge of an increasingly bitter staff, which has lost confidence in Sally Buzbee, Baron's replacement. 

While upper management takes the front lines for a day, striking journalists tell readers to look elsewhere for the news.

 

 

 

Tony Kornheiser, Michael Wilbon back together at "Pardon the Interruption" studio

Tony Kornheiser returned to the "Pardon the Interruption" studio Monday for his first on-set appearance with co-host Michael Wilbon since before the Covid epidemic began.

For nearly four years, Kornheiser's been doing the daily show from his home.

Kornheiser joked that he'd awakened from a dream in which he'd been doing the show from his basement and attic for four years.

Wilbon cracked in a pop-culture reference for the show's baby-boomer audience that Kornheiser was like Bobby Ewing from the old "Dallas" show, returning as if nothing had happened.

In contrast to Kornheiser, Wilbon's been doing one of ESPN's signature shows from various locations around the country, sometimes appearing on the Washington, D.C. set.

As Kornheiser frequently jokes about, Wilbon often performs from Phoenix and Chicago, where he has homes. He also broadcasts from cities where he does his NBA Countdown show.

The PTI on-set reunion appears brief: Wilbon at the end of the show said he'd be traveling again, and Kornheiser sounded unclear about whether he'll regularly appear in the studio.

That raised speculation about whether Kornheiser's return is a prelude to his retiring.

Old-time viewers like me hope that's not the case. Each day, I look forward to his benediction "Happy time, people."

 

 

 

 

New York magazine's Will Leitch blasts college football for Florida State snub

Southern football fans wouldn't expect New York magazine to publish the best commentary on undefeated Florida State's shocking exclusion from the championship playoffs.

Yet the most rabid SEC fan embroiled by the controversy will find strong insights from the Manhattan-centric magazine's Will Leitch, the founder of Deadspin and one of the nation's top sportswriters.

Leitch, who lives in Athens, Ga., home of the also excluded defending national champion Georgia Bulldogs, brings a Southern perspective to the magazine.

In his weekly column, Leitch lists 10 reasons why the decision to bump the undefeated ACC champion Seminoles and include one-loss SEC champion Alabama is such a travesty.

Leitch blasts the championship committee for selling out to TV money. Like the AJC's Mark Bradley, Leitch believes the unfair decision will hasten Florida State's exit from the ACC, bringing the conference's decline, and further strengthen the dominance of the Big Ten and SEC.

Fans of Georgia, LSU, Auburn and other haters of Alabama and coach Nick Saban will nod in agreement at Leitch's assessment that the decision smacks of favoritism to the Tide, which like Duke in college basketball always seems to benefit from referee calls and special treatment.

An Illinois alum, Leitch understands the Big Ten sports culture. A confessed lifelong fan of the St. Louis Cardinals, he has an old-school appreciation for  baseball. The writer is also a popular novelist and commentator on politics.

New York's Ed Kilgore, a longtime Georgia resident, displays a deep understanding of Southern politics in his pieces for the magazine.

With Leitch and Kilgore, New York covers Dixie like the Dew.

Just two hits on New York Times, Times Literary Supplement best books of year lists

I was disappointed to find I'd read only one of The New York Times' 100 Notable Books of the Year: Michael Schulman's "Oscar Wars: A History of Hollywood in Gold, Sweat and Tears."

The Times published its eagerly awaited list Sunday in the print edition of the Sunday Book Review, a week or so after releasing the selections online.

By the way, when did The Times Book Review change to a harsh headline font, particularly jarring in boldface?

In past years, I'd read several books on the esteemed list. But outside of Schulman's entertaining, encyclopedic history of the Academy Awards, I was shut out this year.

Several of the books on the newspaper's annual list I do plan to read: Irish writer Paul Murray's lauded novel "Bee Sting," Eleanor Catton's environmental crisis novel "Birnam Wood," Emily Wilson's new translation of "The Illiad" - that Homer keeps going strong - and Princeton professor Gary Bass' "Judgment at Tokyo: World War II on Trial and the Making of Modern Asia."

I received more satisfaction from the Times Literary Supplement's recent Best Books of the Year selections by the literary newspaper's contributors.

Two TLS writers cited Princeton professor Peter Brown's "Journeys of the Mind: A life in History," one of the most enthralling books I've ever read. Finishing the monumental book over the summer was my top reading accomplishment of the year.

With immense generosity to academic mentors and colleagues and memorable stories of intellectual adventures at Oxford, Berkeley, Princeton and other academic cathedrals, Brown's inspiring memoir recounts his rise from a working class Irish family to international renown as the pioneer of "late antiquity" scholarship.

The author's recollections of academic discoveries in dusty libraries are as thrilling as his memories of hair-raising trips to the Muslim Mideast when it was open to Western scholars and travelers.

In the book's brief, gem-like chapters, Brown displays an openness to new experiences, from learning languages to further his research to gathering information from every-day people he meets.

Brown first gained fame for a revelatory biography of St. Augustine, and he rivals the major Christian philosopher in his precise yet soaring language

Now, The New York Times will winnow its list down to its 10 best books of the year. I'm rooting for Schulman's Hollywood history to make it.

Julian Jackson's "France on Trial: The Case of Marshal Petain" examines democratic perils

In one of France's worst moments, World War I hero Philippe Petain shook hands with German dictator Adolph Hitler on Oct. 24, 1940.

Addressing the French nation a few days later, Marshal Petain exclaimed "I enter today down the road of collaboration."

Petain, who had witnessed the surrender of Germany to end World War I, was chosen by Hitler's Nazi regime to lead France's puppet Vichy government, which ostensibly ruled a part of France not occupied by the Germans.

After Hitler's downfall and the end of World War II, liberated France under the leadership of Charles de Gaulle tried the 89-year-old Petain and other Vichy collaborators on charges of treason.

British historian Julian Jackson's critically acclaimed "France on Trial: The Case of Marshal Petain" examines the trial, in which Petain was sentenced to death. De Gaulle, his former close friend, commuted the sentence to life imprisonment, and Petain was held prisoner on a small island, where he died in 1951.

As the title indicates, Jackson's book explores how Petain's collaboration with Germany implicated the entire country. After the war's end, France's resistance movement began a wave of harsh punishment for collaborators, including killings.

Petain claimed that he was a "shield" for France, saving it from the more extreme Nazi occupation suffered by Poland and other countries.

The Vichy regime repealed France's liberal laws, restoring a pro-Catholic conservatism. France's right-wing political groups until recently extolled Petain as a national hero.

Under Petain, French Jewish citizens were captured and sent to Nazi camps, although at a lower percentage than in other countries, likely because of the success of the resistance movement in protecting Jews. Jackson documents that the Vichy government independently acted against Jewish citizens as much as from German coercion.

Jackson has written a series of definitive histories of France's World War II experience and its aftermath, including a highly praised biography of de Gaulle ,who led France after World War II and returned to power as head of the Fifth Republic from the late 1950s through 1969.

"France on Trial," published by Harvard University Press in August, is a major work that holds deep lessons for the United States and its imperiled democracy.

Henry Kissinger's death reflects divisiveness of his foreign policy actions

Henry Kissinger established the world order that's crashing today.

Kissinger, who dominated global politics as Richard Nixon's national security adviser and secretary of state, died Wednesday at age 100.

Reactions to his death ranged from human rights advocates who consider him one of  history's worst war criminals to members of America's foreign policy establishment who hailed him as master statesman defending U.S. power.

As Nixon's consigliere, Kissinger with his heavy German accent, dark-framed glasses and raptor's beak acted as the grand puppet master of global events. His "shuttle diplomacy" established the United States as the main power broker in the Mideast.

Disrupting the communist-capitalist stalemate, Kissinger engineered Nixon's ground-breaking trip to China, spurring the communist country's emergence as the United States' major economic partner and rival. Chinese President Xi Jinping's repressive regime has raised conflicts to Cold War levels.

In countering Soviet power in the Mideast and elsewhere, Kissinger set the clock ticking on the communist empire's demise. Peaceful relations with Russia following the end of the Cold War have steadily worsened during Vladimir Putin's reign, collapsing with Putin's invasion of Ukraine.

Kissinger's achievements came with a heavy cost of blood. His "realpolitik" machinations led to the murder of millions in Cambodia, Vietnam, Pakistan, Angola, Chile, East Timor and the Mideast. 

Leaving office after the election of Jimmy Carter in 1976, Kissinger enhanced his reputation by writing his memoirs and other books, giving speeches and advising leaders as a foreign policy consultant.

Ironically, Kissinger's death followed that of New Orleans singer Jean Knight, known for her hit "Mr. Big Stuff."

Countries across the world ravaged by Kissinger's policies would echo Knight's refrain, "Mr. Big Stuff, who do you think you are?"