About this episode
Cliff Corcoran returns to remember Phil Niekro and Tommy Lasorda, discuss disappointing offseason moves in Cleveland and Chicago, and debate the best way to paint old ballplayers. Plus tales of a president on horseback and a first baseman blocked by Pete Rose. TABLE OF CONTENTS How’s the Mule?*Don’t Inhale in the Clubhouse*Cliff Corcoran: Negro Leagues Baseball Cards*Strata of Players*Against Photo-Realistic Painting?*Gustave Courbet’s Female Genitalia and Norman Rockwell’s Nixon*Realism in Walter Johnson Undergarments*A Newsletter is Born*Cleveland By Any Other Name (Spiders Memories)*Cy Young’s Waistline*Reviling the Francisco Lindor Trade*The Outfielder-less Cleveland Club*Willing Suspension of Disbelief: Cleveland*Premature Pennant Peak/Do the Cubs Have an Excuse?*On Phil Niekro*Polka Party!*On Tommy Lasorda*Little Angry Men*Goodbyes. The Infinite Inning is not only about baseball but a state of mind. Steven Goldman, rotating cohosts Jesse Spector, Cliff Corcoran, and David Roth, and occasional guests discuss the game’s present, past, and future with forays outside the foul lines to the culture at large. Expect stats, anecdotes, digressions, explorations of writing and fandom, and more Casey Stengel quotations than you thought possible. Along the way, they’ll try to solve the puzzle that is the Infinite Inning: How do you find the joy in life when you can’t get anybody out?