Larry Kart

About Tebow's flaws as a QB, this is pretty devastating: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/25/sports/football/a-gifted-athlete-tim-tebow-has-plenty-of-flaws.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=tanier&st=cse As for "judging him by the results," football is a team game, and the team around Tebow was a pretty good one. The teams around Bradford and McCoy were not. As a Bears fan, I witnesssed the same effect when Kyle Orton took over from an injured Rex Grossman several years back and "won" a bunch of games not because Orton did anything other than not make horrendous mistakes (not that he was allowed to by the coaches) but because the team had a fine defense that often gave the offense the benefit of turnovers and a short field to work with. Thus we win 10-9, or 13-10. And yet Orton was felt by many fans to have "won" all of those games. What Orton really is as a QB is now clear; he's mediocre at best. Too bad he wasn't on a mission from God.

About Tebow being a winner, I see I confused you with GA Russell. Elway felt that Tebow had to be removed because he could only be somewhat effective in an offense tailored to him, and that that offense could not win a championship. Manning solved the Tebow problem, in the short run Manning might win a championship, meanwhile a better option for the future than Tebow could be found, and control of football operations could be returned to Elway et al. from the true believers in Tebow. Is it impossible that Tebow could be great? Yes, in the opinion of almost all the football people in the NFL. Is it possible that Tebow could be decent? Yes, but only in an offense that's tailored to him. Again, though, "decent" doesn't win championships, and why, unless one cares about Tebow personally, should one invest the fate of your team in him rather than any number of other potentially decent QBs? Instead, hope you can get a better than decent one down the road.

Exactly. Denver is not going to win a championship with Manning; they just don't have the offense. By the time the Broncos develop an offense (if they can; this whole thing gives me doubts about their ability to accomplish anything with the current team in charge), Manning will be out of the game. As far as Tebow goes, I am NOT a Tebow fan. However, I think it's quite possible that he could develop into a decent quarterback IF he is put in the right situation. New York is NEVER the right situation for such things; Denver could have been with a little patience. If Elway dumped Tebow because he was sick of dealing with the fans, fine, but let's admit that he did it for his own comfort, not to help the team. If he felt that Tebow would never develop, then I can understand getting rid of him, but the signing Manning for a team like this makes no sense, either from the team's standpoint or Manning's. I guess what I'm saying is that I think Elway is in over his head in the front office. If Manning is and remains healthy and the Broncos add some receivers he feels comfortable with (I believe they're doing that already), then the Broncos will have a much better offense right away. As for Tebow, the notion that he's a winner because he was the QB when the team won some defense-dominated, fluky games is silly, unless you believe in divine intervention. Remember Kyle Orton? He was the winning QB in a lot of games for the Bears when he was thrust into action by an injury, but that was for a team that had a fine defense and not because of much that Orton himself did. And we all know the QB that Orton has since proved himself to be. As for Tebow perhaps developing into a decent QB, why waste the time and effort and the fate of your team on this quest? Why not, if Manning's health holds up, buy two or more years of likely superior play from a Hall of Fame player who might lead you to a Super Bowl while you also acquire down the road a young QB who could be better than "decent." This side of Trent Dilfer, Super Bowl-winning teams don't have decent or below decent QBs. As for GA Russell's points -- Yes, pretty much no one wanted Tebow, unless they have a coach who digs the Wildcat (like the Jets' new offensive coordinator Tony Sparano) or an owner who really needs someone who can put butts in the seats, like the guy at Jacksonville. And I don't know anyone who thinks that the Broncos needed to get Tebow out of town to make Manning feel more at ease. About Tebow being a winner, see the first paragraph above.

Because 1) They knew that Manning, like most topflight starting QBs, is not into teaching/nurturing other QBs; that's the job of coaches, Manning's is winning games; and 2) They thought that Tebow did not have enough of the right kind of talent to ever be a successful starting QB in the NFL. Many but not all people in and around the NFL feel the same about Tebow. Thus, getting Manning and trading Tebow is in Elway's view the obvious right move, because it not only gives the Broncos a decent chance to win a championship (the team have a fine defense, no?), but it also solves the problem they had last year and would have had down the road, in which the fans run the franchise. When Manning runs out of gas, Elway figures that whatever QB they can acquire to replace him will be better than Tebow is now or will be then. Hey, even if Manning's head falls off in game one, they might still be in better shape.

You should check out some Vic and Sade: http://vicandsade.net/episodes.cgi Episode 213 concerns the Missouri State Home for the Tall IMO (and I'm not alone here) Paul Rhymer was a genius. Invented a world (perhaps akin to that of the great Frank King comic strip Gasoline Alley, wrote a script for broadcast every weekday for some 15 years. In my later years at the Chicago Tribune I worked alongside a wonderful woman whose folks came from the same region of north central Illinois where Vic and Sade was set. She had the same sense of dry ironic humor, the same wry tone of voice. Rhymer launched Vic and Sade on June 29, 1932, and between 1932 and 1946, he wrote more than 3500 episodes.

My late wife grew up in Kansas, among people named Clyde Baysore and Delbert Finniger. Then there was Paul Rhymer's great radio show "Vic and Sade," about Vic and Sadie Gook and their adopted son Rush, who lived in a vaguely fictionalized Bloomington, Il. Vic and Sade's best friends were Fred and Ruthie Stembottom. Vic's Lodge acquaintances at the the Drowsy Venus Chapter of the Sacred Stars of the Milky Way Lodge included Hunky J. Sponger, Y.Y. Flirch, J.J.J.J. Stunbolt, Harry Fie, I. Edson Box, Homer U. McDancy, H.K. Fleeber, Robert and Slobert Hink, Hank Gustop, and O.X. Bellyman. Then there was Rishigan Fishigan from Sishigan, Michigan; The Bright Kentucky Hotel; and Sick River Junction, Missouri (where the Missouri State Home for the Tall was located).

Lucid is as lucid does. The guy ain't expressively free form IMO, just careless.

Grammar is also a guide to ways of making sentences that make sense. The part of the quoted West sentence that refers to the Schubert sonata -- "like ... Schubert's tempestuous piano Sonata No. 21 in B flat (D.960) I will not let life or death stand in the way of this sublime and funky love that I crave!" -- can only mean that Schubert's sonata, like West, "will not let life or death stand in the way of [the] sublime and funky love that [it craves]!" The piece is tempestuous, but it ain't tempestuous enough to do that -- though I do recall the time Debussy's "Prelude to Afternoon of a Faun" leaked some semen onto my shoe. Further, as I showed above, while West's sentence can be recast to link up Heathcliff and Catherine to what West feels, I don't see how the Schubert sonata can be stitched into West's "I" -- i.e. in a coherent sentence. Suggestions are welcome. Well, "making sense" is really nothing more than a consensual agreement to convey thoughts in mutually understood terms. As for Schubert, I thought I understood what he meant. Seems like he was projecting his personal drama into Schubert's music and finding relative equivalency therein. Not unlike an emotional synesthesia, hearing music, seeing a life's tale. Last I looked, that was allowed, albeit at one's own peril, some of this music being what it is and all... Seems like a waste of time to me, what with the readily availability of "Bernadette", but to each their own, and besides, who the fuck IS Cornell West anyway, really, that I should care about what he hears in Schubert or any other damn thing? I see your visit to Texas has paid lasting dividends! "Well, "making sense" is really nothing more than a consensual agreement to convey thoughts in mutually understood terms." Exactly. And West's sentence turns the mutual understanding of the link between Schubert's sonata and what he feels about women into a matter of guesswork. What he would have needed to say was something like this, however fucking awkward it is: "My refusal to let life or death stand in the way of this sublime and funky love that I crave is just as tempestuous as Schubert's piano Sonata No. 21 in B flat (D.960)." But then the Heathcliff and Catherine part of it are out the window -- unless, again, one thinks of a sentence as a dugout canoe: pile it all in; the relationships between what's in there are what I think they are, even if i didn't say it. To switch to music, would one say that of Ornette or Ayler? IMO, no.

Or to put it another way -- not every sentence that is ungrammatical by some standard doesn't make sense, but some sentences (like that one of West's) that are ungrammatical by some standard also do not make sense. West's sentence is like a dugout canoe -- as long as he gets A, B, and C into the canoe, he's satisfied that the relationship among A, B, and C that he feels is there will be evident to all. But it ain't. By contrast, the relationship between the singer and what he sings in "Bernadette" -- as you quite accurately describe it -- is not only perfectly, powerfully clear but also, you should pardon the expression, as grammatical as can be.

Grammar is also a guide to ways of making sentences that make sense. The part of the quoted West sentence that refers to the Schubert sonata -- "like ... Schubert's tempestuous piano Sonata No. 21 in B flat (D.960) I will not let life or death stand in the way of this sublime and funky love that I crave!" -- can only mean that Schubert's sonata, like West, "will not let life or death stand in the way of [the] sublime and funky love that [it craves]!" The piece is tempestuous, but it ain't tempestuous enough to do that -- though I do recall the time Debussy's "Prelude to Afternoon of a Faun" leaked some semen onto my shoe. Further, as I showed above, while West's sentence can be recast to link up Heathcliff and Catherine to what West feels, I don't see how the Schubert sonata can be stitched into West's "I" -- i.e. in a coherent sentence. Suggestions are welcome.

Yeah, clearly he wouldn't allow the perfect to be the enemy of the good. Much of Schubert is sublime, but it would probably take a special interpreter to make it funky. I know why he mentioned it, but I meant that I didn't know how to nudge the Schubert sonata into the sentence grammatically.

They should have included this:

P.S. Nice to be informed that "Wuthering Heights" is a remarkable novel and by Emily Bronte, too. Also, that final sentence, as written, makes no sense; it says that "I" (i.e. West) am "[L]ike Heathcliff and Catherine's relationship" and " Schubert's tempestuous piano Sonata No. 21 in B flat." What he means is that "Like Heathcliff and Catherine, I will not let life or death stand in the way of this sublime and funky love that I crave!" Don't know how to nudge the Schubert sonata into the sentence, though.

Quote from a poster on the Pro Football Talk blog, referring to the screwup in the Tebow-to-Jets trade, but capable of wider application: THIS IS THE GREATEST OFFSEASON IN NFL HISTORY!!!!!!!!!!!!

Then I guess I won't reply to it.

Shoot -- I mistakenly deleted Jim's last post while trying to delete/modify my response to it. Please repost yours, Jim.

And why -- compared to any number of other arguably wayward and or evolving-at-oblique-angles threads, including some (e.g the Quincy Jones thread) in which IIRC you yourself veered toward the Bastille bearing a torch in your hand -- is this one a "50 car pileup"?

Next up -- Monica Lewinsky.

"...a level of physical attraction, personal adoration, and moral admiration that is hard to find." You gotta love that "hard to find."

Never been a Liebman fan, but those interviews are interesting to say the least.

Thank you, Mark -- Owens' is the chapter and verse passage I recalled reading.

JeffCrom -- I didn't put what I said quite right, and what you said pretty much hits the nail on the head. By systematic harmonically, I really meant systematic in the particular way that the quoted passage suggests he was, "using the higher intervals of a chord as a melody line and backing them with appropriately related changes." Instead, as you say, "Bird's quote seems to imply that he was using a lot of elevenths and thirteenths, but that's not really what was going on." What you add about his rhythmic innovations and "macro [and micro?] syncopation" is spot on, too. As I wrote in my chapter on the Jazz Avant-Garde 1949-1967 in"The Oxford Companion To Jazz": "However 'swing' is defined, it would seem that up to and including Parker, jazz's rhythmic language depended on the presence of relatively stable metrical frameworks -- ones in which rhythmic events could be shaped by, as Igor Stravinsky put it, 'the fruitful convention of the bar.' But in Parker's music the ability to make meaningful microsubdivisions of the beat within such frameworks may have reached a kind of physical or perceptual barrier. In any case, nearly five decades after his death (a very long time for an art such as jazz) that barrier arguably remains unbreached -- by John Coltrane, by Ornette Coleman, by anybody. New metrical frameworks, looser metrical frameworks, no metrical frameworks -- the issues were in the air."

Sorry, Chuck, I too can't cite chapter and verse, but the money line from the Biddy Fleet-Bird at Minton's anecdote is Bird supposedly saying: "I found that by using the higher intervals of a chord as a melody line and backing them with appropriately related changes, I could play the thing I'd been hearing." The source I can't recall said while that is all well and good, "using the higher intervals of a chord as a melody line" is something that Bird really didn't do. Rather, IIRC, the point was that his melodic choices were far more "free" and (so to speak) sudden/less systematic from a harmonic point than taking the given chord structure of a tune and "using the higher intervals of {those chords} as a melody line."

Litweiler's review of Shaw appeared in the Oct. 17, 1968 issue of DB. The club was the Hungry Eye. The rest of the band was organist Bobby Pierce and drummer Fred Stoll. I should copy out the review, which is indeed excellent (and soulful, too), but I'm too lazy to do that right now. It's rather lengthy, we're in the midst of a warm pre-spring day, and I feel a nap coming on,