Tribe Watch '13 (Week 4)

Record: 9-13

Standing: Last in the AL Central (4 games out of 1st place)

We're almost a month into the season and it's still tough to get a real beat on how good this team is. This week was particularly tough to gauge their quality given how few games they played. The Tribe only played 2 out of their 3 games against Chicago due to rain and they managed to split that series. Then after a scheduled off day on Thursday, they were rained out in Kansas City on Friday. To make up that game, a double header was played yesterday. Thus far, the Royal have taken 2 out of the 3 games we've played against them, but this is a four game series that ends tonight, so if the Tribe wins that one, they'll have split with KC as well. A win would give us a 5-4 record on this road trip and if they can play .500 on the road, I'll always be fine with that. Right now, the troubling factors are the team's overall record and their sporadic hitting. Those issues are interconnected as better hitting should lead to more wins. I'm far from pushing the panic button on the season just yet, primarily because there have been so few games with our regular lineup. The injury to Michael Bourn has caused changes in the lineup that have forced guys to bat in spots that they don't normally hit. I think if we can get a healthy roster, we'll be in much better shape. Bourn should be back this week, so let's hope that's the start of something positive. Looking ahead to this week, after finishing up with the Royals tonight, we come home for our first interleague series of the season, playing a two game set with the Philadelphia Phillies. The Tribe will have another off day this Thursday and then play the Minnesota Twins over the weekend. Both of those are winnable series if we play well. Let's hope that the end of April marks the end of bad weather and the start of some great baseball. Go Tribe!

RBR: Jack & Jill

I have often found myself to be an Adam Sandler apologist when it comes to his films. While many of these get lambasted by critics for being crass, stupid, or just poorly made, I will still watch them and find some value in them. I certainly don't feel he makes masterpieces, but I can usually rely on them for providing me with a few solid laughs. But I found while watching his latest film, Jack and Jill that there are limits to the degree I will go to defend the "Sand-man". I watched this film in horror wondering how anyone could have thought this film was good and/or funny. Simply put, putting Adam Sandler in drag to play his twin sister was a bad idea no matter how you look at it. The character is loud, obnoxious, and fails to yield any sympathy no matter how much the film tries to portray her as a victim. Perhaps even more baffling than the idea that it would be funny to have Sandler play a woman is how this film managed to get a great actor like Al Pacino to not only be in the film, but to play a version of himself who is drawn to Jill because she reminds him of his New York roots. The rest of the cast (including Katie Holmes as Sandler's wife) is an underdeveloped group of characters merely there to stand on the side as observers and tell us how wacky and funny Jack and Jill are. They're not convincing and neither is the film. I simply couldn't wait for this one to be over. If I had to point out one positive aspect of the film, its that I was impressed with how seemless the scenes are involving two version of Sandler in the same shot. Often when TV shows or movies try to have scenes involving one actor play two roles, it comes off phony or cheesy looking, but the scenes in this film really made it look like there were two different people in the same shot. Still, this is no reason to give this movie a watch. A strong recommendation to avoid this one. Rating: *