{"id":23033,"date":"2021-06-14T11:00:04","date_gmt":"2021-06-14T16:00:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sportsfirings.com\/?p=23033"},"modified":"2021-06-14T11:00:04","modified_gmt":"2021-06-14T16:00:04","slug":"obit-watch-june-14-2021","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sportsfirings.com\/?p=23033","title":{"rendered":"Obit watch: June 14, 2021."},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2021\/06\/13\/arts\/ned-beatty-dead.html\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Ned Beatty<\/a>. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hollywoodreporter.com\/movies\/movie-news\/ned-beatty-dead-deliverance-1234967321\/\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">THR<\/a>. <a href=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/2021\/film\/news\/ned-beatty-dead-dies-deliverance-network-actor-1234995509\/\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Variety<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Damn. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.imdb.com\/name\/nm0000885\/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">165 acting credits in IMDB<\/a>. The man <strong>worked<\/strong>. And as far as I&#8217;m concerned, he classed up everything he was in.<\/p>\n<p><center><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"480\" height=\"270\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/35DSdw7dHjs\" title=\"YouTube video player\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/center><\/p>\n<p>I apologize, but this is the best Big Man scene I can find on the &#8216;Tube.<\/p>\n<p><center><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"480\" height=\"270\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/fM8_E6gRP2Y\" title=\"YouTube video player\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/center><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hollywoodreporter.com\/tv\/tv-news\/john-gabriel-dead-ryans-hope-1234967378\/\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">John Gabriel<\/a>, long time actor on &#8220;Ryan&#8217;s Hope&#8221;. He did a decent amount of other stuff, including several appearances on &#8220;77 Sunset Strip&#8221;. Interestingly, he was also one of the (uncredited) newsreaders in &#8220;Network&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Lawrence forwarded me an obit for <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hollywoodreporter.com\/tv\/tv-news\/douglas-s-cramer-dead-wonder-woman-dynasty-love-boat-1234963991\/\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Douglas S. Cramer<\/a>, TV producer. I wasn&#8217;t really planning on noting this, but Lawrence pointed out that <a href=\"https:\/\/www.imdb.com\/name\/nm0186144\/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">his credits<\/a> do include &#8220;Mannix&#8221;&#8230;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2021\/06\/12\/obituaries\/mudcat-grant-dead.html\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Mudcat Grant<\/a>, pitcher for the Twins and the Indians.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2021\/06\/12\/obituaries\/mudcat-grant-dead.html\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Grant led the American League in victories, winning percentage and shutouts in 1965 and pitched for 14 major league seasons.<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2021\/06\/12\/obituaries\/mudcat-grant-dead.html\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">He was remembered as a leading right-hander of his time, but also for his intriguing nickname, his second career singing and dancing at nightspots, and his book profiling outstanding Black pitchers.<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2021\/06\/12\/obituaries\/mudcat-grant-dead.html\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Grant, a two-time All-Star, was a mainstay in the starting rotation for the Indians and the Twins for much of his career, then became a reliever, most notably with the Oakland A\u2019s and Pittsburgh Pirates.<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2021\/06\/12\/obituaries\/mudcat-grant-dead.html\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">The Indians traded Grant to the Twins in June 1964. His best season came the following year, when he went 21-7, turned in a winning percentage of .750 and threw six shutouts. He pitched two complete-game victories against the Los Angeles Dodgers in the World Series, losing once, and hit a three-run homer as the Dodgers went on to win the series in seven games.<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2021\/06\/12\/obituaries\/mudcat-grant-dead.html\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Cited by Sporting News as the A.L. pitcher of the year, Grant headed a staff that included Jim Kaat, Jim Perry and Camilo Pascual, backed by a lineup featuring Harmon Killebrew, Tony Oliva, Bob Allison and shortstop Zoilo Versalles, the league\u2019s most valuable player.<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>&#8230;<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2021\/06\/12\/obituaries\/mudcat-grant-dead.html\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">As a youth Grant performed in a choir. Following the 1965 World Series, he founded Mudcat and the Kittens, a song and dance group that played at nightclubs and hotels during the off-seasons and that also gained international bookings.<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2021\/06\/12\/obituaries\/mudcat-grant-dead.html\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">\u201cFirst his musicians \u2014 up to seven of them \u2014 begin, playing dance music and jazzier stuff, and then the Kittens, some very sexy girls in spare feline outfits, take over the stage to sing and dance and purr,\u201d Frank Deford wrote in Sports Illustrated in 1968. \u201cThen Mudcat comes on. He sings \u2014 everything from show tunes to rock \u2018n\u2019 roll \u2014 and tells jokes and dances.\u201d<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2021\/06\/12\/obituaries\/mudcat-grant-dead.html\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">\u201cI made way more money in music than I did in baseball,\u201d Grant once said.<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Ned Beatty. THR. Variety. Damn. 165 acting credits in IMDB. The man worked. And as far as I&#8217;m concerned, he classed up everything he was in. I apologize, but this is the best Big Man scene I can find on the &#8216;Tube. John Gabriel, long time actor on &#8220;Ryan&#8217;s Hope&#8221;. He did a decent amount [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[150,195,31,16,80,29],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23033","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-1970s","category-mannix","category-movies","category-obits","category-sports","category-tv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sportsfirings.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23033","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sportsfirings.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sportsfirings.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sportsfirings.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sportsfirings.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=23033"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.sportsfirings.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23033\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23036,"href":"https:\/\/www.sportsfirings.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23033\/revisions\/23036"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sportsfirings.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23033"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sportsfirings.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23033"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sportsfirings.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23033"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}