Archive for August 14th, 2014

TMQ Watch: August 12, 2014.

Thursday, August 14th, 2014

And so is TMQ. And so is TMQ Watch. The first column of the NFL season is always kind of strange; there’s a lot of short items, basketball coverage, and other things that throw us for a loop. We’re probably not going to hit every one of TMQ’s throwaway quips. And yes, we’re aware that TMQ did a couple of draft columns; we looked at those and frankly didn’t find anything noteworthy in them. One was his usual silly mock draft, the other was his draft analysis, and both contained the recommended US daily allowance of TMQ tropes.

Anyway, back to this week’s TMQ, after the jump…

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Book note.

Thursday, August 14th, 2014

The NYT has a brief interview with Doug J. Swanson, tied to the release of his new non-fiction book, Blood Aces: The Wild Ride of Benny Binion, the Texas Gangster Who Created Vegas Poker.

This is great news, as far as I’m concerned, for two reasons:

  1. The story of Benny Binion and his foes, especially Herbert Noble, is a fascinating one. Lawrence gave me a copy of The Green Felt Jungle (a work I’m surprised Swanson didn’t mention) for Christmas one year, and that covers the Binion/Noble story at some length. But I’m excited about a more up-to-date book length treatment.
  2. I’m also kind of fond of Doug Swanson’s work. I’ve read and enjoyed (to varying degrees) four out of five of the Jack Flippo books, and was wondering why I hadn’t seen a new one in a while.

So, yeah, I’ll be picking this one up soon.