Streakin'!

Although it counts for only one shutout in the books, Radbourn just pitched the equivalent of two consecutive complete-game shutouts. You might recall that John Clarkson of the Resolutes performed that feat during his first two starts of the season en route to a record 21-inning scoreless streak. Don't look now, John, but Old Hoss is right behind you! After throwing two scoreless innings in relief of Al Spalding over the weekend, Radbourn's 18-inning gem tonight puts him at 20 scoreless innings in a row. He won't get another regular-season start until next season, but he just needs one blank frame to match Clarkson's feat. I'm astonished that such a lofty record is in jeopardy so soon!

Let's Play Two!

One of the most iconic phrases in baseball history comes from the late, great Ernie Banks, who often said, "Let's play two!" Well, the Blue Legs and Canaries played two tonight, although it counts as only one game in the standings. One game, but eighteen innings. Yep, that's a league record for my nineteenth-century Hall of Famers! 

I'd venture to say that there isn't anything typical about an 18-inning game, but this one was bizarre all around. For one thing, the final score was just 1-0, which ties the mark for the lowest-scoring game in league history, despite being twice the length of a standard game. Holy cow (said the Scooter), it took 18 innings to score the game's first and only run! Even more astounding is that the fact that the two guys who started the game in the first inning -- Old Hoss Radbourn of the Blue Legs and Kid Nichols of the Canaries -- were still taking the mound in the 18th. 

Realistic? Obviously not today. In the nineteenth century, however, guys threw a lot of pitches, and they tended to finish what they started. When the ninth inning came and went with both men still working on shutouts, I didn't feel the need to remove them. There were a few opportune moments to lift them for pinch hitters, but both are reasonably proficient with the bat and Radbourn himself managed to pick up three hits in the game, which is more than most of the position players can say.

And I haven't even mentioned who won! In the end, the Legs edged the Birds by that single run when Jimmy Collins led off the 18th with a double and scored on pinch hitter Frank Chance's walkoff single. The Blue Legs' narrow victory also clinches them a spot in the Creighton Cup championship series against the first-place Haymakers. There are a still a few more regular-season games to wrap up before the championship, but I don't think anything will match the drama of what we saw tonight!

Oops...He Did It Again!

Tonight's game was a dustup between the Canaries and the Resolutes, with Kid Nichols and John Clarkson on the mound for their respective teams. Clarkson, of course, made history during his last start when he took the Haymakers' Mickey Welch deep to become the first pitcher in league history to hit a home run. Well, he just did it again! With one out and nobody on in the bottom of the seventh, Clarkson came to bat against Nichols and blasted another one out of the park. That blow increased the Resolutes' lead to 4-2, giving Clarkson a bit of insurance as he cruised toward his fourth victory of the season.

This win evens Clarkson's line at 4-4 in 10 starts. That record doesn't seem very impressive until you consider that Clarkson sports a 1.91 ERA, sandwiching him between the Haymakers' dynamic duo, Mickey Welch (1.83) and Cy Young (2.47), in the race for the league's ERA title. Welch (5-2) and Young (7-1) have the gaudy win-loss records, too, but Clarkson has pitched just as well as either of them. 

My favorite stat for Clarkson, however, is the sheer number of innings he's logged. With 10 starts, and assuming no extra-innings games, he would have a theoretical maximum of 90 innings pitched. His actual total? 85! That's a staggering body of work, even in a league where pitchers tend to finish their starts far more often than today. As of this writing, he's pitched a dozen more innings than the next-highest hurlers (Cy Young and Pud Galvin at 73 apiece). Clarkson is out there throwing quality innings game after game, giving the Resolutes an excellent chance to win every time he takes the mound. There's still a lot of baseball yet to be played, but I think we're looking at this year's Pitcher MVP -- even without those two home runs!

JOHN F****** CLARKSON!!!

Well, the matchup between Welch and Clarkson turned out to be the game of the year, but not for the reason I suspected. A highly touted pitchers' duel evaporated after just three batters, when Cap Anson homered off of Clarkson to give the Haymakers a 2-0 lead. Another run in the second made it 3-0, and Clarkson was looking shaky. 

Welch, meanwhile, was dealing. Through three innings he had allowed only one baserunner, and that man was quickly erased on a double play. It was shaping up to be another superlative performance for a pitcher who was looking more and more likely to win his second straight Pitcher MVP trophy. With two outs in the bottom of the sixth, Welch was hoping for another one-two-three inning, especially considering that fellow hurler Clarkson was up. What did Welch throw to Clarkson? Strat-O-Matic accurately simulates strikeouts, walks, and other outcomes, but it doesn't specify particular types of pitch. I imagine it was a curveball that didn't have quite enough bite, or a changeup that came in slow and fat over the plate. In any case, Clarkson whipped his bat around and connected.

Gone.

For the first time in over four-and-a-half seasons of play -- a total of 158 games, including regular season and playoffs -- a pitcher had hit a home run. Clarkson rounded the bases to the jubilant ovation of Resolutes fans who haven't had a lot to cheer about in their inaugural season. Even Welch must've tipped his cap. 

Clarkson didn't allow another run, but Welch didn't either. Amos Rusie, the Haymakers' hard-throwing closer, came on to pitch a scoreless ninth and secured the 3-1 victory. For the Haymakers, it was just another win that continued to increase their enormous lead in the standings. For the Resolutes, it was another chapter in the growing legend of John Clarkson, the heart and soul of this young team.

Marquee Matchup

Can't wait to roll some dice in tonight's Strat-O-Matic extravaganza! The Haymakers are visiting the Resolutes, and it's possibly the best pitching matchup of the season. For the home team, John Clarkson will toe the rubber, looking to improve upon his league-leading 1.75 ERA. His opponent is Mickey Welch, the defending Pitcher MVP, who sports a sterling 1.93 ERA of his own. It seems almost inevitable that one of these men will claim his second Pitcher MVP trophy at the end of the season, and both are within striking distance of the league-record single-season ERA of 1.61, set last year by Welch.

Trade Deadline

Today was the trade deadline for my nineteenth-century baseball teams, and three of the four teams were involved in the action. The frontrunning Haymakers picked up versatile center fielder Ned Hanlon from the Resolutes in exchange for reserve infielder Sol White. Hanlon provides the Haymakers with speed on the basepaths and elite defense in the outfield, both of which his new team has been lacking. How did the Haymakers land such a useful player for, essentially, a spare part? Well, the Resolutes found themselves in need of a stopgap third baseman for the remainder of the regular season, as their other trade today ended up being quite the blockbuster! 

Here's the scoop on that one: The expansion team nabbed elite outfielder Pete Hill from the Canaries in a dream-come-true opportunity. Hill will bat leadoff for the Resolutes and replace Elmer Flick in center. With Flick shifting to right, Fred Clarke remaining in left, and iron-gloved Orator Jim O'Rourke riding the pine, the Resolutes will suddenly have the best outfield defense in the league, even without Hanlon! It's also a great opportunity for Hill to take a step forward in his career, as he'd been overshadowed by superstar center fielder Hugh Duffy and obliged to patrol right field despite being Duffy's defensive equal. With Hill comes pitcher Rube Foster, who had won the Canaries' closer role this season but will likely revert back to his natural position as a starter now that he's a Resolute.

The Canaries were loath to part with the multitalented Hill, but for team allowing a league-worst 4.13 runs per game (and with a -15 run differential, also worst in the league), the defending champs needed pitching. And they sure got it! Enigmatic hurler Rube Waddell moves to the Canaries after rejuvenating his career with the Resolutes. Waddell sports a solid 2.77 ERA, good enough for fourth in the league (although his 39 innings pitched is a much lower total than the other ERA leaders). The Canaries also get Tommy McCarthy, a natural outfielder who'd been pressed into service as a third baseman on the Resolutes (hence the Resolutes' need to trade for Sol White). McCarthy brings a solid bat, and although his defense at third was nothing short of atrocious, he profiles as a plus defender in a corner outfield spot, thereby softening the blow of losing Hill. 

It's a great trade for both teams, and, as luck would have it, the Canaries and Resolutes will face each other in their very next game...tomorrow!

Universes Beyond

Maybe I need to give MTG another try?

Heroes of Saltmarsh

In June of 2019, after wrapping up our long-running Shattered Realm campaign, our Skype D&D group (Matt, his daughter, my boys, and myself) created new characters and began to play through the Ghosts of Saltmarsh D&D book. Over a year-and-a-half later, we're about to embark upon the seventh and final adventure in that volume. To commemorate this epic campaign, Matt commissioned an artist to create illustrations of the four PCs.

Without further ado, I give you...the heroes of Saltmarsh!

How cool is that?!? From left to right, we have the triton hexblade Vlaryn, the dwarf barbarian Moe, the lizardfolk monk/rogue Seven, and the fallen aasimar sorcerer Ciara. A truly great party, now memorialized in artwork!

Better Than a Battle

We're making good progress in our family Alien RPG campaign. The intrepid colonists have struck out across the frozen, irradiated surface of their new world (thanks to a pesky xenomorph whose acidic blood caused the colony ship to crash) in the hope of reaching a Weyland-Yutani outpost that (they hope) is waiting for them. This part of the campaign is all about survival, and it's shaping up to a a really fun change of pace from typical combat encounters. Amy makes no secret of her disdain for lengthy, tactical RPG battles, and I too was looking for different kinds of threats and challenges in this campaign. 

We've had our share of cool, memorable moments so far -- I particularly enjoyed the bit where Nathaniel's character, a ten-year-old kid, piloted the escape pod down to the planet -- but one episode really serves to highlight what makes this campaign so different from our usual RPG fare. After dispatching a nasty scorpion-like creature in a hail of gunfire, the heroes stopped for a breather. Matthew's character, a smarmy Weyland-Yutani executive, botched his consumable resource check (rolling four 1's on 4D6!) and thus, in narrative terms, the character ended up spilling his entire water supply on the ground. The impact of that roll was far better than any battle, as dehydration is a foe that cannot be fought with pulse rifles or incinerator units. The other characters then had to share their own precious water, and now they're not feeling quite so confident about their ability to reach the outpost...

Midseason Review

We're at the halfway point of Season 5, and it's turning out to be the most fun season since our inaugural campaign. Here are some of the major storylines so far!

• While the Haymakers (8-4) have been comfortably in first since the start of the season, the other three teams are locked in a tight battle for second. As of this writing, the Blue Legs (6-6) hold that spot, with the Resolutes (5-7) and Canaries (5-7) on their heels. At the end of the regular season, the first- and second-place teams will face off in a best-of-five series for the Creighton Cup. Will the Haymakers reach the championship series for a fifth consecutive season?  
• With the expansion Resolutes now in play, the talent pool has been diluted quite a bit. Not surprisingly, scoring is way down. Thus far, teams are scoring 3.48 runs per game, more than a half-run drop from the 4.18 per game that the three original teams were scoring last year.
• On a related note, pitchers reign supreme! The single-season ERA record (1.61, Mickey Welch, Season 4) is in jeopardy as the Resolutes' John Clarkson (3-3, 1.53 ERA, 53 innings pitched, 2 shutouts) and the Haymakers' Cy Young (6-0, 1.84 ERA, 49 IP) have dazzled in the first half. Meanwhile, Pud Galvin (5-1, 3.18 ERA, 51 IP, 1 SO) has exceeded all expectations after coming over to the Blue Legs prior to the start of the season. Although Clarkson and Young have the inside track for Pitcher MVP, Galvin seems to be getting better with every start. As for some of the other accomplished moundsmen, Tim Keefe of the Canaries (2-4, 3.77 ERA, 43 IP) and Mickey Welch of the Haymakers (2-2, 2.54 ERA, 39 IP, 1 SO) have struggled in comparison to their past standards; Keefe, however, did manage to strike out a league-record six consecutive batters during one of his starts. 
• The Position Player MVP race is shaping up to be a two-man contest between Cap Anson of the Haymakers and Nap Lajoie of the Blue Legs. Lajoie is tied with teammate Sam Crawford for the league lead in home runs (three), but last year's top sluggers -- George Davis and Sam Thompson -- have experienced a major power outage, with nary a home run between them. 
• Finally, three cheers for the Resolutes, who are solidly competitive in their very first season! Led by rejuvenated hurler John Clarkson and slugging left fielder Fred Clarke, the Resolutes are a threat to reach the Creighton Cup series. How are they succeeding? In a word, pitching. They're dead last in defense and their offense is scoring a paltry 2.50 runs per game (also last), but their pitching is ranked second behind the Haymakers. 

The second half begins tomorrow! Hmm...for future reference, maybe we need a midseason All-Star Game or something...

Tiny Supers

As much as I want to give Champions its due, I'm struggling to muster the energy to slog through the rest of the rulebook. I need a system that gets to the fun faster. In the words of Comic Book Guy...

I'll see if Nathaniel, who enjoys reading highly detailed game rulebooks, might want to give Champions a whirl. In the meantime, I'm switching over to Tiny Supers, part of the TinyD6 family of minimalist RPGs. Lots of flavor and fun, with fully customizable characters. If I ever do run a superhero campaign for the boys, it's gonna be a Tiny one!

Spreadsheet Sold Separately

Matthew got up late last night to go to the bathroom and found me in the living room reading the latest edition of the superhero RPG Champions. 

"Tell me about Champions when you finish reading it," he said. I could barely stifle a laugh. It's going to be a while before we have that conversation. Holy hell! This game is complicated. 

I have a newfound admiration for my twelve-year-old self. How had I managed to keep all these esoteric rules in my head? How had I created countless Champions heroes and villains without Excel and formulas to crunch the numbers? 

Game design has come a long way over the past several decades. I know a few grognards who still yearn for the days when games had rules to cover every possible situation and the quality of a system was directly proportional to the size of its rulebook, but I've come to appreciate the elegance and adaptability of games that have light, flexible core rules with the ability to layer in complexity through exception-based mechanics. 

I'll finish reading Champions Complete -- I owe it to my younger self to get through the rulebook, at the very least -- but if I ever do run a follow-up to the Earth Commanders campaign or play any sort of superhero RPG with the boys, I think I'll keep my eye out for another system.

Full Circle

Matt and I have been exchanging emails about superhero RPGs, and it got me thinking about my first true RPG love, Champions. Long before the Druid Cycle world, long before the siren song of AD&D lured me into TSR's clutches, I was a dyed-in-the-wool Champions fanatic. In fact, the original Front Porch campaign -- one of only two that was actually conducted on my parents' front porch -- was Earth Commanders, which employed the delightfully fiddly Champions system to tell a tale of cosmic superheroes based (where else?) in Montreal.

Earth Commanders got me hooked on gamemastering, but my favorite Champions memory is unrelated to Front Porch stuff. Decades before taking part in the D&D Fifth Edition playtest, I was a twelve-year-old kid who somehow managed to get access to playtest materials for Champions and related HERO System products. I used to dial up a BBS (remember those?) based in Texas, and, as my parents fretted their long-distance bill with every bit that trickled through my 1200 baud modem, I downloaded drafts of HERO System books and read them with a kind of awed reverence. One day, I mustered the courage to email a fan letter to prolific game designer Aaron Allston -- a fixture on that BBS -- and he sent me a very nice note in response. (Sadly, Allston passed away a number of years ago.)

I think it's high time to share Champions with my own kids, so I've ordered a copy of the most recent edition of the game. With our Alien RPG campaign starting up again soon and our ongoing Shattered Realm stories to continue, I have no idea when we would actually play this game, but it certainly will be fun to share all my old stories with the boys.

Snyderbronies Unite!

True story: I decided to sign up for HBO Max the very day I learned that the Snyder Cut of Justice League would be screened on that platform. Now the Snyder Cut has an official release date: March 18.

Sorry, Mugsy!

I'm reading a great book on iconic ballgames from the nineteenth century and happened upon an anecdote featuring the legendary John "Mugsy" McGraw. I grimaced at the sudden realization that I had somehow forgotten to include McGraw among the Hall of Fame players for whom I've created Strat-O-Matic cards. Prior to Season 5, I'd created cards for Connie Mack, Charlie Comiskey, and all the other early HoFers who were inducted in non-player categories. How had I missed McGraw? Not only is he one of the towering figures of baseball history, he's also a fellow upstate New York native; we used to go right past his memorial monument in the town of Truxton every time we'd drive from my parents' house to Colgate. 

Today I pulled some numbers from Baseball Reference and plugged them into my custom Strat formulas to calculate game stats for hitting, stealing, baserunning, and defense, and now I have a card for McGraw. Sadly, it's too late to include him in Season 5. The expansion Resolutes really could benefit from his services; as one of the nineteenth century's better third basemen, he'd address our newest team's greatest area of need. Now he'll have to enter the player draft with all the other players I'll be adding for Season 6, so there's no guarantee the Resolutes will be able to nab him. I'm disappointed to have missed him the first time around, but excited for him to join the league next year!

Pause for Applause

I'm still only in the fourth inning of a key contest between the first-place Haymakers (4-0) and the second-place Resolutes (3-1), but I had to put the game aside for a few moments to honor John Clarkson, whose tremendous 21-inning scoreless streak has just ended. 

Here's how it all went down. The Resolutes are hosting the Haymakers tonight. With Clarkson going against Cy Young, it's a marquee pitching matchup. Both men were on their game, trading zeroes through the first three innings. In the top of the fourth, Bid McPhee, the Haymakers' second baseman, led off with a bloop single. Testing the strong arm of catcher Connie Mack, McPhee managed to swipe second to put a runner in scoring position without nobody out. Into the batter's box stepped my fellow Western New York native, Deacon White, who was hitless through the Haymakers' first four games; in fact, White had yet to reach base by any means here in Season 5. It was ironic indeed that White promptly lofted the ball into the right-field corner, motoring around the bases for a triple. McPhee, of course, had already crossed the plate, which brought Clarkson's streak to an end. 

I'm sure the hometown Resolutes fans gave Clarkson a warm round of applause before the game continued. 21 innings without a run! (And it's 24 innings if we include his preseason action.) This was no Orel Hershiser-esque feat (59 innings!), but it's still by the far the longest scoreless inning streak in the five-season history of my nineteenth-century league. Watch out, Mickey Welch: Clarkson is still looking like the frontrunner for Pitcher MVP!

Back on the Upswing

Ever since I started my pre-NHL Strat-O-Matic hockey league, I've wondered if I should just abandon the baseball version and focus entirely on hockey. That first baseball season was a magical run (the charismatic King Kelly absolutely owned the league!), but Seasons 2 and 3 were rather humdrum affairs that provided few memorable moments. In Season 4, things started to get interesting again, with George Davis's home run heroics and Mickey Welch's mind-bogglingly dominant pitching. Season 5, however, is shaping up to be an all-time great. This league is back on the upswing!

Where do we stand after three games played for each team?

• Blue Legs: They're in third place at 1-2, but with six homers in three games, they're smacking dingers at a record-setting pace. The best single-season total for a team is 12, set last year by the Canaries over 21 regular-season games. Star second baseman Nap Lajoie has two of the Legs' six homers, and he's looking like an early MVP candidate.
• Canaries: At 0-3, with a -17 run differential, the defending champs are experiencing a serious hangover. They have yet to commit an error in the field, which is just about the only positive thing I can say at this point.
• Haymakers: This perennial powerhouse has jumped out to a 3-0 mark and +17 run differential. Once again, their pitching leads the way; Cy Young and Mickey Welch have pitched every inning thus far.
• Resolutes: The expansion team is 2-1 and in second place. Slugging left fielder Fred Clarke is tied for the league lead with two homers, but the real story here is the Lazarus-like return of John Clarkson to the upper echelon of moundsmen. He's pitched complete-game shutouts in both of his starts to date, meaning that he's working on a league-record 18-inning scoreless streak that he'll put on the line against the Haymakers in his next appearance. 

Opening Day

There's nothing quite like Opening Day, and the debut of a brand-new team only sweetens the experience! Season 5 kicked off with the defending champions, the Canaries, visiting the expansion Resolutes in the latter team's first-ever regular-season game. And what a game it was!

John Clarkson delivered the first pitch in team history, and a moment later he struck out Hugh Duffy to notch the team's first out. Clarkson looked sharp from the get-go, and the mighty Canary sluggers had trouble squaring up to his curve. 

Clarkson's opponent, Tim Keefe, retired the first three Resolutes in order. In the top of the second, however, left fielder Fred Clarke stepped into the box to face his former teammate. Clarke caught Keefe's fastball and belted it over the right-field wall. Fred Clarke had just recorded the Resolutes' first base hit, and it was a home run! I can only image the scene if this game had been real -- the Resolutes' fans would have lost their minds as a jubilant Clarke rounded the bases and a stunned Keefe could only shake his head in dismay.

Keefe did a lot of head-shaking, as it turned out. The Canaries' ace never had his best stuff, surrendering walks and hits left and right in seven laborious innings. He was fortunate that he had allowed only three runs, as the Resolutes struggled all game with runners in scoring position. 

Meanwhile, Clarkson was cruising. Aided by fine defensive work from middle infielders Monte Ward and Frank Grant, not to mention the strong throwing arm of catcher Connie Mack, Clarkson silenced the league's most potent offense. A leadoff single to Ed Delahanty in the top of the ninth provided a minor scare, but Clarkson made short work of the heart of the Canaries' lineup and completed the first shutout of his career. Not only that, Clarkson won a ballgame for the first time since Season 2, when he took home the Pitcher MVP award. His career unraveled after that magical run, but maybe, just maybe, John Clarkson is back!

If the rest of the Resolutes' games are going to be this intense, I'm in for a long season!

Spring Training

The four teams have just completed spring training, assessing their talent after the biggest player shakeup in league history. I've run a few preseason games and already we have some intriguing highlights and storylines to consider prior to the start of Season 5...

• The Haymakers' slugging right fielder, Sam Thompson, was the runner-up for the Player MVP in Season 4. He suffered an injury early in spring training, and although he'll be back in time to start the regular season, his absence has underscored just how thin the Haymakers' lineup has become. 
• The lack of a solid cleanup hitter was especially painful for Cap Anson, who precedes Thompson in the Haymakers' usual lineup. Anson was absolutely locked in during our preseason action -- reaching base in all five of his at bats -- but came around to score only once.
• The Resolutes' best player thus far has been hard-luck pitcher John Clarkson. The former MVP tossed three scoreless frames and, notably, was the only Resolutes hurler who did not allow at least one run.
• Speaking of pitchers, we saw standout springtime performances from Mickey Welch (Haymakers), Cy Young (Haymakers), Kid Nichols (Canaries), Joe McGinnity (Canaries), and Pud Galvin (Blue Legs), but the Canaries' Tim Keefe utterly dominated, retiring all nine batters he faced. If their ace is in top form, the Canaries will be really tough to beat as they seek to defend their championship.
• My favorite spring training highlight was when Canaries star Honus Wagner homered off of the Blue Legs' Vic Willis in the twelfth inning of their preseason matchup. Wagner's shot was the only homer of the spring.

Opening Day is next!

Season 5 Preview

We've got a new team ready to make its debut and nine new Hall of Fame players to add to the league! It's almost time to get rolling with Season 5 of my nineteenth-century Strat-O-Matic baseball league! Let's take a look at the teams...

Blue Legs

• Where They Stand: After a 6-14 season and a -33 run differential, this team has a long road back to respectability. They just suffered through the worst season in the brief history of this league.
• New Faces: Frank Chance, 1B; Pud Galvin, P
• Outlook: Galvin, the reigning Playoff MVP, slides in as a solid #2 behind Old Hoss Radbourn, giving the Legs a pair of battle-tested starters. Chance will provide much-needed offensive and defensive help. Even with these reinforcements, however, the Legs seem like a .500 team to me.

Canaries

• Where They Stand: The defending champions finished the regular season in second place with a 12-9 record, but their +27 run differential was the best ever, as was their scoring rate of 5.24 runs per game. 
• New Faces: Wilbert Robinson, C/1B; George Wright, 2B/SS
• Outlook: The addition of Wright makes the league's most dangerous lineup even more potent, but the Canaries lost a lot of their depth to the Resolutes in the expansion draft. Still, my money is on the Birds to win their second consecutive championship at the conclusion of Season 5.

Haymakers

• Where They Stand: They finished in first place for the third consecutive year, but fell to the Canaries in the championship series. These days, the Haymakers rely on their elite pitching, which managed to paper over the team's shoddy defense on the way to allowing only 3.57 runs per game -- the lowest rate in history.
• New Faces: Sol White, 2B/3B
• Outlook: Their stellar .619 winning percentage in Season 4 was driven largely by luck, as the team posted only a +6 run differential and had a .538 expected winning percentage. I anticipate some regression this year, but I think the Haymakers remain strong enough to finish in second place.

Resolutes

• Where They Stand: This expansion team is a unique mix of new players I've added to the league and bench players who never got a real shot with their previous teams. They haven't played a single game yet, but I'm already loving this ragtag crew!
• New Faces: See my previous post!
• Outlook: The Blue Legs set a new standard for futility last year. Can the Resolutes do better than 6-14? I...rather doubt it.