Torii Hunter and the impostor statement

Man oh man... there has been some outcry today in the baseball world about Los Angeles Angels center fielder, Torii Hunter's, choice of words in an interview about trying to get black American kids (or African-American children, if you prefer) interested in playing baseball. I am going to try to be clear and concise and not all over the place, but I make no promises...

Here are the two sentences that incensed people.

"'People see dark faces out there, and the perception is that they're African American," Los Angeles Angels center fielder Torii Hunter says. "They're not us. They're impostors.'"

"It's like, 'Why should I get this kid from the South Side of Chicago and have Scott Boras represent him and pay him $5 million when you can get a Dominican guy for a bag of chips?'"

Here is the full original article from USA Today about getting African American children back into the sport, and the challenges of that goal... You can see the context that these statements were pulled from.
USA Today Article

And here is Torii Hunter's non-sorry apology for his choice of words...
Torii Hunter's blog

I read quite a few comments on Torii's blog, ESPN, and other news outlets, and some people's logic really seemed off to me (of course, that is personal opinion I suppose). I feel the need to address those using my own experience and logic.

Many people were angry that it sounded like Torii was bashing Hispanics by calling them "impostors", but those who know how Torii speaks, knows that there is hardly a more loving, passionate man in baseball. He shoots from the hip, he has fun, and the media and fans love him for his colorful use of language. The "impostor" comment was not said with malice towards anyone, it was his playful way of letting his friend know that there IS a difference between a black man from the Dominican and a black man from Arkansas, he was saying "They aren't black Americans, they aren't the same as me, please don't think that." Yeah, he could have said exactly that, but that's not Torii's style, he is more colorful/playful than that; and, this is an interview, not a speech, he was retelling a story he experienced, so he used the same language he used with his friend.

Here is a story that I feel flavors why I side with Torii on this one... I lived for many years, in high school people/friends would always call me Mexican or group me in with other Hispanics (anyone who spoke Spanish was a Mexican to them) I would tell them "I am not Mexican, I am Spanish and Cuban" and they would say "Same thing". It is irritating when people don't respect your roots and I am sure it is just as irritating to Torii when white people (or anyone) say "You guys all look the same to me, there is no difference." What? Really? A black kid from Cuba is no different than a black kid from the US? Now THAT is an ignorant/racist comment. So Torii's "impostor" comment may sound like a knock to Latin Americans, but it's more a knock to everyone who just looks at skin color and can't/wont differentiate between cultures.

As for Torii saying they sign Hispanic players for "a bag of potato chips"? Again, this isn't saying that Hispanic players are worth a bag of chips, he is saying that for the most part, the MLB can sign Hispanic kids (at a VERY young age sometimes 9-10 years old) for next to nothing and put them into an academy (where they are schooled, fed, given room...all these things might be more than their families can provide). If an American kid was asked by a major league team to move to an academy when he is 10 years old, you know there will be an agent and significant money would have to change hands, and it wouldn't be "a bag of chips" because things are done differently in the US... Those other countries don't play by our rules of child labor and the such, if they did, those academies would be out of business, and it would probably be a bad thing since those academies are a boarding school for many of these kids, giving them a better chance at life. Of course, I don't know any of these things for sure, it is just information I gleaned from articles, and from watching documentaries and films like "Sugar"

Yes, yes, a few very talented Cuban exiles sign large contracts, not a bag of chips at all, but that is a minority (and they are usually older with plenty of experience), the truth is the majority of these kids are paid very little to dedicate themselves to the baseball academies for many years (this is the equivalent of a minor minor league). Again, Torii could have said "You can get a Dominican guy for much less than a black kid with an agent" but that isn't Torii's style of speech.


So Torii made a statement so he could clarify what he meant by the "impostor" statement he made in the interview, and he said this...
"What I meant was they're not black players; they're Latin American players. There is a difference culturally."

Holy smokes, people jumped down his throat again... his implying that a black Dominican is not "black"... Ugh... people are so stuck on the semantics and the details of Torii's words. People started jumping down his throat saying that he is ignorant and that all blacks in the New World came from the same place... yes, totally right, but that's not what Torii's talking about. He slipped up "again" and most probably meant "black Americans" are not the same as black Hispanics.

People on the forums were saying that black is black, white is white... that color was more important than culture... I think those people are way way off base.

I don't agree that skin color is more important than nation of birth (or tribe or family). I think there is a difference between people from different cultures/nations, even if skin color is the same. It is funny that people keep calling out Torii for being ignorant, when Torii's "impostor" comment was a story related about the naive ignorance of one friend thinking that all dudes on his team with black skin are the same. The truth is that the plight of the African-American, (or the American black man), is very different than the plight of other black skinned people around the world, they do not share a common modern history (last 200 years), yes they share a mother land, but that distant history has been lost to them for a long long time. It seemed to me that the civil rights movement of the 60's was there so that we could move away from that separation, so that the black man living in America could finally be accepted by his adopted home (yes he was forced here, but it is his home now) and be a full fledged black American citizen. Making a comment that "black is black, black Americans and black Dominicans are the same because they all came from Africa" is like saying that Mexicans and El Salvadorians are the same because they both came from "olive skinned" Spaniards. THAT is ignorance.

Again, I think most of this outrage is because people are focusing on the details, they are more interested in the drama of controversy rather than supporting a good cause and a good human being... People are losing track of the tone/emotion of Torii's mission, he is not out to start a war between nations, he simply wants black American kids to take up baseball and he doesn't think it's right for people to naively say "There are tons of dark skinned people on the field, they're black like you, so we don't need anymore."

I support Torii. I think it is very big of him to humble himself to his fans on his blog.

A number of people on his blog posted a Bible quote, and I think it is appropriate when people are calling Torii "ignorant" (even after he admitted there was a misunderstanding) with his naive/innocent choice of words... it is from Matthew 7:3-5

"Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, 'Let me take the speck out of your eye,' when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye."

Sketchbook Pages 2

Hey hey! More sketchbook pages! Hurray!

Again, this stuff was drawn while watching tv and movies. As you can see, I was really focused on hair and fashion on these pages. I have really been concentrating on drawing more hair lately, it's such a bundled mess to me.

The first page has drawings from Dr Who (the second Doctor) and some webisode of a show on IGN guest starring Felicia Day.


The second page has drawings from Frost/Nixon and from The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly.

Sketchbook Pages

I want to start posting more often, and that means posting sketchbook pages because I rarely take anything to finish, I usually spend most of my time studying faces, hands, clothing, etc etc... When I post pages, I will try to post the whole page with no subtractions, I wont hide my bad drawings just to show the good ones. I feel this is important.

The first page is of Gorillas at the LA Zoo. They are hands down my favorite animal, and the LA Zoo has a great new Gorilla enclosure. This page is the first page of gorillas I drew when I was there, and you can tell from all my side notes, that I had to reacquaint myself with these creatures.


This second page is a page I did while watching Dr Who. Excuse me, while DEVOURING Dr Who. I would watch 2-5 episodes a day and draw the entire time. I will probably be posting plenty of Who drawings. This is a page from Series 4 with companion Donna Noble.

Il Brutto

Lately, I have been drawing a lot while watching TV shows and movies. I just re-watched "The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly" the other night, what an amazing movie! I always forget how great it is. The shot compositions, the music, and I love the actors, but especially Eli Wallach, I couldn't stop drawing Tuco. He has such a great face, great expressive eyes! Here is a shot from the film.




"There are two kinds of people in the world, my friend: Those with a rope around the neck, and the people who have the job of doing the cutting." -Blondie

Baseball, Steroids, and My Hero

Growing up, Tim Salmon was my baseball hero...

Everyone who knows me, knows that I love the sport of baseball. Baseball is art to me, it is beautiful, it flows, it represents life. Recently, with all the steroids and home runs, I feel the sport has been more like a wrecking ball; it's all about mashing and power rather than speed and gracefulness. I really love that the sport is now starting to go back to speed and defense, but I think things like guaranteed contracts and pitch limits are still hurting the sport (but that is another conversation).

Today, Mark McGwire admitted to taking steroids throughout his career. I don't think this comes as a surprise to anyone. I am not angry at McGwire, I am relieved that he is now able to free himself of this burden. I think this, non-anger, comes in part because he never lied about it (in congress), he did refuse to answer questions, but he never lied. I think this humanizes McGwire, he felt guilty, and didn't want to talk about it, but he wouldn't lie about it like so many other players did.

It seemed that every athlete used steroids, everyone from the late 1980's to the mid 2000's is vulnerable to allegations that they took steroids. That is unfair, but it is the truth... this is also the time that I became a huge baseball fan, unfair to me, but it's the truth.

My good friends from high school know that Tim Salmon was my favorite player. When the 1993 season started, I chose Salmon to be my favorite, while my sister chose JT Snow as our favorites. Snow started the season strong (until Roger Clemens threw behind his head, and Snow started failing at the plate), but Salmon was slow and steady, and he eventually won the Rookie of the Year Award!! Through the years, every article I read about him made me love him even more. Like the time he accepted less money (by 3-4 million a year) to stay with the Angels, or the article where it said he would sit in the clubhouse before games and rather than play cards or goof around, he'd be reading books to his children.

My good friend Lil Mike (whose favorite player was Mark McGwire) has asked me "What would you do if you found out Tim Salmon used steroids?" I always said "I wouldn't doubt if he did, I guess everyone did it for one reason or another, but I have to hope that he didn't or that he used substances that were legal at the time." This leads to today...

While listening to MLB.com's coverage of this McGwire story, former MLB pitcher, Al Leiter came on and mentioned players who went to the players union to try to get MLB to have steroid testing... and he repeatedly mentioned Tim Salmon as being a strong proponent to have testing, that Tim Salmon was very outspoken in trying to clean up the sport.

Wow.

Hearing this almost brought a tear to my eye, literally, I started choking up. This is the power baseball has on me, the power it had in shaping me as a man... Today, the little boy in me feels a great weight being lifted off. My hero was clean, and he was trying to clean up the sport I loved. Wow. Now, looking back on Salmon's career, I feel a bit of bitterness towards all those steroid users. Salmon never made the All Star game, and while he was an above average player in every way, there were many other (roided) players that diminish his numbers.

I found this quote by Salmon (in an 2009 LA Times article by Ben Bloch), it makes me sad, but this is probably the story of many players:

"For me, as I broke down and my play became less at the level that I expected, I always was thinking it was because I was getting older and things like that," Salmon said Friday at Angel Stadium. "I'm facing guys that I used to be able to hit and all of a sudden I can't hit them anymore and I'm going, 'What?'

"I always took that personally, like, man, I'm losing it. Now I can look back and say, 'OK, maybe it wasn't so much me.' . . . Maybe I can look back on that and say, 'It wasn't because of my talent, because I was doing all the right things.' "

Tim, you were not only talented, but you were a great role model. Thanks for being you, you helped me become the man I am, and you didn't even know it.

Merry Christmas. ho ho ho

Merry Christmas everyone. This is a quick Christmas color sketch. See ya all on the flip side.

2nd Annual "Hey You Guys" Charity Art Auction

The Second Annual "Hey You Guys" Charity art auction is underway, and boy oh boy do we have some AMAZING artists donating artwork to the cause! The auction is taking place right now through December 13 2009, you can bid online at:

2nd Annual "Hey You Guys" Charity Website

All proceeds go towards Donorschoose.org, an organization that helps classrooms buy supplies they need. We are concentrating on classrooms that need art supplies. So please come by and bid on some art, or come to the "Ghostbusters" movie screening on Dec 5th! We will have the art as well as a raffle and other goodies! Word has it someone is bringing a new looking Ecto-1 (it is a Dodge Magnum called the Ecto-2k)

So I finished my contribution today (a couple days late). I decided to draw Johnny from Karate Kid, but it's Johnny in his skeleton costume. I swear, that was one of the more terrifying images I saw when I was a kid... a group of skeleton men using karate to kick the crap out of kid. Ohhh, chills.

I decided to do the drawing on Scratch Board. I hadn't used this stuff since Junior High, but I wanted to do a negative drawing, only showing the white of the skeleton costume, so this medium was the perfect match; it would be much better than ink because inking a whole page in black would have just warped the paper.

I included the pencil drawing I did. I then transferred that drawing using Saral paper, and skritch-scratch, I went to work with a scratch board tool. Hope you like it, I was very happy with the results. I like the drawing enough, I might do some inking on it, just to have my own finished copy.

Baseball Post 3

So today, I am going to post a couple videos dealing with some of the best scenes in baseball films coupled with arguing with Umpires.

The first clip is from "A League of Their Own", one of the best baseball films ever made. It is in my top five for sure, and on some days it is in my top 3. Here is the most famous scene... "There's no crying in baseball". Man, Tom Hanks's facial expressions get me every time. This scene ends with Hanks arguing with the ump...



The next scene comes from "Bull Durham". Costner hit his peak with "Bull Durham" and "Field of Dreams", what happened to this guy? (Actually, I like the 'Postman' too) Anyways, this scene is all about arguing with the umpire and how to get kicked out of a ballgame. I noticed a trend from the "A League of Their Own" scene and this one... see if you find a pattern in the words NOT to use with an ump...



And the final scene is gut busting comedy from the original "Naked Gun"... man, some days I wish umpires would be like this. Please notice they are using Randy Newman's "I Love LA" in this clip, two posts from now, I will revisit this fact.

Baseball Post 2

So my second baseball related post will be videos of my favorite scenes/quotes in the classic baseball comedy "Major League"... you will notice most of the comedy I like in this film is driven by direct statements with a cuss word inserted, great formula!

First up is Ricky Vaughn (Charlie Sheen) showing up to Spring Training, I love the delivery of that line. The sad thing is they cut Lou Brown (James Gammon) saying "Ha ha... this is my kind of team!" I love that scruffy voice of his.



Next up is a Willie Mays Hayes (Wesley Snipes) video. Again, classic Lou Brown delivery on a line.



And last but not least, Cerrano (Dennis Haysbert) with Jobu, and the famous "You saying Jesus can't hit a curveball!?" line, by Eddie Harris (Chelcie Ross)

Baseball Post 1

Over the next day or two, in honor of the playoffs, I will be posting some of my favorite scenes from baseball movies... let's start with a primer on the game of baseball, this is for all those people out there who don't understand the sport...

Last art from the T&P Art show.

These are the last bits from the T&P Fine Art Gallery show I did a while ago. I did a couple Captain America's cause I love Cap, and I have never drawn a good Cap... I like both of these, the close up is inspired by Kirby, the other one is Kirby with a bit of Romita inspiration.




And then I did a couple pieces inspired by movies... not much to say except they were fun to draw and ink.

Some more Artwork

Here are a couple other pieces of art I did for the T&P Fine Art Gallery show this past month.

Jack Johnson- The first black heavy weight boxing champion in the world.



Thomas Jefferson- Sitting in his cabinet at Monticello, reading a couple books, thinking about things.



Theodore Roosevelt- Good ol Teddy reaching for his trusty Big Stick! He is ready to face off vs the Critic! Now, we all know the Critic is worthless, he sits back and criticizes the Man in the Arena, the man who actually is out there doing the work. This idea was based on a famous speech he once gave. The Man in the Arena

This piece was done in a Kirby style. I just wanted to do artwork that simulated comic panels, and Kirby was the king at comics! Here, I pay him tribute.

Upcoming Art Show @ T and P Fine Art Gallery in Philly

Hi, I have been busy working on pieces for an art show opening at the T and P Fine Art Gallery in Philly on Friday, September 4th. If you are in that area, you should check it out and buy something... if you aren't in that area, you can still buy something from them, or ask me to draw you something for money. That would rock.

www.tandpfineart.com



I just drew whatever came to mind that day, whatever struck my fancy... so of course, presidents, comic heroes, and movie characters...

Here is a piece from the show. I will show the others in the coming days, so expect a couple posts.

Tiny Nazgul

Here is a quicky.

A friend posted about the moon looking like Sauron's eye. I then thought the bats in the sky would look like tiny Nazgul... I had to draw it.

Enjoy.

Fat man in suit

I saw Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince last night. Boy oh boy, I loved the guy who played Horace Slughorn. Well, for a warm up today I wanted to draw Slughorn, but I didn't want to research the character, so I did drew a generic fat man in a suit. Maybe I will take some time and draw a Slughorn later, have him holding a little vial of love potion.

Old storyboards: Metalocalypse

I was just cleaning up some old boards, looking through some of the work I have done in the past... and I came across one of my favorite boards.

This was done for Metalocalypse, season 2, episode 14 (I think)... the CFO gets replaced by some other "cooler" guy. And at the end, the CFO agrees to party with the guys...



Well, CFO has a little too much to drink and...



I think they cut this gag from the episode, I don't know, I never saw the final episode. That was a fun episode to board, there was a sword fighting sequence in there.

TV boards are challenging cause I was always thinking "How can I reuse BG's (backgrounds) as to not piss off my art director, and how can I make this easy for the animators so they can spend most of their time on the money shots..." Lots of planning goes into making a very simple looking show. I think the planning part of it was my favorite.

I always would have a chuckle boarding on this show, not because I thought the show was funny, but because I loved drawing the characters with overly animated and goofy expressions (not the style of the show, but since it was done in flash, nothing had to be on model), and I loved listening to Indie Folk music while boarding a show that dealt with Death Metal. This is as subversive as I get.

I may post some more golden nuggets as I find them. Going through old work is like treasure hunting.

Theodore Roosevelt and his Big Stick

It is no secret that I am a Theodore Roosevelt fan. Someday I will do a blog of Theodore Roosevelt fun facts!

Anyhow, I started doing pieces for an upcoming art show, and I decided that I would start with a good ol' Teedie (Fun fact#1: He didn't like the name Teddy... he was known to his family as Teedie)

This is an 11" x 16" ink and watercolor piece. I need to do like 10 more pieces for the show, I really want to do a 2' x 3' piece or something bigger... but I don't know, that is a lot of paint to move around. I think all my pieces will be a combination American Presidents and Philadelphia baseball players (The art show is in Philly), but plans may change...

I apologize for the crummy scan, I just can't get a good scan of watercolors. I promise the original is nicer.

Heads

All my friends know I love drawing heads... So here is a warm up page I did this morning. You can see some influences of things I have been watching lately; mainly,the Ken Burns docs on Thomas Jefferson and Mark Twain.

My muse... Sam the Olympic Eagle

When someone asks "When did you know you wanted to be an artist?" I know the exact moment...

I was a student at Halldale Elementary school in Torrance, CA...My kindergarten class was tasked to do a painting of "Sam the Olympic Eagle" in honor of the 1984 Los Angeles olympics. As you can see here. I pretty much rocked it.

For those of you that don't remember Sam the Olympic Eagle, here he is. Heck, this is even the image they gave us to copy!! You can see how close I got.

Well, the teacher must have seen a bit of talent in my painting because she submitted it to a contest of some sort, and I was the only kindergartner amongst a bunch of six graders. It was scary, I was a shy kid, but a group of Asian sixth graders took me under their wing for the night, and made me feel like I belonged. (Maybe this is why I have always been comfortable being the only white dude in large groups of Asians?)

It's funny because I don't remember the creation of the painting UNTIL my teacher told me it was good. After that, my memory is crisp, the painting was unfinished, I hadn't painted the eyes; and, I DO remember the fear I had of messing it up after someone told me it was good so far (maybe this is why I don't like showing my work in progress?) So I needed to paint the eyes, and two girls in class said they wanted to help, I was shy and also interested in girls (yes, 5 years old seems young to be interested in girls, but I was interested in having a girlfriend even at that age, ohhh Heather McGinnis how I loved you...), so I just sat there as two girls fought over who could paint eyes better. One of them painted the left eye real nice, she delicately put the white gleam on there... when she was going to put the gleam in the other eye, the second girl said "I can do the eyes good too"; my scalped tingled (My scalp tingles when people are touching my property, it's like my spidey sense) and my stomach lurched and she shoved a finger full of white paint and smeared it around... she had ruined my painting. (Since that time, I don't like people doing any of my work, I will do all the work myself thank you very much, and I know I can do it better than anyone else!)

Star Trek revival

I have come to the realization recently that in retrospect, I was the coolest kid in high school... Let me explain...

In high school I was pretty much a "geek" or a "nerd"; I mean, I loved Angels baseball to a fault (not really a fault, but some may have seen it as such), I loved Star Trek, and I played D&D. Along with wearing jean shorts, these things made me a bit of a nerd. I was never an outcast, no no, I had friends in every social group, but I preferred playing chess at lunch rather than chasing tail (ok, that's a lie, I would have preferred to chase tail, but I was too shy to do that)

No one thought I was cool, heck, my own friends have told me recently that they would even make fun of me behind my back; BUT, now all these old high school acquaintances that I am being re-acquainted to have come out of the woodworks as Angels fans(or other teams like the Red Sux), and they want to talk to me about baseball, and mention how they are HUGE fans, blah blah blah... where were you when I was listening to Angels games on my hand held radio in 6th period Economics class?

Ok, so baseball was not cool, but now it is. Check.

And with the new Star Trek movie, everyone is saying "Oh man, Star Trek is gonna be soooo cool!!!" Ahem... "Gonna" be cool? It never stopped being cool. I was dressed like a chubby Jean-Luc Picard for my last Halloween, 7th grade year. So, Star Trek used to not be cool, and now it is? Double check.

And now all this talk is getting me thinking of old ST:TNG episodes (That's Star Trek: The Next Generation to all you lay people). I always loved the costumes, so I just wanted to do a quick sketch of Picard in that grey uni with the red jacket. I know it's stiff and all, but I really just wanted to draw the costume... and I was tired of seeing those Alpacas...



Also, here is my favorite music from ST:TNG... this piece made me go out and buy a recorder a couple months ago, just to learn to play it. Enjoy.