Tag: Sports & A Beer

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In the Tap Lines for December 2024

Well, 2024 was going along pretty well for 10 months. We will need to really enjoy the living hell out of what may be a final American holiday season. Sorry, not sorry for being so dark but do your best to truly live the sentiment of the season. Christmas is a time for EVERYONE to be happy. I am happy for the great Christmas beers and will be for each of these 31 days.

~ e-visits to (3) breweries from the Best of issue of Craft Beer & Brewing Magazine

~ special featured reviews of Christmas Ales

~Heads-Up on Los Angeles Beer Events

~ Three suggested beers to buy this month. One light, one medium and one dark

~ A Book & A Beer reads Everyone This Christmas Has a Secret by Benjamin Stevenson

~ A Podcast & A Beer listens to Shift Meal on the Ringer Food podcast

~ Sports & A Beer returns with what to do with the excess bowl games

~ New Beer Releases and Best Beers of the Month

~ I will tap the Firkin and give my no holds barred opinion on the craft beer world.

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Sports & A Beer – Managerial Changes

For every sport, every season brings the coaching carousel.  A coach gets fired and then by the next year is coaching somewhere else.  In the National Football League both the Jets of New York and the Saints of New Orleans have parted way with head coaches and surprisingly the Premier League in England has only seen one high profile departure ( so far ), that being Erik Ten Hag being booted by Manchester United.  It is too early for NBA firings but there are plenty of coaches whose hot seats are warm.

After the changes, the team may win a few games and the word leaks out that the coach had “lost” the locker room as if a character in The Importance of Being Earnest.  It is more likely that any given sports team is a fragile state of being.  It is why dynasties are so intriguing because they are not the natural state of affairs.  United can rule Manchester and then can be usurped by City.  Red replaced by light blue.

Coaches are integral but so is a dominant player or healthy players and luck.  Lots of luck.  A football in America can bounce so many ways and a football in Britain can ping just under or just over a crossbar.  Which makes coaching changes such an object of discussion because the avid fan cannot really pinpoint why a coach will succeed or fail. If indeed they did either.  A true bad coach is rare and may just be someone who is better as an assistant in truth.

Tying this into craft beer.  Is there a brewery that you think could use a change in brewer.  Not because one is bad per se, but just as a means of refreshing the current beers and dreaming up new ones?  Maybe a brewery that has added a beer(s) to their line-up that are not in their wheelhouse while discontinuing others that were legend?  Next time you are beer shopping, check out the beers that you think could use a new direction.

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In the Tap Lines for November 2024

It is peak holiday season with Halloween decor still up (probably) and Thanksgiving and Christmas fast approaching. As with previous years, the elves, reindeer and I will start highlighting holiday beers, but only AFTER Turkey Day.

~ e-visits to (3) breweries inside airports for those flying this holiday season

~ special featured reviews of two beers from The Rare Beer Club

~Heads-Up on Los Angeles Beer Events

~ Three suggested beers to buy this month. One light, one medium and one dark

~ A Book & A Beer reads Wool by Hugh Howey

~ A Podcast & A Beer listens to My Unsung Hero

~ Sports & A Beer returns with the coaching carousel

~ New Beer Releases and Best Beers of the Month

~ I will tap the Firkin and give my no holds barred opinion on the craft beer world.

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In the Tap Lines for October 2024

We have entered Q4 of 2024. As always, the year just swings by before you know it. Before the calendar switches, we need to pack in fun like a trip to Colorado, which I will be posting about later.

~ e-visits to (3) breweries that won at this year’s GABF

~ special featured reviews of Halloween inspired beers

~Heads-Up on Los Angeles Beer Events

~ Three suggested beers to buy this month. One light, one medium and one dark

~ A Book & A Beer reads The Book of Elsewhere by Keanu Reeves and China Miéville

~ A Podcast & A Beer listens to Blocks with Neal Brennan

~ Sports & A Beer returns with WNBA and NBA expansion to Portland and maybe Seattle

~ New Beer Releases and Best Beers of the Month

~ I will tap the Firkin and give my no holds barred opinion on the craft beer world.

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In the Tap Lines for September 2024

Here in Los Angeles, September is the last real dry and hot month and I am so happy to see fall on the horizon. Except that fall brings the always too soon Fall Y’all Pumpkin Spice nonsense, followed concurrently by always too soon Christmas. So let’s do our best to stay in the present and keep our eye on all things Oktoberfest.

~ e-visits to (3) breweries in Colorado in anticipation of GABF

~ special featured reviews of Oktoberfest beers + tips on Fest Biers to buy in SoCal

~Heads-Up on Los Angeles Beer Events

~ Three suggested beers to buy this month. One light, one medium and one dark

~ A Book & A Beer reads The Watchmaker of Filigree Street by Natasha Pulley

~ A Podcast & A Beer listens to the NPR 4th Grade Podcast Challenge

~ Sports & A Beer returns with beer prices in the Premier League

~ New Beer Releases and Best Beers of the Month

~ I will tap the Firkin and give my no holds barred opinion on the craft beer world.

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Sports & A Beer – Hard Knocks

Since the Hard Knocks documentary series has come to HBO streaming ( gonna pass on the dumb Max name ), I have become a fan. And the roster of shows keeps expanding with pre- season and in-season now joined by off-season.

We only follow the team over five episodes and by team, I mean the back of house team. The GM, the owner, the scouts. Players are not far from mind, but they are not the focus. The ultimate episode is the draft which is a bit anti-climactic since the Giants basically got the wide receiver they wanted as well as a defensive free agent they coveted as well.

Future seasons may have more action to them, but this one, though illuminating pales in comparison to the pre-season version.

For beer, you can go two ways. Find any New Jersey beers you can or failing that, New York. Or you can pull out the biggest abv beer that you have on hand and wake up the next morning like you had been hit by a linebacker.

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In the Tap Lines for August 2024

There was a lot going on in July out in the wide world, August promises no respite for that. But in BSP World, there is a lot of fun, including….

~ e-visits to (3) new breweries in Pennsylvania from listening to Lew Bryson’s Seen Through a Glass podcast

~ special featured reviews of beers from Lagunitas, remember them?

~Heads-Up on Los Angeles Beer Events

~ Three suggested beers to buy this month. One light, one medium and one dark

~ A Book & A Beer reads You Like it Darker by Stephen King

~ A Podcast & A Beer listens to The Ringer-Verse for Deadpool and Wolverine

~ Sports & A Beer returns with Hard Knocks

~ New Beer Releases and Best Beers of the Month

~ I will tap the Firkin and give my no holds barred opinion on the craft beer world.

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In the Tap Lines for July 2024

For me, May Gray and June Gloom are the best time in SoCal but I know that I am in the minority and that most people love the sun. Whichever Angeleno you are, please make July – Visit a brewery month. It is really needed beer fans.

~ e-visits to (3) new breweries in my home state of Oregon

~ special featured reviews of barrel-aged beers from Lough Gill Brewing in Sligo, Ireland

~Heads-Up on Los Angeles Beer Events

~ Three suggested beers to buy this month. One light, one medium and one dark

~ A Book & A Beer reads The Napoleon of Crime by Ben MacIntyre

~ A Podcast & A Beer listens to Finally! A Show About Women That Isn’t Just a Thinly Veiled Aspirational Nightmare

~ Sports & A Beer returns with Sports and climate change

~ New Beer Releases and Best Beers of the Month

~ I will tap the Firkin and give my no holds barred opinion on the craft beer world.

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Sports & A Beer – NIL

Name, image and likeness.  To universities and coaches, it is a bit of a curse word.  To the NCAA as a whole?  A lot more swear words.  But how will college sports really be changed by this?  Probably won’t know until a few years and college classes have gone through but I have a guess and it involves a power switch.

That switch was from coach to player.  It is on full display here in Los Angeles with LeBron James and Anthony Davis as much in charge of head coach as the front office.  It is seen in the transfer portal where athletes head out of town if they don’t play or get to play in the style they want.

This will expand, in my opinion, to those college athletes who will find that they have levers of power to pull and will start to pull them.  Who will stand in the way of a 19 year old combo guard who is making local commercials really well and whose draft stock is rising?

Not the college who has a marquee name to use as a draw. Not a coach who is on the hot seat. Not a NCAA administrator who needs to keep both happy.  Of course keeping the worker down is endemic in the US so all will keep trying to push the athlete down but they might soon find that they cannot.

Pivoting to beer, the closest analog to a NIL is IP and how breweries skirt lawsuits with beer names and labels.  Who will gain the upper hand there?  So go find a beer with a movie reference or a product reference on it.  How does name and likeness translate in the realm of beer labels?

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In the Tap Lines for June 2024

June is L.A. Beer Week Time so the BSP blog will be celebrating that all month long.

~ e-visits to (3) breweries from the Sister Cities of Los Angeles

~ special featured reviews of whatever is in the refrigerator throughout the month

~Heads-Up on Los Angeles Beer Events

~ Three suggested beers to buy this month. One light, one medium and one dark

~ A Book & A Beer reads There’s Always This Year by Hanif Abdurraqib

~ A Podcast & A Beer listens to The Curious History of Your Home

~ Sports & A Beer returns with NIL thoughts

~ New Beer Releases and Best Beers of the Month

~ I will tap the Firkin and give my no holds barred opinion on the craft beer world.