Category Archives: stan isaacs

Another puckish poll

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(Stan Isaacs)

It is now 10 years since star Newsday columnist Stan Isaacs died at 83, much too long to go without his annual Isaacs Ratings of Esoteric Distinction. Included in Isaacs’ lengthy and distinguished career as a serious journalist was an awareness of when to find a giggle, and that’s where IRED came in, a whimsical ranking of decidedly inconspicuous topics—“an appraisal of areas that are generally ignored by raters,” he proclaimed—such as bowling pins, Fred Astaire’s dancing partners, TV remote buttons, “People Who Are Neither on the Way Up or Down.”

Each April, something to fit “fools’ day,” Isaacs would publish his self-described “loving spoof of the Ring Magazine boxing ratings…a rush to respond to the unrecognized need for evaluation of quantities like the Bridges Across the River Seine.” He would commence with a grading of the best chocolate ice creams, then move on to such matters as evaluating “Things That Aren’t as Good as They Used to Be.”

A keen observer with a twinkle in his eye, Isaacs declared that there was “no category too arcane” to grade. Bryan Curtis of the website Grantland’s noted shortly after Isaacs’ death that he had been “a fierce opponent of whatever he was ‘supposed’ to be writing, an insurrectionist with a smile.”

To me and, I suspect, to veteran Newsday readers, he was a journalism hero. And so, herewith, a feeble attempt at resurrecting IRED with 2023 topics:

Balloons: 1, Animal; 2, Latex; 3, Weather; 4, Mylar; 5, Hot Air; 6, Chinese Spy.

Climates: 1, Tropical; 2, Dry; 3, Temperate; 4, Continental; 5, Polar; 6, Change.

George Santos claims (actual and otherwise): 1, Baruch College volleyball star; 2, Baruch College student; 3, Goldman Sachs superstar; 4, Jew-ish; 5, Broadway producer of “Spiderman” musical; 6, Super Bowl champion; 7, four-time Olympic taekwondo gold medalist; 8, CPA, DDS, MBA; 9, local dog catcher; 10, U.S. Congressman.

Persona non grata: 1, Russia; 2, George Santos; 3, Harry and Meghan.

Elvis impersonators outside of Las Vegas: 1, Austin Butler.

Bunnies and rabbits: 1, Easter; 2, Velveteen; 3, Pat The; 4, Br’er; 5, Energizer; 6. White; 7. Bad.

Not ready for prime-time spectator sports: 1, Quidditch; 2, Hot-dog eating; 3, Korfball (ask your Dutch friends); 4, Pickleball.

Technological breakthroughs: 1, Light bulb; 2, Telephone; 3, Internal combustion engine; 3, Internet; 4, iPhones; 6, chips (not potato); 7, A-I (TBD).

Artificial Intelligence: 1, Alexa; 2, Siri; 3, ChatGPT; 4, Bard; 5, Something called Flippy (if you’re hungry for fried food).

Baseball rules (old and new): 1, Infield fly; 2, Ground; 3, Pitch clock; 4, Pizza-box bases; 5, Universal DH; 6, Three strikes you’re out.

Fashion plate eligible for a Mr. Blackwell list: 1, LSU women’s basketball coach Kim Mulkey.

Comedy: 1, Sketch; 2, Stand-up; 3, Dark; 4, Topical; 5, Slapstick; 6, Endless, non-stop “news” of the New York Jets obtaining quarterback Aaron Rodgers.

Roadside signage too regularly ignored: 1, Speed limit 55; 2, Speed limit 20; No turn on red; 3, No U-turn; 4, No Parking; 5, Slow; 6, Stop.

Longest days: 1, First day of summer; 2, When daylight savings time ends (changed clocks add an hour to total 25); 3, Any day in a doctor’s office waiting room.

Major comebacks: 1, NASA shooting for the Moon after 50 years; 2, Inflation.

U.S. Presidents arrested: 1, Ulysses S. Grant (speeding in his horse-drawn carriage); 2, Donald Trump (34 counts).

Whatever happened to… 1, Snow; 2, Reading stuff in newspapers and books (as opposed to iPhones); 3, Facemask mandates.

Bulbs: 1, Halogen; 2, Fluorescent; 3, Incandescent; 4, LED; 5, dim.

The old college try: 1, NCAA women’s tournament runner-up Iowa; 2, NCAA men’s tournament runner-up San Diego State; 3, 30,000 runners in this year’s Boston Marathon (wherever they finish).

Channels: 1, PBS; 2, ABC; 3, CBS; 4, CNN; 5, ESPN; 6, Fox; 7, English.

April 1st

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(Stan Isaacs)

In memory of the late Stan Isaacs, who enjoyed a long and distinguished career as Newsday’s star columnist before his death in 2013 at 83, herewith is another (pale) revival of his annual April Fool’s Day spoof, a whimsical ranking of decidedly inconspicuous topics. Each April 1, Stan published what he described as “an appraisal in areas that are generally ignored by raters”—such as bowling pins, Fred Astaire’s dancing partners, TV remote buttons, “Things that Aren’t as Good as They Used to Be.”

He called his polls IRED, the Isaacs Ratings of Esoteric Distinction, what he said was a “loving spoof of the Ring Magazine boxing ratings….a rush to respond to the unrecognized need for evaluation of quantities like the Bridges Across the River Seine.”

His delightful lampoon can’t reasonably be duplicated. But I keep trying the past few years. As he put it, “no category is too arcane to grade,” so here goes the 2022 J-Faux lists, on similarly (and seriously) judged objects that normally might seem trivial, and beginning with London-related categories, since I have spent a fair amount of time there visiting daughter, son-in-law and grandboy the last couple of years….

London Underground stops: 1, Elephant & Castle; 2, Barking; 3, Tooting Broadway; 4, Cockfosters; 5, Shepherd’s Bush; 6, Shoreditch High Street; 7, Hammersmith.

London Pub Names: 1, Laughing Gravy; 2, Boot and Flogger; 3, The Widow’s Son; 4, George and Vulture; 5, Mad Bishop and Bear; 6, The Fat Walrus.

London parks for morning runs: 1, London Fields; 2, Victoria; 3, Hampstead Heath; 4, Battersea; 5, Kensington Gardens; 6. Hyde Park.

Other topics:

Passwords: 1, Open sesame; 2, 12345; 3, Knock three times; 4, (Must contain a number but first and last character cannot be numeric; must contain only upper or lower case letters, and any of these special characters–!, +. -, _, *; must not contain your first, last or user name.); 5, Joe sent me.

Coronavirus variants dating to the SARS-CoV-2 that causes COVID-19: 1, Alpha; 2, Beta; 3, Gamma; 4, Delta; 5, Omicron; 6, BA.2.

Good names for college fraternities and sororities: 1, (see above).

Solutions to not changing clocks twice a year: 1, Recent Sunshine Protection Act, approved by the Senate to make Daylight Savings Time permanent year-round beginning in 2023; 2, Move to Quito, Ecuador, where clocks never change and sunrise and sunset vary by roughly four minutes from the shortest to longest days.

Blues in the NCAA men’s basketball Final Four: 1, University of North Carolina “Carolina Blue” (sky blue), classified by the Pantone matching system as 278C; 2, Kansas Blue, Pantone 293; 3, Duke Navy Blue, Pantone 280; 4, Villanova Signature Blue, Pantone 281.

Blues in the NCAA women’s Final Four: 1, UConn “National Flag Blue,” Pantone 296C. (The other three teams wore shades of red—Stanford cardinal, South Carolina garnet and Louisville (just) red.

Ghosts: 1, King Hamlet; 2, Casper; 3, The Flying Dutchman; 4, The Ghost of Christmas Past; 4, Baseball’s “ghost runner,” the guy who materializes on second base in extra innings.

Goats: 1, Scape-; 2, Capricorn; 3, Billy; 4, The Moon?; 5, -Cheese; 6, Athletes who proclaim themselves the Greatest Of All Time.

April Fool!

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(Stan Isaacs)

Among the countless, brilliant concepts in newspapering worthy of my jealousy was Stan Isaacs’ annual ranking of decidedly inconspicuous topics. Each April Fool’s Day, Isaacs—a Newsday colleague and mentor who died in 2013 at 83—published his whimsical list, which he called IRED: The Isaacs Ratings of Esoteric Distinction.

I wish I had thought of something like that. Goofy, worldly and creative, Isaacs’ long and distinguished career as a serious journalist included an awareness of when and where to find a giggle. His IRED spoofed Ring Magazine’s boxing ratings because, Isaacs wrote, there was “an unrecognized need for evaluations of quantities” like The Bridges Across the River Seine; of People Who Were Neither On the Way Up or Down; of Fred Astaire’s Dancing Partners; of Bowling Pins. Just to cite a few of the categories he presented for judgment over the years.

Anyway, since Stan is gone, I have endeavored to make it my yearly duty to honor his memory on April Fool’s Day with my ersatz version of his ratings. Not in his league, admittedly. Still, herewith the 2021 listings:

Vaccines: 1 (tie), Moderna, Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson.

Pandemic accouterments: 1, (see above); 2, mask; 3, hand wipes; 4, quarantining; 5, 10-foot pole.

Doctors I have known and appreciated: 1, family physician; 2, cardiologist; 3, neurosurgeon; 4, dermatologist; 5, allergist; 6, podiatrist; 7, dentist; 8, optometrist; 9, audiologist. (And still counting.)

Famous doctors: 1, Livingston; 2, Spock; 3, Jill Biden; 4, Holliday; 5, Severinsen; 6, Martin; 7, J.

British police procedurals: 1, Poirot, 2, Vera; 3, Endeavour; 4, Inspector Lewis; 5, Grantchester; 6, Father Brown; 7, Bletchley Circle.

Zoom buttons: 1, Share screen; 2, Breakout Rooms; 3, Chat; 4, Mute; 5, Gallery View; 6, End Meeting.

Swiss Army Knife tools: 1, hoof cleaner; 2, corkscrew; 3, USB stick; 4, can opener; 5, pliers; 6, scissors; 7, fish scaler; 8, nail file; 9, toothpick.

Floating vessels (until they didn’t): 1, Ever Given (unstuck from the Suez Canal); 2, Exxon Valdez; 3, Deepwater Horizon; 4, Costa Concordia.

March madness: 1, daylight savings time; 2, dandelions; 3, spring break; 4, taxes; 5, college basketball.

Favorite M&M colors (tie): 1, blue, green, brown, yellow, red, orange.

Words that don’t begin with Z: 1, xenops; 2, xylophone; 3, xenophobia; 4, Xerox; 5, Xenia, Ohio; 6, antidisestablishmentarianism.

Impeding the swift completion of postal workers’ appointed rounds: 1, gloom of night; 2, snow; 3, heat; 4, sleet; 5, rain; 6, Louis DeJoy.

Pies: 1, apple; 2, blueberry; 3, pumpkin; 4, chicken pot; 5, shepherd’s; 6, 3-point-14159….

Baseball action rarely seen anymore: 1, pickle; 2, stealing home; 3, bunting; 4, basket catches; 5, two-hour nine-inning game.

Cars I have owned: 1, MGB; 2, Saab; 3, VW; 4, Toyota; 5, Chevy.

Newspaper sections: 1, sports; 2, news; 3, op-ed; 4, obituaries (as long as they aren’t about me); 5, arts; 6, business.

Original favorite newspaper section: 1, funnies.

Another April Fools’ Day

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(Stan Isaacs)

It’s April Fools’ Day, but this is not exactly a prank. This is an earnest attempt to honor my late Newsday colleague and mentor Stan Isaacs, who died in 2013 at 83. It is inspired by the fact that, each April Fools’ Day during Stan’s long and distinguished career there, Newsday published his whimsical rankings of decidedly inconspicuous topics, calling them IRED—the Isaacs Ratings of Esoteric Distinction. The purpose, he said, was to offer “an appraisal in areas that are generally ignored by raters,” and he declared that “no category is too arcane” to grade.

IRED, he said, was “a loving spoof of the Ring Magazine boxing ratings….a rush to respond to the unrecognized need for evaluations of qualities like the Bridges Across the River Seine.” For each April 1 edition, he began with his personal classification of chocolate ice creams and, from there, quantified such universal matters as Fred Astaire’s dancing partners; TV remote buttons; “Things that Aren’t As Good as They Used to Be;” bowling pins. “The IRED never glittered more,” he once noted, “than when it evaluated People Who Were Neither On the Way Up or Down.”

Grantland’s Bryan Curtis, in an appreciation shortly after Stan’s death, insightfully recognized him as “a fierce opponent of whatever he was ‘supposed’ to be writing, an insurrectionist with a smile.” That was the key to making Stan a journalism hero. Worldly and creative, and admirably goofy. A keen observer with a twinkle in his eye. A man, certainly, who understood the need for an April Fools’ Day giggle.

As a pale tribute, then—and even in these strange times—here is my 2020 rip-off of his delightful parody:

Historical figures for the Age of Coronavirus: 1, Lady MacBeth (wash your hands). 2, Ignaz Semmelweis (19th Century pioneer of antiseptic procedures). 3, Edvard Munch (don’t touch your face like that).

Now part of the daily language: 1, In an abundance of caution. 2, Social distancing. 3, Flatten the curve. 4, Shelter in place. 5, Postponed. 6, Zoom.

Possible 2020 Opening Days in baseball: 1, May 1st. 2, June 1st. 3, July 1st. 4, August 1st. 5, April 1st, 2021.

Telephone functions (circa 1970): 1, Telephone.

Telephone functions (circa 2020): 1, Mail. 2, Camera. 3, Newspaper. 4, Clock. 5, Calendar. 6, Map. 7, Encyclopedia. 8, Book. 9, Stopwatch. 10, Record player. 11, Calculator. 12, Notebook. 13, Compass. 14, Alarm. 15, Radio. 16, Television. 17, Diary. 18, Tape recorder. 19. Technological wizardry I have not yet deciphered. 20, Telephone.

Familiar structures personally visited: 1, New York City’s Chrysler Building. 2, Shanghai’s “Bottle opener” (World Financial Center). 3, Sydney’s Opera House. 4, St. Louis’ Gateway Arch. 5, Barcelona’s Sagrada Familia cathedral. 6, Athens’ Parthenon. 7. The Leaning Tower of Pisa. 8, London’s Westminster Abbey. 9, Starbucks.

Minor league baseball team nicknames (then and now): 1, Montgomery Biscuits. 2, Reading Coal Heavers. 3, Lancing Lugnuts. 4, Chattanooga Lookouts. 5, Akron Rubber Ducks. 6, Allentown Peanuts. 7, Albuquerque Isotopes. 8, 2019 Miami Marlins.

Music genres: 1, Classical. 2, Blues. 3, Country. 4, Folk. 5, Ska. 6, Rock. 7. Roll.

Famous quarterbacks: 1, Tom Brady. 2, Joe Namath. 3, Joe Montana. 4 (tie) Archie, Payton and Eli Manning. 5, Doug Williams. 6, Monday morning. 7, Armchair.

An April Fools’ Day Tradition

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(Stan Isaacs)

It used to be an annual tradition on April Fools’ Day for my longtime employer, Newsday, to publish star columnist Stan Isaacs’ whimsical rankings of decidedly inconspicuous topics—such as bowling pins; Fred Astaire’s dancing partners; TV remote buttons; “Things That Aren’t As Good as The Used to Be.” Stan died in 2013 and I officially retired from the newspaper the next year. But in Stan’s memory, his delightful parody must not go away.

It was conceived, he said, “as a loving spoof of the Ring Magazine boxing ratings….a rush to respond to the unrecognized need for evaluations of quantities like the Bridges Across the River Seine.”

His waggish purpose was to offer “an appraisal in areas that are generally ignored by raters” and he declared that “no category is too arcane” to grade. He called his yearly polls IRED, the Isaacs Ratings of Esoteric Distinction.” What follows is my pale imitation—which I will call the J-Faux—of similarly (and seriously) judged objects that normally might seem trivial.

Eating utensils: 1 (tie), Knife. Fork. Spoon. 2, Chopsticks. 3, Fingers.

Times: 1, Daylight. 2, Standard. 3, New York (print edition).

Thoroughfares: 1, Route 66. 2, Abbey Road. 3, Bourbon Street. 4, Barcelona’s Las Ramblas. 5, Broadway. 6, Straight and Narrow.

Chess strategies: 1, Nimzo Indian Defence. 2, Noak’s Ark Trap. 3, Morphy Defence. 4, Fianchetto.

Prognosticators: 1, Nostradamus. 2, Punxsutawney Phil. 3, Jeane Dixon. 4, Jimmy the Greek. 5, Your daily horoscope. 6, Any meteorologist in Southern California, where “it never rains.”

Three Stooges: 1, Moe. 2, Larry. 3. Curley.

50-Year Anniversaries Being Observed in 2019: 1, First man on the moon. 2, Amazin’ Mets’ World Series victory. 3. Woodstock. 4, Joe Namath’s Super Bowl guarantee. 5, First post-college job for yours truly.

Famous Pairs: 1, Pinky and the Brain. 2, Bob and Ray. 3, Romeo and Juliet. 4, Simon and Garfunkel. 5, Bonnie and Clyde. 6, Macaroni and cheese. 7, Death and taxes.

Harry Potter characters: 1, Hedwig. 2, Professor Dumbledore. 3, Draco Malfoy. 4, The sorting hat. 5, Hermione Granger. 6, Voldemort. 7, Ron Weasley. 8, Various muggles. 9, Dudley Dursley.

Forms of precipitation: 1, Rain. 2, Snow. 3, Sleet. 4, Fog. 5, Graupel.

Books on my bookshelf that I really mean to read some day: 1, Finnegans Wake. 2, War and Peace. 3, One Hundred Years of Solitude. 4, The Satanic Verses. 5, The other 35 of Shakespeare’s 37 plays.

Dogs: 1, Snoopy. 2, Lassie. 3, Tramp. 4, Rover. 5, Balto. 6, Rin Tin Tin. 7, Pluto. 8, Old Yeller. 9, Fido. 10, Sprocket. 11, Jack Russell.

Puzzlers: 1, Pi. 2, Rubik’s Cube. 3, E=mc2. 4, More than a few New Yorker cartoons.

Dreadful sports clichés: 1, They control their own destiny. (Impossible; destiny is destiny.) 2, Step up to the plate. 3, It is what it is. 4, At the end of the day… 5, That team just wanted it more. 6, They dodged a bullet. 7, They were playing with a chip on their shoulders. 8, There’s no tomorrow. 9, They gave 110 percent.

New Year’s Days: 1, April 1 (Until the Gregorian calendar replaced the Julian in 1564). 2, Jan. 1. 3, Sometime between Jan. 20 and Feb. 20 (Chinese or Lunar New Year); 4, Sometime between Sept. 5 and Oct. 5 (Jewish New Year, or Rosh Hashanah). 5, Sept. 11 (Coptic New Year, or Nayrouz). 6, Baseball Opening Day (“This is going to be our year!”)

Ranking sports journalists: 1, Stan. 2, Isaacs.

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(Stan Isaacs)

This is what Stan Isaacs gets for having been a terrific mentor—my lame attempt to revive his grand contributions to polling.

Isaacs, a premier Newsday sportswriter and columnist from 1954 to 1992 and among my more inspirational colleagues during his last 22 years there, died in 2013, at 83. He died on April 2, the day after his annual April Fool’s parody, the Isaacs Ratings of Esoteric Distinction, would have appeared. It’s high time those carefully judged rankings of apparent triviality be reinstated.

The IRED was pure Isaacs, goofy and worldly and creative. It was originally conceived, he explained to readers, “as a loving spoof of the Ring Magazine boxing ratings, a rush to respond to the unrecognized need for evaluations of quantities like The Bridges Across the River Seine.” He declared that “no category is too arcane” and that “the IRED never glittered more than when it evaluated People Who Were Neither On the Way Up or Down.”

He once ranked towns along the route of the Boston Marathon. And Bowling pins. And his Least Favorite States (he had Nevada No. 1). And Fred Astaire’s Dancing Partners. And Things That Aren’t As Good as They Used to Be.

He once ranked TV remote buttons: 1, Off. 2, Mute. 3, Return. 4, Exit. 5, Power. 6, Volume. 7, Channels. 8, Closed Caption. 9, Menu. 10, Pause.

He once ranked Lewis & Clark: 1, Clark. 2, Lewis.

On a couple of occasions, Isaacs gave me the extraordinary honor of serving as a guest contributor to the IRED, rating high school nicknames (The Polo Marcos of Illinois and Custer Indians of Milwaukee led my list) and United States Football League silver helmets (since nine of the 12 original teams in that short-lived league all wore silver helmets).

The idea of compiling such standings, Isaacs said, was to offer an “appraisal in areas that are generally ignored by raters.” A daunting task, given the high bar he set. But here goes:

Potatoes: 1, Mashed. 2, Baked. 3, French Fried. 4, Couch.

Obsolete golf clubs: 1, Niblick. 2, Spoon. 3, Brassie. 4, Cleek. 5, Mashie.

Most distinctive state flags: 1, New Mexico. 2, Louisiana. 3, Arizona. 4, California. 5, Colorado. 6, Texas.

English pairs: 1, Lennon and McCartney. 2, Fish and Chips. 3, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle. 4, Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon. 5, Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn. 6, Henry VIII and Jane Seymour. 7, Henry VIII and Anne of Cleves. 8, Henry VIII and Catherine Howard. 9, Henry VIII and Catherine Parr.

Mail: 1, e-. 2, Amazon. 3, Fed Ex. 4, UPS. 5. U.S. Postal Service.

Muppets: 1, Fozzie the Bear. 2, Statler & Waldorf. 3, Kermit. 4, Bert & Ernie. 5, Miss Piggy. 6, Beeker. 7, Animal. 8, Janice. 9, The Swedish Chef.

Twins: 1, Astronauts Mark and Scott Kelly. 2, NFL players Ronde and Tiki Barber. 3, BeeGees Robin and Maurice Gibb. 4, Advice columnist authors Dear Abby and Ann Landers. 5, Romulus and Remus. 6, Rod Carew.

Sports Scandals: 1. Chicago Black Sox throwing the 1919 World Series. 2 (tie) Lance Armstrong and Floyd Landis Tour de France doping. 3, Rosie Ruiz Boston Marathon “victory” by running only the last half-mile. 4. Tonya and Nancy. 5, 1950s point-shaving in college basketball involving CCNY, NYU, LIU, Manhattan College, Bradley University, the University of Kentucky and the University of Toledo. 6, Ben Johnson’s steroid-powered 1988 Olympic sprint victory. 7, The 1983 George Brett Pine Tar Incident (ask a Yankee fan). 8, This month’s Australian cricket ball-scuffing incident.

Tigers: 1, Bengal. 2, Caspian. 3, Siberian. 4, Malayan. 5, University of Missouri.

Clouds: 1, Cirrus. 2, Stratus. 3, Cumulus. 4, Cumulonimbus.

Characters from TV’s Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle: 1, Moose. 2, Squirrel. 3, Boris. 4, Natasha. 5, Sherman. 6, Mr. Peabody. 7, Dudley Do-right. 8, Nell. 9, Snidely Whiplash.

Landscape implements: 1, Mower. 2, Trimmer. 3, Rake. 4, Hired Help.

Favorite currencies made obsolete by the adoption of the Euro: 1, Lira (Italy). 2, Forint (Hungary). 3, Peseta (Spain). 4, Deutsche Mark (Germany).

Favorite pollsters (in reverse order): 6, Nielsen. 5, Pew Research. 4, Gallup. 3, AP college football. 2, Quinnipiac. 1. Stan Isaacs.