A16| Monday, October 7, 2019 ***** THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
I GET AROUND| By Constance Burnikel &
Zhouqin Burnikel
Across
1 Curly-tailed
Japanese dog
6 Sharp-tasting
10 Unwanted inbox
fillers
14 Tibetan priests
15 Sheltered from
the wind
16 Evening, in ads
17 Portable storage
device
19 “That’s too bad”
20 Summer on the
Seine
21 Chest bone
22 Courtroom
proceedings
24 Angler’s fishing
lure
27 ISP owned by
Verizon Media29 Enjoying a
vacation
30 Alarm clock
toggle
31 Skeleton’s place?
33 Hurdle for Ph.D.
hopefuls
34 In the past
37 Lab procedures
38 Female caribou
39 Shrek’s
sweetheart
41 Latvia, until 1991:
Abbr.
42 Give help to
43 Some American
workers
44 Land in the water
46 Orioles legend
Ripken
47 Number after
uno48 Arrogant leader
53 Single-celled
organism
54 Period in
history
55 “That feels
wonderful!”
57 Slightly soggy
58 Set of shows
with a
predetermined
end date
62 Perlman of
“Cheers”
63 The Hatfields,
to the McCoys
64 “I wanna have a
turn!”
65 “Piece of cake!”
66 One of the
Brontë sisters
67 Not suitableTheWSJDailyCrossword|Edited by Mike Shenk
12345 6789 10111213
14 15 16
17 18 19
20 21 22 23
24 25 26
27 28 29 30
31 32 33 34 35 36
37 38 39 40
41 42 43
44 45 46 47
48 49 50 51 52
53 54 55 56
57 58 59 60 61
62 63 64
65 66 67s
Solve this puzzle online and discuss it atWSJ.com/Puzzles.Down
1 1980s sitcom
featuring an
extraterrestrial
2 Healthy cabbage
variety
3 “This puzzles
me”
4 Itemonacop’s
belt
5 Hardwood tree
6 Tax on imports
7 Suspect’s
defense
8 ___ up (excite)
9 Golfer’s
reservation
10 Postal letters,
colloquially
11 Rice dish
12 In the least
13 Like many a
dorm room
18 Windblown pile
of snow
23 Cardi B
specialty
25 Wingtip’s tips
26 Give a hoot
27 Part of a play
28 Cheers for
toreadors32 Compensation
from the labor
union
33 Thor or Odin
35 Positive
energy
36 Not fooled by
38 Watch one’s
weight
39 Sportswear
company
founded in Italy
40 Braying beast
42 Forage crop
43 Play with,
kitten-style
45 Weep
46 Red hue
48 Tight-knit group
49 Warren
Buffett’s city
50 Shows up
51 Macho guys
52 Burdened down
56 Camel feature
59 Charged
particle
60 Manning with
two Super Bowl
rings
61 Tennis court
dividerPrevious Puzzle’s SolutionThe contest answer is HOST. The initial letters of
the words in each of the four longest Across
answers spell a first name that pairs with another
grid answer to name a famous man: BOB HOPE,
TONY ORLANDO, SLY STONE and RIP TORN. The
first letters of the last names spell the contest
answer.JAPAN HOPE BOO
STONE UPON ANN
BASEONBALLS MET
MCA LOIN ACA
ELL IOTT VODKAS
TITANSOFNEWYORK
ANY REININ
TROD ORC NEBR
DEN I RO ROD
SOMEBODYL I KEYOU
CRESTS ORLANDO
AIL OWES AES
ROT REST I NPEACE
ALE AS IN TUTOR
BED TORN OPENSWeather
Shown are today’s noon positions of weather systems and precipitation. Temperature bands are highs for the day.
City Hi LoW Hi LoW City Hi Lo W Hi Lo WToday Tomorrow Today TomorrowCity Hi LoW Hi LoWAnchorage 47 37 pc 50 41 r
Atlanta 85 65 t 82 62 t
Austin 79 57 pc 84 59 s
Baltimore 81 56 c 68 52 r
Boise 69 47 s 65 36 pc
Boston 77 57 r 67 53 pc
Burlington 59 46 r 62 41 pc
Charlotte 83 64 pc 76 57 c
Chicago 66 45 s 66 47 s
Cleveland 68 49 r 70 48 s
Dallas 76 55 s 79 61 s
Denver 75 40 s 80 48 s
Detroit 67 45 pc 65 49 s
Honolulu 86 70 pc 86 74 pc
Houston 81 62 pc 82 63 s
Indianapolis 71 46 s 71 47 s
Kansas City 70 46 s 69 51 s
Las Vegas 87 63 s 92 65 pc
Little Rock 73 50 s 74 51 s
Los Angeles 85 61 s 81 61 s
Miami 90 77 sh 86 76 t
Milwaukee 65 48 s 65 51 s
Minneapolis 64 50 s 69 53 pc
Nashville 65 52 r 76 53 s
New Orleans 89 72 t 86 73 pc
New York City 77 56 sh 67 54 pc
Oklahoma City 71 47 s 73 56 s
Omaha 69 49 s 70 54 s
Orlando 87 73 pc 88 74 t
Philadelphia 80 57 r 68 53 c
Phoenix 98 73 s 97 68 s
Pittsburgh 60 45 r 66 46 s
Portland, Maine 69 50 r 66 43 pc
Portland, Ore. 68 48 pc 56 38 sh
Sacramento 89 51 s 86 52 s
St. Louis 72 48 s 73 48 s
Salt Lake City 66 46 s 76 49 s
San Francisco 80 54 s 72 51 s
Santa Fe 68 44 s 70 44 pc
Seattle 61 46 r 53 40 pc
Sioux Falls 67 51 s 69 54 s
Wash., D.C. 81 60 sh 69 57 rAmsterdam 58 52 c 63 50 r
Athens 73 64 t 73 62 t
Baghdad 100 70 s 102 71 s
Bangkok 89 75 t 90 78 c
Beijing 76 48 pc 69 44 s
Berlin 51 38 pc 54 48 r
Brussels 58 53 pc 59 49 r
Buenos Aires 74 47 pc 75 51 pc
Dubai 100 85 t 99 85 s
Dublin 60 46 r 56 45 pc
Edinburgh 58 48 r 55 46 shFrankfurt 56 49 c 57 48 r
Geneva 62 43 sh 68 53 pc
Havana 86 70 t 85 70 t
Hong Kong 88 79 sh 90 79 s
Istanbul 69 59 c 64 59 sh
Jakarta 94 77 pc 94 77 pc
Jerusalem 79 61 s 83 63 pc
Johannesburg 85 55 c 85 57 s
London 59 53 r 62 50 pc
Madrid 83 56 pc 84 56 pc
Manila 93 78 s 92 78 pc
Melbourne 63 47 c 56 46 sh
Mexico City 74 56 t 69 53 pc
Milan 69 50 pc 67 49 s
Moscow 39 31 c 38 35 pc
Mumbai 89 78 pc 91 80 t
Paris 62 54 pc 62 50 sh
Rio de Janeiro 82 73 pc 80 72 t
Riyadh 103 78 s 98 76 s
Rome 71 52 t 73 54 s
San Juan 89 80 pc 88 79 pc
Seoul 64 53 r 68 48 pc
Shanghai 81 66 pc 75 64 c
Singapore 87 78 t 87 78 sh
Sydney 7562pc 7552pc
Taipei City 87 75 s 86 74 pc
Tokyo 74 69 c 82 68 sh
Toronto 64 42 c 62 44 s
Vancouver 59 43 r 56 35 sh
Warsaw 4835pc 5148c
Zurich 59 43 sh 63 53 pcToday TomorrowU.S. Forecasts
International
City Hi Lo W Hi Lo W
s...sunny; pc... partly cloudy; c...cloudy; sh...showers;
t...t’storms; r...rain; sf...snow flurries; sn...snow; i...ice
Today Tomorrow
WarmColdStationaryShowersRainT-stormsSnowFlurriesIce<
0s
10s
20s
30s
40s
50s
60s
70s
80s
90s
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phitCityP DllPPtl danlddAtl tewwSan Diego PhLos AngeA lLLL
Vegattli Mpls./St. Paul..LouLChicCh ghihhington D.C.gton D CtChlkk rtfordhitdi pCleveCl l dAtil kAbq qhhkahoma Cityhoma Cityan AAt ies Moinesoux FllJacksonhCheyenne Phhil d l hihh lhpanta FeColorado
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ihghTTTcAbyTopekaC bbAAg tFt. WorthpgifildbilTTipVVancouver Calgaryd tAnchorage HonoluluJacksonvilleLittle RockCharlotteLouisvillePittsburghSalt Lake City New YorkTampaNashville
MemphisDetroitKansas
CityEl Paso DallasBillingsPortlandMiamiSan FranciscoSacramentoOrlandoAtlantaNew OrleansHoustonSan Diego PhoenixLos AngelesLas
VegasSeattleBoiseDenverMpls./St. PaulSt. LouisChicagoWashington D.C.BostonCharlestonMilwaukee HartfordWichitaIndianapolisClevelandBuffaloAustinHelena BismarckAlbuquerqueOmahaOklahoma CitySan AntonioDes MoinesSioux FallsJacksonBirminghamCheyenne Philadelphia
RenoSanta FeColorado
SpringsPierreRichmond
RaleighTucsonAlbanyTopekaColumbiaAugustaFt. WorthEugeneSpringfieldMobileTorontoOttawaMontrealWinnipegVancouver CalgaryEdmonton70s80s50s40s30s100s90s90s90s
90s90s80s80s70s70s
70s70s60s
60s60s60s60s50s50s50s50s50s50s
50s40s50s50s40s40sYankees.
“How do I feel about sending in-
experienced players out in playoff
games? I feel really good about it,”
Twins manager Rocco Baldelli
said. “I really don’t believe in guys
being behind the eight ball just be-
cause they haven’t done something
before.”
It wasn’t always that way. Jeff
Francoeur, a former major-league
outfielder and current TBS analyst,
recalled a much harsher reality for
very young players when he en-
tered professional baseball at the
beginning of the last decade. Back
then, he said, “You could be 21 and
could be hitting .400 in Double-A
with 30 home runs, and they just
weren’t going to bring you up.”
The landscape has changed dra-
matically, giving way to a parade
of burgeoning superstars who are
changing the way the industry
views players in their early 20s.
Soto and Lux have already put
their stamps on the postseason. So
have Atlanta Braves outfielder
Ronald Acuña Jr., 21, and Yankees
infielder Gleyber Torres, 22.
Torres hit the go-ahead, two-
run double to propel the Yankees
over the Twins in Game 1 on Fri-
day,thendroveinaruninSatur-
day’s Game 2, another victory.
“I’ve never seen anything like
Gleyber,” teammate Aaron Judge
said. “Especially at his age, 22, to
be doing what he’s doing in the
big leagues is something that’s un-
heard of.” Ultimately, whichever
team wins the World Series will
almost certainly do so thanks to
the significant contributions of a
player who in another life would
still be spending his weekends at
frat parties.
There have been young stand-
outs in the playoffs before. Alex
Rodriguez was barely 20 when he
made his postseason debut in- A year later, Andruw Jones,
just 19, became the youngest
player ever to homer in the play-
offs. But never before have so
many players both this young and
this freakishly talented come to-
gether on the stage of October.
To compare production across
eras, baseball wonks use a metric
called wins above replacement
(WAR). A WAR of 4 or higher gen-
erally represents an All-Star cali-
ber performance. For the first time
in 110 years, seven different play-
ers aged 22 or younger reached
that total in 2019, as calculated by
the website Baseball-Reference.
Five of them are in the playoffs:
Acuña, Soto, Nationals outfielder
Víctor Robles and two more
Braves, infielder Ozzie Albies and
pitcher Mike Soroka. (The other
two are Devers and San Diego Pa-
dres infielder Fernando Tatís Jr.)
Meanwhile, Torres and 22-year-old
Houston Astros first baseman Yor-
dan Álvarez both fell just short, at
3.9 and 3.7 WAR, respectively.
For much of baseball history,
extremely young players were stig-
matized. They were hazed merci-
lessly by teammates and viewed
with skepticism by higher-ups,
who often valued experience over
ability—especially in the playoffs.
Then a few young superstars,
notably Mike Trout and Bryce
Harper, redefined the notion of
“old enough.” In recent years,
many of the longstanding, unwrit-integral postseason roles, mistakes
can happen. The Braves saw that
during their Game 1 NLDS loss to
the St. Louis Cardinals on Thurs-
day, when Acuña neglected to run
out a ball he hit off the right-field
wall, keeping him to a single.
A few innings later, Acuña dem-
onstrated why he’s worth the occa-
sional lapse. He blasted a home
run that traveled 455 feet. It
served as an important reminder:
Experience matters in October—
but nothing matters more than
sheer talent.
“The best players are going to
make plays,” Baldelli said. “Some-
times it’s the guy that has the ex-
perience, and a lot of the times it’s
not.”ten clubhouse rules requiring
young players to show deference
to their elders have been all but
abolished.
Before homering in his first
playoff at-bat, Lux received guid-
ance from veteran teammate Jus-
tin Turner and recently retired in-
fielder Chase Utley about how to
calm his nerves in October. Their
advice? “Just breathe. It’s the
same game,” Lux said.
With so many young players
around, it’s not as if the old-timers
have much of a choice but to ad-
just. “It’s the whole mind-set, ‘If
you can’t beat them, join them,’ ”
Dodgers manager Dave Roberts
said.
With players this young in suchSPORTS
In the Playoffs,
Very Young Is
Old Enough
A look inside the youth revolution that’s
changing the game of baseball
In almost any other era of base-
ball, Gavin Lux would have been
watching this year’s playoffs on
television. Four months ago, the
21-year-old infielder had never
spent a day above Double-A. His
major-league team, the Los Ange-
les Dodgers, was already one of
the best and deepest in the sport.
“If you had told me at the be-
ginning of this year that I’d be
playing in the postseason,” he
said, “I don’t know if I’d com-
pletely believe you.”
But age and inexperience are
quickly fading as barriers to op-
portunity. And already, these play-
offs are showing why.
In Game 1 of the National
League Division Series on Thurs-
day night, Lux became the youn-
gest player ever to hit a pinch-hit
home run in the postseason. The
Dodgers’ opponent, the Washing-
ton Nationals, had won the wild-
card game just two nights earlier
on a late, key hit from another
young phenom, Juan Soto.
In the raucous Champagne cele-
bration in the clubhouse after that
contest, Soto pulled an empty bot-
tle out of a recycling bin so he
would have something to hold. He
won’t turn 21 for another three
weeks.
“When you’re ready for the big
leagues, it’s not dictated by birth-
days,” Nationals general manager
Mike Rizzo said.
The more these bets on talent
over experience pay off in October,
the more emboldened teams are to
keep making them. The Boston
Red Sox won the World Series last
year in part thanks to the breakout
performance of third baseman Ra-
fael Devers, now 22, who drove in
nine postseason runs.
This year, the Dodgers put four
rookies on their NLDS roster, three
of whom are under 25. The Minne-
sota Twins named five players to
their ALDS squad who debuted in
the majors during the regular sea-
son. They included 22-year-old
Luis Arraez, a surprise choice to
start ALDS Games 1 and 2 at sec-
ond base against the New York
The playoffs are very
likely going to be shaped
by somebody barely old
enough to buy a drink.
BYJAREDDIAMOND ANDBRIANCOSTA
FROM TOP: GARY A. VASQUEZ/USA TODAY SPORTS/REUTERS; ELSA/GETTY IMAGESAge and inexperience are quickly fading as barriers to opportunity in baseball. The Dodgers’ Gavin Lux, age 21, pictured
above, and the Yankees’ Gleyber Torres, age 22, pictured below, have already put their stamps on the postseason.