Not only does Detroit's last place baseball team sweep other last place teams (ours), they also have teams that make the postseason. On Saturday night the Motor City will host two playoffs games. The Red Wings will play the Penguins at 7pm in the Stanley Cup, and the Pistons will play the Celtics in the NBA's Eastern Conference Finals half an hour later The city of Seattle has been home to two playoff games......

BOOKS: Novelist Richard Powers reads tonight at Benaroya Hall for Seattle Arts and Lectures. The former computer programmer's latest book, The Echo Maker, is "a haunting novel about memory, identity, and the boundaries of neuroscience," (Booklist), and won the National Book Award and all sorts of "Best Book of the Year" awards in 2006. He's a novelist of "ideas"; David Foster Wallace is a big fan. Here's an interview in the P-I. 7:30pm //......

(This fall we are combining our love of the football and our dream of learning to cook. On Sunday morning, following a trip to a local farmer’s market/major supermarket chain, we will be preparing a meal from the city of the Seahawks opponent. Then at halftime we will throw our badly burned hands in the air and make hot dogs.) New Orleans may be the American city best known for its cuisine. If you add,......

Well, that was spectacular. From the heady days of August 25th, when the M's were three up in the wild card and only one back in the division, had won two straight in Texas, when we were all excited about Blue-za-palooza or whatever the fuck it was...to now, after 11 losses in 12 games, when we're all pretty much in wait 'till next year mode. You've all seen the boat sink, here are the numbers.......

The Detroit Cobras make hard-rocking versions of R&B and soul classics utterly devoid of irony. On their latest album, this year's Tied and True, the female-fronted Motor City five-piece run the gamut, covering such greats as Bettye LaVette, Leadbelly, Tammi Terrell, The Equals, and Little Willie John. This Tuesday, the Cobras bring their bad girl attitude and bitchin' guitar licks to Neumo's for a 21+ show. Seattlest has one pair of tickets to give......

The Detroit Cobras, from the selfsame city, mix the old and the new, combining the sounds of Motown girl groups with raw garage rock. With their tough chick singer Rachel Nagy (and female guitarist Mary Ramirez), the Cobras are kinda like a certain big-haired British trainwreck minus the trackmarks. LA Weekly said it loud and clear: "No offense to Amy Winehouse, but it was the Cobras [and] Rachel Nagy who first reinvented the 60s......

The combination of a Mariner win and losses by both New York and Detroit last night meant that the Mariners leapfrogged 'em both and woke up today as the leader for the American League Wild Card! This is the first time the Mariners have been in first place of anything since late August of 2003, when we sat in the commissary of a scientific research station in Ecuador and listened over unscrambled Armed Forces radio......

At work the other day, Seattlest was talking to a coworker and friend who originally hails from Minnesota. Naturally, we talked of the bridge collapse. As one would expect these sorts of conversations to go, the conversation logically ended with us looking up the coordinates for the northernmost point in Maine. Just how did this happen? In the course of conversion, it came up that Minnesota, not Maine, is the northernmost contiguous United State. So......

Neither making the NFL Hall of Fame as a fourth-round pick or crushing Mike Harden could've prepared Seahawks legend Steve Largent for the opponent he faces now: Google. Largent, who's now president of a cell phone industry association, CTIA, has some strong words for the Bay Area know-it-alls who make it impossible for us to get a second date. In a letter to the FCC protesting Google's $4.6 billion offer to buy the 700 mhz......

Got an email from a friend the other day: "My boss says he's officially back on the Mariners bandwagon." We were thrilled--the more bosses that join the bandwagon the better, in our view, even if it means it'll be harder to get the company seats. The Mariners finished the first half of the year with the best record of any Mariner team in history that didn't include Mark McLemore, and it's not easy to explain......

--A former Redmond church leader is being charged with child rape. --Mike Webb is still missing and his house has been ransacked. --Remember when the debate over whether to build a high bridge to West Seattle was concluded when a ship rammed the low bridge? How come that kind of stuff can't end debates now? --Light rail in Portland a crime magnet? --There was some kind of condo incentive in Seattle where if you bought......

Vitals: 24 yo RHP. Born in Manakin Sabot, VA. 6-5, 200. 19-12, 3.66 career. 2-1, 2.75 in 2007. $1.03 million salary. Arsenal: Mid to high 90s fastball, sweeping curve, changeup. Recent Battles: Beat King Felix last April in a much-touted battle of young fireballers. Held M's to 4 hits in seven innings. Our Best Weapon: Beltre's our best fastball hitter. Hopefully he can lay off of Verlander's soft stuff and gear up for the heater.......

Vitals: 29 yo LHP. Born in Wichita, KS. 6-2, 225. 36-43, 4.44 career. 3-1, 2.48 in 2007. $3.26 million salary. Arsenal: Low-90s fastball, slider, change that runs away from righties. Recent Battles: Robertson held the Mariners to one run in seven innings last September, beating Jarrod Washburn. Our Best Weapon: Righties hit Robertson well. If Ibanez needs a day off, this might be a good game to start little-used Jason Ellison. The Internet Says: Robertson......

Vitals: 24 yo RHP. Born in Kennewick, WA. 6-2, 220. 46-53, 4.67 career. 1-0, 3.69 in 2007. $4.5 million salary. Arsenal: Mid-90s fastball, nasty slider, change. Recent Battles: The M's faced Bonderman last on September 5th, knocking him out of the game with a three-run fourth. This game was notable for being Joel Pineiro's 58th, and last, win as a Mariner. Our Best Weapon: Ibanez is 8-17 career against Bonderman. The Internet Says: In 2002,......

We knew that Carlos Guillen's 2001 bout with tuberculosis was serious, but until we read this feature by Jon Paul Morosi (formerly of the P-I, now with the Detroit Free Press), we never knew that Guillen was so close to death:He could barely sleep. He had a fever every night. He battled headaches and weakness. He lost almost 20 pounds. He coughed up blood. Yet, Carlos Guillen continued to play shortstop for the Seattle Mariners.......

Yet another postponement, and the new plan is to try to play a doubleheader on Monday, beginning at 10:05 am PST. The M's have a day game in Boston on Tuesday, so this would mean they'd play 3 games in about 28 hours. Not good. Even if they play both games on Monday, that leaves two games that will need to be played sometime during the season. The P-I's John Hickey has the scoop on......

Monday THAT STARBUCKS "I WAS A CHILD SOLDIER" GUY: At twelve, Ishmael Beah found himself fleeing rebels, wandering from village to village. At thirteen, he was a soldier in Sierra Leone, hooked on drugs and capable of things he would never have imagined. Now, rehabilitated and living in the U.S., he tells his story in A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier, in an attempt to raise awareness of the child soldier......

Ex-Seattleite, ex-Stranger-nic and ex-grassroots campaign manager Phil Campbell wrote a book that we loved about Grant Cogswell's run for City Council in the wake of WTO. The book is Zioncheck for President, which we've discussed with Phil in the past. Now Stephen Gyllenhaal has bought the rights to the film adaptation and plans to produce the thing DIY style here in Seattle. In keeping with the grassroots spirit of Zioncheck for President, Gyllenhaal said he......

Seattle's an expensive place to live, no doubt, and we've been noticing a trend towards taking a certain amount of pride in that fact, even among those of us that are just scraping by here. When someone complains we're quick to kick 'em a few times and remind them that you get what you pay for. Hey, if you can't take the price of the opera subscription go back to Boise. Seattlest is as guilty......

ART: Roq La Rue hosts Detroit's celebrated lowbrow underground artist Glenn Barr for the signing of his new hardcover book Haunted Paradise. 6-8pm // Roq La Rue, 2312 2nd Ave // Free RAWK: Tenacious D brings their over-the-top metal spectacular to the Paramount for one night only. 8pm // The Paramount // $37.50 MUSIC: Grizzly Bear at Neumo's. Yellow House is a great album (among the best from last year), but it wasn't until......

Yesterday we wrote that the Huskies would beat #10 Wazzu, and we were wrong. Don't be that surprised, it happens a lot. What was most frustrating about the game is that Huskies could have easily won. Several times in the final four minutes UDub had the ball down one, and instead of dumping it inside, which had worked all game, the Huskies resorted to the offensive scheme that has made us weep all season: A......

The Seattle Times reported today that commute times all around Seattle are increasing. We've never heard of a metropolitan area that had decreasing commute times, so it's not exactly news that it's taking people here longer and longer to get to work (We'd love to hear of a metro area with decreasing commute times, though, so if you know of someplace please share. No fair citing Detroit during the 90's or something with similarl rapidly......

Former Boeing executive Alan Mulally took over as Ford's CEO in September, and so far, well, um...Ford Motor Co. lost a staggering $12.7 billion in 2006, an average of $1,925 for every car and truck it sold. The company that invented the assembly line and whose name was a byword for the auto industry warned it will bleed cash for two more years before it has a shot at making money. Ford's loss, reported on......

BOOKS: Dave "Mr. McSweeney's" Eggers' latest is titled What is the What: The Autobiography of Valentino Achak Deng. Mr. Deng himself--a survivor of the Darfur shitstorm--discusses his life tonight. Bring tissue. 7:30pm // Elliott Bay Book Co. // Free JAZZ: Detroit's Kenny Garrett, a former Miles Davis sideman, brings his "blues-tinged, precise and rapid-fire style" (BBC Music) here for two nights. Tonight's the first. Wade through a dumbass Flash site to hear mp3s here. 7:30pm......

--Seattle: slightly less drug use than San Francisco, slightly more than Detroit. --Six books we've never heard of are winning awards from the Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association. --The Gates Foundation invests heavily in companies that undermine it's philanthropy says the Seattle Los Angeles Times. --Timothy Burgess wants onto the Seattle City Council and the only thing Seattlest knows about him is that Sound Politics seems to be in favor of him. --Lake City experiences......

There have been three nationally televised Seahawk home games this year, and each time our city has been hit with a wicked weather storm. First there was the Monday night game against Oakland when were setting one day rainfall records. Then came the Packers game which was played in, what was for us, a driving snow storm. Finally tonight, with a brutal wind storm bearing down on the Puget Sound, the Hawks will knock nuts......

What do poet David Wagoner, poet Shannon Borg, executive director of the Richard Hugo House Lyall Bush, and Seattlest co-editor and sports guy Seth Kolloen have in common? Besides the fact that they all live in Seattle, smartass? Yes, they've all been selected for the Stranger's Genius Awards shortlist of literary badasses. The best local sportswriter you've probably never heard of writes online for Seattlest (www.seattlest.com). There, on a near-daily basis, Seth Kolloen—Seattle native, handsome......

Has Seattlest mentioned that we are in love with Sufjan Stevens? Yes, we love him, but it's totally not in a sexual way. Though we certainly appreciate his boyish good looks (and nicely toned arms), for us to touch someone with such wide-eyed childlike wonder would surely make us a pedophile. More than anything, we'd love to hold him close to our bosom, thereby protecting him from the cold, cruel world. Still, when a......

Seattle baseball fans will be watching Oakland vs. Detroit in the ALCS to see if ex-Mariner Carlos Gullien can exact revenge on the A's for giving the Mariners a colossal asshole-drubbing this season, and to listen to former Mariners manager/savior, Lou Pinella, provide colorful commentary on FOX. The rest of the country, however, will tune in to witness the battle that will once and for all decide which television show was the best of the......

"I think [for] anyone that drives in over 130 runs numerous times in his career, it's impossible not to be clutch." -- Alex Rodriguez, May 2006. 1-14 (.071 batting average), 0 RBI, 4 strikeouts, 1 error vs. Detroit -- Alex Rodriguez, October 2006.......