I hope to see a bunch of local baseball fans at Game On! tonight (Thursday, April 26) when our Atlantic City Surf host their annual “Meet the Manager” event. The shindig starts at 7pm and the ultra cool sports bar on the Pier at Caesars is the perfect locale to get the season started. The Surf has a lot of new stuff on tap, from a new manager, Cris Carminucci, to a new general manager, Brendan Fairfield. Of course the team has also switched leagues going from the Atlantic League to the Canadian-American Association (Can-Am) League. Former manager Jeff Ball has been kicked upstairs as assistant GM. Surf marketing director and AC Weekly columnist Chuck Betson will be announcing the special events the Surf have planned for the 2007 season at Bernie Robbins Stadium which will be the club’s 10th anniversary in Atlantic City.
The Surf opens its 10th season on May 24 at home, 7:05pm, vs. the Grays, the Can-Am League’s road team. Tickets can be obtained by calling 609-344-7873.

Bob Dylan’s record company site reports that the 66-year-old (on May 24th) troubadour will return to the Borgata to kick-off his U.S. 2007 summer tour. He’ll be in Atlantic City two nights – June 22 & 23 – and tickets go on sale through the Borgata Web site on May 5. A May 1 pre-sale is available via the Dylan site. Other city’s scheduled on the tour include Herhsey, Pa.; Uncasville, Conn.; and Paso Robles, Calif.
Dylan’s latest album, Modern Times, released last August on Columbia Records, is among the best of his 46-year recording career. It hit No. 1 on the Billboard charts, marking the first time that a Dylan album hit the top spot since his 1976 release, Desire.

Sanjaya Malakar might be off American Idol but that doesn’t mean he’s going away anytime soon. Right after he was voted off, the offers began with an invitation from People Magazine for Sanjaya to attend the White House Correspondents Association Dinner in Washington, DC on Saturday, April 21. President Bush is also expected to attend. Malakar will share a table with Valerie Bertinelli, Zac Efron of High School Musical, comedian Eddie Izzard and Robert Kennedy Jr. Some of the other guests include Jane Fonda, Henry Kissinger, John Cusack and Sheryl Crow.
On Monday, he will be appearing on Live with Regis and Kelly, The Ellen Show and The Late Show with David Letterman.

Do you have what it takes to be a member of the living dead?
Pat & Dan Productions are casting for their zombie film that they are shooting in May of this year. They are holding an open casting call Saturday and Sunday, April 21–22, 1–6pm at My Film Café, 32 Marmora Rd. (32 Tuckahoe Rd.), Wayside Village Shopping Center, Marmora. The production company is looking for 50 people to play zombies as extras. Pictured are the zombies from the very funny 2004 film Shaun of the Dead.

You know how sometimes little things just make you go nuts? I’ve been feeling the culmination of those little things and I need to vent. Venting about the small stuff will keep me from crying about the big picture that has come into focus this week once again. But first the small stuff:

Northeaster vs. Nor’easter
I grew up at the South Jersey shore. When we had a storm from the Northeast, we called it a Northeaster. The famous March Storm of 1962 was a Northeaster. However, sometime in the mid-1990s, weathermen in the Philly region started calling the storms Nor’easters, a term that has since made its way into the Associated Press stylebook.

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Things are beginning to heat up for the summer music line-up in Atlantic City. Recently announced casino concerts include the return of favorites like Earth, Wind and Fire (Borgata, June 1 & 2), the Spinners (Hilton, May 11 & 12) and Vince Neil (House of Blues, Aug. 31 w/ Quiet Riot and Slaughter). Look out for Tool to hit Boardwalk Hall on June 9, UK pop-rock legends Squeeze to play Borgata, Aug. 4 and Beyonce to turn up somewhere that same month. The White Stripes — who’s new album Icky Thump – sounds like it’s going to be great (it’s due out in June) may also be coming to town not too long after the summer’s over. For a weekly update of announced shows at all of the casinos in town, check here.

Antonio Tarver’s last trip to a boxing ring in AC didn’t end well when he lost his light heavyweight crown to Bernard Hopkins at Boardwalk Hall on June 10, 2006. His scheduled return to the ring April 22 in Boardwalk Hall vs. Elvir Muriqi was announced as postponed today (April 13). Use any Friday the 13th jokes you feel is appropriate.
Here is the announcement from Star Boxing: “We regret that the anticipated fight on April 22, between Tarver and Muriqi, has been postponed. We would like to take this opportunity to thank the boxers, Boardwalk Hall, ABC, ESPN, and the Hilton and Resorts Hotels for their understanding and cooperation. We hope to announce the rescheduled date in the near future after we have an opportunity to evaluate the boxers’ conditioning and available dates. In spite of the false rumor, Antonio Tarver was on weight and in shape for the bout.”
All righty then.
Tarver is pictured (above right) with some Borgata Babes during his last trip to town.

With the recent announcement of the Briggs-Ibragimov WBO heavyweight bout at Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City (in June), as well as the upcoming Holt-Arnaoutis fight (April 20, Bally’s) and the Tarver-Muriqi fight (April 22, Boardwalk Hall), the latter of which is to be the first time in several years that ABC will broadcast a live boxing match, one could say that Atlantic City is really stepping back into the ring as far as bringing in big-time boxing events.
Speaking of big-time boxing events – Arturo “Thunder” Gatti will fight somebody July 14 at Boardwalk Hall.
In the meantime, here’s one of many classic A.C. matches that can be found on YouTube. A first-round KO by ‘Marvelous’ Marvin Hagler against Philly native William ‘Caveman’ Lee 25 years ago at Bally’s Park Place.

I’m not usually the one to say “off with their heads” when someone says something in public that is stupid. Do we really think Sen. Joseph Biden is a racist because he said Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois, is the “first mainstream African American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy.” Insensitive and thoughtless yes, but racist?
That said, this whole Don Imus mess involving his stupid, crass and ugly comment about the Rutgers women’s basketball team, that they were “nappy-headed ho’s” is in a different category. He was not making fun of a politician or a professional athlete, fair game in my book. He was talking about 19- and 20-year-old students, who were only on Imus’ radar because they made it to the NCAA National Championship game. Such an accomplishment should not make you the butt of an old white man’s jokes on the national airwaves.

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Fans of Dusty Springfield, Petula Clark and the other female stars of the sixties British Invasion will enjoy the trip down memory lane provided by SHOUT! The Mod Musical at Harrah’s. Five talented female singers — Holly Burton, Toni Carrington, Lauren Fijol, Georgia Hair and Brooke Reams — dressed in the smashing fashions of the era, sing and discothèque dance their way through a decade’s worth of groovy songs as they confront the rapid social changes that marked that decade in London and the world.

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