Crankshaft by Tom Batiuk and Dan Davis for September 25, 2024

And yet you apparently didn’t do it until decades later, while trying to tell your daughters bedtime stories.

By the by, where and when is Coach (probably the manager, but in lieu of a name let’s go with it) bawling out Ed? If it’s before the game he would have probably been expected to be in uniform and on the field taking part in warm-up exercises, even if he wasn’t starting (nowadays a pitcher not starting often sits in the stands with a radar gun or camera, but not back then). Also, it’s called a rotation list because the pitching staff works on a rotating basis. Couldn’t Ed keep track of when his next start was coming up?

“And then I started to write myself a note, reminding me to learn how to read, but then I realized I’d never learned to write, either, so without that note it slipped my mind for a few decades.”

Illiteracy not good.

He may have decided to learn to read… But he didn’t do it until decades later.

“Then I decided it wasn’t all that important after all and didn’t bother actually doing it until 50 years later.”

By the way, how did Ed get a license to drive a bus? Isn’t part of the driver’s test written?

In the last panel, Lillian’s thinking, “I wish I could miss hearing Ed drone on about he learned to read again. Doesn’t he remember the last time he told this story?”

By the time Batty returns to The Burnings™, will we all be too old to care?

P 4 (Ed): “…because I knew that I was missing a lot of good shows because I couldn’t read TV Guide either…”

Still with the smoke ?

Dick and Jane…….The beginning readers that have been around for decades are still as pertinent and useful today as they were when they were introduced in the 1930’s.

i bet theres plenty of pro athletes who cant read but theres always someone telling him where they should be .batty is just a lazy writer

MLB finds pitchers. One missed start is irrelevant.

Most all of us have had those moments in life that actually changed us and our life’s direction or spurred us into action. Sometimes it was wisdom from the pain. You can regret those events but you can’t change the results. Apparently, he did learn …..

Wake me when Tom is finished with his over the top BS, I grew up in 40s and was how to read in first grade

Panel 3: Is the place still on fire?

He started to learn to read much later in life, after he was a bus driver.

All those old POPULAR MECHANICS issues still waiting…..

First time in 2 months I read J.J. and the hate crew section and it hasn’t changed a bit. Try again in another 2 months to see if anyone grew up.

If you squint and look real closely, you can see through the window, receding far off in the distance, the opportunity that Batty had to weigh in on real-life issues affecting his precious Ohio: the consistent threat of racist MAGA terrorists and their bomb threats.

But nah… let’s head down memory lane instead.

Look at Ed’s face in panel 3. Even he is bored to death with this crap.

So much of todays and the previous few would not have happened in real life. Only in Batty Land.

On TV Tropes, there’s this little bit on the Crankshaft WMMV page:

Fridge Logic: That a ball player as good as Crankshaft was supposed to be would only get one shot at impressing big league scouts.

I’m assuming Crankshaft gave up playing in the baseball leagues after Beanball sabotaged his chance, and didn’t wait for a second chance