Use a colorful stock photo to attract readers’ attention.

For more than a month, the present author has waged an on-again, off-again with a very persistent ear infection — a condition itself which appears to have developed owing largely to the dimensions of the author’s left Eustachian tube, which is roughly the size of an infant child’s. That’s the medical explanation distilled to its essence, at least.

A week of antibiotics did little to address the problem, initially. A second week — in this case, of steroids administered both orally and by way of the ear canal — helped some. The most recent treatment, however — of a second, more efficient antibiotic (according to the doctor) — has produced tangible results so far as the health of the ear in question is concerend. What else it’s done is to cause within the author’s body a condition that isn’t but ought to be known as Gastrointestinal Melee 5000.

Indeed, a brief inspection of the fact sheet for the drug in question reveals that users of same frequently observe selles molles. An exercise in euphemism, is how one ought to regard this.

At the very least, this (admittedly minor) ordeal has created a flimsy pretense upon which it is now possible to produce Internet Weblog Content. It has occurred to the author that it might be amusing to attribute to each major-league club the most common “side effect,” as it were, of cheering for same.

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(You may first want to read this article.).

Ruben Tejada
One day short of a season
Yes, a bad season

Ruben Tejada
Fell one home run short of one
He shouldn’t complain

Ruben Tejada
Should hope he is still playing
In 2016

Or 2014
His season was terrible
How can he fight this?

Ruben Tejada
At least they called you back up!
You cost them a win

Or a third of one
Depending on which site’s WAR
Can’t we all agree?

Ruben Tejada
If you file a grievance
I think you may win

But really you’ll lose
Because no one will sign you
Not that they ought to

Ruben Tejada
Why did your walk rate collapse?
This is the last poem

Wait — How you say poem?
It’s one syllable, or two?
Whatever, I’m done.

Brian Wilson recently crossed the New York Yankees off his list of potential team to sign with — due to the fact that New York Yankees can’t have facial hair (which is dumb because, among other reasons, damn near every “original yankee” had facial hair), and Brian Wilson refuses to shave (as per Andy McCollough by way of MLBTR).

The only shower “the Beard” has ever known?

The NotGraphs Investigative Reporting Investigation Team has discovered that Wilson isn’t the only 2013-2014 free agent who has ruled out signing with the Yankees. Indeed, there are several such players, and, like Wilson, their reasons for eschewing the Bronx Bombers are as colorful as their personalities (which is to say, not all that colorful, in some cases).

Those of you testing your Hot Stove predictive skills would be wise to take into account the following info (with the player’s FanGraphs Crowdsource free agent contract ranking in parentheses):
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“Hey, Cy, thanks for doing this.”

“Sure, anytime.”

“Let’s start with Braves catcher Brian McCann. Where do you see him ending up?”

“An Irishman, eh?”

“Uh, I guess so. Sure.”

“You don’t think he’ll stay with Milwaukee?”

“The Braves are in Atlanta now, actually.”

“Atlanta, really? Where’s that?”

“Georgia.”

“Hmmm. Awfully far south for a baseball team.”

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DJ Kitty,
nominated for Best Movie
in a bus
in South Korea.
How–
     a paw to my lips
               says sometimes it’s better
                              not to ask.

Thanks to Erik Hahmann, who passes along this photo via means of human carrier pigeon, Carson de Cistulli.

There either is or isn’t an actual Czech folk song regarding the successful construction of a new baseball field. What follows either is or isn’t a translation of that same folk song’s lyrics into English by the author.

In the middle of Czech Republic, a new baseball field was built!
Syn, slaughter the fatted calf.
Dcera, prepare a stew from harvested vegetables.
In the middle of Czech Republic, a new baseball field was built!
Tonight, we abandon reason for pleasure.

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The date: the November 14, 1989.
The place: your idyllic childhood neighborhood, teeming with family owned drug stores, people who say hello to each other on the sidewalk, and Richard Marx cassettes.
The scene: you, begging your parents for a couple of bucks to go to the baseball card store. “They’re not toys,” you cry in a reedy voice that betrays a luckless adolescence. “Baseball cards are an investment.” You show them your Beckett Baseball Card magazine, revealing a series of numbers with arrow signs pointing up.

The date: November 14, 2013.
The place: a Value Village. People still talk to strangers, except now they kind of mumble things and smell slightly off. Richard Marx cassettes still present.
The scene: Your partner is looking at baby clothes that said baby has, in the time it takes the human brain to process visual information, already outgrown. And as you’re glancing through bright, plastic, potentially deadly toys, you find this:

Your baseball card portfolio has been underperforming.

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It is not the reader’s concern what specific question I was moved to ask Mademoiselle Google — a question regarding perhaps the human condition and or the author’s current straits. What is of interest is that Mademoiselle Google anticipated the query to come. She was incorrect in her anticipations, but they cast light upon what shall henceforth be known as “The Four Hot Mysteries”:

The call is coming from inside the house? To that I would say, “The Cubs are inside the Internet.”

Also, to answer The Four Hot Mysteries above:

1- In either case, to what end?
2- There is no place that does not see you.
3- Sometimes.
4- Four.

This sort of thing is precisely the reason I typically use HotBot.

Those who cling to reason will demand an explanation for the present weblog entry, which consists of little more than an embedded audio clip of comedian Amy Schumer uttering the words “inside baseball” — perhaps in the presence of NPR personality Terry Gross, perhaps not.

For those who — like probably all the members of American rock band 38 Special, for example — for those who know that one is best served merely by holding on loosely, the presence of this brief audio clip will be as second nature. “Did life even exist before I heard Amy Schumer just saying ‘inside baseball,'” those same readers will ask.

“It did and it didn’t,” is the correct answer, of course — as everyone already knows.

It’s that time again. The time where I get to write one last post about the Ron Swanson Baseball Hall of Fame and then am forced to think of new and original posts for this godforsaken website, rather than just keep running variations on the same thing over and over. Honestly, I don’t think any of us are going to get what we want out of our time together going forward. After all, Notgraphs has been reduced to whatever this is, jokes about France, and is kept afloat practically singlehandedly by the diminishing returns offered by David Temple. And next week it’s back to Back In the Game recaps for me. Because I hate myself and you.

So let us revel one last time in the glory of Ron Swanson, patron saint of all that is worthwhile, and his acolytes, who were decided upon by you, the masses, like this was some kind of homecoming election. Once again, you have correctly identified and chosen to recognize the most popular, beautiful, and athletic people in your class. Congratulations to you, you sheep, you have confirmed my worst thoughts about you.

The leading vote getter was…

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