Hi Randy,
How’s it going? Remember that contract you signed? The one that offered you a chance to write for NotGraphs and said that we’d try you out this spring and if we liked your stuff, we’d give you a million dollars? Guess what? We like your stuff! Welcome to the team. Just give me a call about some details. Thanks.
Best,
Jack Z., guest editor, NotGraphs
Recently, in these electronic pages, the author drove significantly more traffic than usual by means of a post alerting the public to five ballcaps of great merit available (at that time) on internet auction house eBay.com. What follows represents a nakedly desperate attempt to re-create that rare success.
To wit:
Montreal Expos 20th Anniversary Hat (Link)
Style: Snapback
Time Left: 28 days, 23 hours
Cost: US $25.00 (Buy It Now)
Some will argue that beauty is subjective. Ancient mathematician Euclid, who explored in some depth the idea of the Golden Ratio, would argue that those people are super wrong. What else he’d probably argue is that, among all the ballcaps currently available on eBay, this vintage and white Expos one is manifestly the most appealing. Of note for potential buyers: there’s no indication from the relevant auction page whether Jonah Keri is or isn’t included in the purchase price.
It is with some frequency that we as baseball fans are made privy to a prospect’s hit tool via an all-too-familiar allusion, that annoyingly vague reference to the distinct sonic quality of said prospect’s bat against a recently pitched ball.
“The ball just sounds different coming off his bat,” we are told.
“When the ball comes off his bat, it just sounds different,” we hear.
“Different, is what the ball sounds like off his bat,” our ears pick up.
I present these Instructional Figures without comment, in the trust that anyone wishing for baseballing betterment may profit thereby.
You, reader, may well have been to a baseball game at least once in your life. And you, reader, may well have also bought tickets for a home opener. Doing such a thing in your United States of America or Rob Ford’s Toronto, is usually a matter of being next to an Internet-enabled computing machine, going to the team’s Web site, being redirected to some sort of page operated by the Master of Tickets, and doing the do with your credit card and a printer.
For a Mexican home opener, or partido inaugural should you feel inclined to use the local phrase, things can be done that way, but only if you are a) the owner of a credit card, and b) said credit card is from a Mexican bank. Many people are not owners of credit cards. I am not the owner of a Mexican credit card. My credit card was issued by a bank in Her Majesty’s Greatest of the Britains. Thus on Monday morning, at the ungodly hour of 9.15 a.m., I awoke from my delightful slumber, drank a cup of coffee, did not shower, put on the previous day’s clothes, brushed my teeth (I’m not a complete monster), wrapped some headphones around my unkempt hair, pressed play on my iPod, and walked out onto the very streets of this Mexico City, listening to the highly enjoyable BBC Radio Five Live programme, the Danny Baker Show, intent on buying tickets for the above-mentioned partido.
While it has focused on expanding the appeal of the game both internationally and to various segments of the American population, Major League Baseball has always been careful to not alienate its most loyal and prized demographic, dad-shirt wearing suburbanite people like myself. Therefore, it has cultivated an air of respectability, aggressively going after PED users, taking steps to end home plate collisions, keeping Jamie Moyer around as long as humanly possible. But baseball is not alone in coveting my demo, and the NFL especially has been trying to poach fans by actively blanding down their hyper-violent game to make it more palatable to “ketchup-is-too-a-spice” types such as myself. Eventually, Baseball had to respond or risk losing me and my ilk to games that seemed “safer.”
Not to be outdone by the NFL’s new rules banning “dunking” over the goalpost, Major League Baseball announced today the following 10 changes to the game:
1) Butt slaps are heretofore banned, and any uniformed personnel engaging in butt slaps, smacks, taps, touches, or gentle caresses on the field of play or in the dugout is automatically ejected from the game.
2) High fives are only allowed after successful sacrifice bunts, groundouts resulting in a run scoring, or sacrifice fly. After a home run, players are to be given the silent treatment for at least three innings. No fist bumps. God help you if you fist bump.
3) Uniform tops are to remain buttoned all the way up, and tucked neatly into pants. Socks must be visible to the mid-calf or higher. Stirrups are encouraged.
The image above of Torii Hunter (which image one can embiggen most expediently by clicking) appears merely to depict the Tigers right fielder taking advantage of a free moment to stretch his legs during the sixth inning of today’s Grapefruit League contest between Atlanta and Detroit — nor, in fact, are appearances entirely misleading in this case.
As both Sergei Eisenstein and probably also one of Sergei Eisenstein’s friends took pains to establish, however, any image must be considered with the context that it’s presented — and the context in which the above image was originally presented provides layers of meaning that would put most onions (which have many layers, is the point) to shame.
2013 was a bad year for you, Astros fans, and if we’re being honest — and why wouldn’t we — 2014 isn’t going to be a whole lot better.
And when the doggiest days of summer are upon you, when hope is but a degrading granule of sugar in the boiling bathtub of water that is Houston fandom, remember this; Jose Altuve will tumble for you.
Watch:
Listen:
UPDATE: Yeah, too soon.
Aroldis Chapman is not super-seriously hurt and will likely return to the field this season–perhaps as soon as May. This is great! Baseball and all human people are better off with him being not seriously hurt. This news also allows guilt-free enjoyment of the following low-quality GIF: Noted deadpan master Steven Wright striking Chapman in the face with a one-liner.
My spreadsheet has many columns.
My spreadsheet has many rows.
My spreadsheet smells like jasmine.
My spreadsheet says the sweetest things to me as I drift off to sleep at night.
My spreadsheet is made of gold.
My spreadsheet has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
