It’s time for baseball season in Japan, much as it is in America. Here’s a sampling of some marketing slogans for the teams across the drink.
Yokohama DeNA BayStars
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Obviously we were all watching during the 10th inning of the Rays-Yankees game when Mark Montgomery struck out Vince Belnome and then celebrated with a televised snot ejaculation. But that doesn’t mean the event didn’t merit an entry in the index of Great Body Fluid GIFs. This way, we can preserve this moment between these two fine, if not well known, athletes.
Every year, thousands of well-intending Twitter users will slip their tweets unknowingly into a baseball Twitter search. For those like myself who leave a Tweetdeck search column running, I have the pleasure of encountering these non sequitur tweets. I’ve compiled a few, and graciously omitted those I see annually in my Chicago #Bears feed.
@TheBoothenTFS @Firestarter2311 Taking in the #Rays another day in #Paradise 🙂 pic.twitter.com/nSmQFmheYb
— Laraine Hudson (@Pumplady55) February 27, 2014
I JUST WANTED BASEBALL NEWS. stop. CANNOT BE UNSEEN. stop. SEND HELP. stop.
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Few baseball players can retire from baseball and immediately be a 10-year veteran of broadcasting, but that’s exactly what SP Jamie Moyer and “OF” Matt Stairs have done. Our hard-working visual analytics crew has broken down the pregame footage from today’s Toronto-Philadelphia game, and the signs are obvious: The Stairs and Moyer duo have been in the booth since 2004.
“But I distinctly recall seeing these guys play baseball after 2003,” you might say.
You might have dumb-brain. Here, take a look for yourself:
Those are not recently-retired pro athletes. Those are leisured gentlemen of the Booth. They meet all the criteria. Face lines, gray protein strands extruding from the head, an absence of protein strands in certain head areas, slouchy postures, world-weary gazes, tired and nuanced smiles — these are all the irrefutable scientific signs of a broadcasting veterancy.
This leads us to ask, of course, how many other broadcasters are secretly playing baseball? Well, at least one.
(For a bigger video, go here.)
I had heard earlier this week that Wil Myers had bestrapped himself with a GoPro camera, and today I’ve discovered the harvest of that effort. Are there deficiencies in this footage? Sure there are. Such as: Wil’s repeated efforts at the same joke — a joke which, as it turns out, renders him incapable of working for the CIA (“Don’t do anything stupid,” *points at camera on brow*).
But what this film shows us is more than worth enduring the jittery cinematography and awkward verbal exchanges. What this film shows us is the future of baseball media. As cameras get yet even smaller and our interest in athletes yet even more invasive, I think we will one day see the hat-mounted camera become a staple of the baseball uniform.
Let’s examine the highlights of Myers’s footage:
• Witnessing the signature Wil Myers batting circle warmup from his perspective.
• Viewing the world from Myers’s upright, tall batting stance.
• Watching two neatly crushed balls proceed from bat to blue oblivion.
• Participating with Myers as a trio of fly balls whiz into his glove.
Now imagine if we could have watched from the perspective of Willie Mays as he — with back turned towards the crowd — basketted The Catch. What did Kirk Gibson see while standing in the batter’s box with two bad legs in 1988? And what did it look like to John Jaso when he caught the final perfect game pitch from Felix Hernandez in 2012?
It’s coming. And it’s going to be kinda awesome.
#Rays Balfour had his rather cool truck at camp today. pic.twitter.com/yansZRkgvK
— Marc Topkin (@TBTimes_Rays) February 19, 2014
Because as an Australian player of ball, one must transport and carry various sundries — such as a bag one can sling over the shoulder or lay gently in the passenger seat (buckled or unbuckled). In order to help create a sense of size with this truck, I went ahead and pulled the ol’ Woodrum Family Prius around and parked it side-by-side with the Balfour Compensator for a more visceral comparison:
Obviously a many thanks to Erik Hahmann (@ehahmann) for alerting us to this trucktastic tidbit.
Pujols on Jeter: "On and off field, he's the way you want your kids to grow up, Only Jesus is perfect, but he's pretty close to that guy."
— Mike DiGiovanna (@MikeDiGiovanna) February 13, 2014
True story, I proposed to my now-wife whilst sitting in a booth at Waffle House. I asked her to prom — our first date, many years earlier — on a TI-82 calculator.
We can say one thing: Rays pitcher Alex Cobb does not have the brand of Sexy we here at NotGraphs look for in our writing staff or in our readership. A proposal via dolphin in some stone-strewn alcove as loved ones watch with rapid, thrumming hearts? Pfft. Where’s the character? Where’s the self-loathing lack of confidence? Where’s the syrup?
The fact that Mrs. Future Alex Cobb said yes to this obvious attempt at lifelong memories and romantic foresightfulness further suggests that she too is not material suitable for a NotGraphs writer.
Thanks to DRaysBay for going high school girl on me and sharing this video.
Obviously because I am an important person, Verified Twitter Account™ owner Dayn Perry is my Facebook Friend™. And with this Press Pass to America’s Soul, I can report to you directly the hot, surging Facebook updates from said CBS writer and author of two books, one of them serviceable, UPDATE: and also a really great chapbook that I forgot about.
His latest status update concerns America’s sports, footbaw.
