In a single plate appearance versus Reds’ right-hander Homer Bailey last night (a three-pitch strike-out), Indians OF/1B/DH Nick Swisher displayed behavior that set off red alerts in the NotGraphs Investigative Reporting Investigation Team’s Office for Investigating Player Alter-Egos. The NIRIT (pronounced nee-reet) OIPAE (pronounced oy-pay) has gathered the following footage and have noted possible alter-egos for Mr. Swisher based on that footage.

EXHIBIT A:
Footage Suggesting a “Koopa Troopa” Alter-Ego for Mr. Swisher

EXHIBIT B:
Footage Suggesting a “Toothless Codger” Alter-Ego for Mr. Swisher

Now the OIPAE needs your help, dear NotGraphs gumshoes. Which alter-ego do you think is more like for Mr. Swisher based on the given visual evidence?

[polldaddy poll=”7142665″]

This morning I received an email as part of the Milwaukee Brewers mailing list. The headline read,

Braun steps up to the plate for fans in “Brewers Win, You Win!” promotion | Brewers Star to Fund Ticket Program for June 3 – 5 Series Versus Oakland Athletics

The pertinent part of the email, for your convenience:

The original promotion called for every Brewers victory between May 1 and May 30 to earn $1 off a Terrace Box ticket for the June 3 – 5 series vs. the Oakland Athletics. With just five victories this month, though, the Brewers outfielder has made a move to ensure that Brewers fans are rewarded despite the team’s struggles.

Regardless of how many wins the team records through the end of the month, fans will be able to purchase a limited number of Terrace Box (regularly $24) and Loge Bleacher ($23) seats for just $8 (matching Braun’s uniform number). Braun is subsidizing the savings through a financial contribution, which will cover up to 4,000 tickets for each of the three games against the A’s.

Let’s do the math. There are two ticket prices, roughly the same. If Ryan Braun picks up the tab for the entire difference in price — let’s say there’s 2000 each of the $24- and $23-tickets since the email doesn’t specify that particular breakdown — that’s $62,000 per game, and a total of $186,000 for the three game set with the A’s. This, of course, assumes that the Brewers organization isn’t covering some of that, and that those sections will sell out, which, I suppose, there’s actually a possibility of that: despite the third-worst record in all of Major League Baseball, the Brewers have the 13th best home attendance, averaging over 31,000 fans per game (a sell-out at Miller Park is 42,200), and are closing in on a million in total attendance with 29 home games played.

The Brewers could stand to put more butts in the seats, sure. And every team runs promotions of some sort. Maybe other players have done similar things in other cities. But seeing this email made me want to cry, for two different reasons:

First, it’s a reminder that my favorite team sucks right now. Boohoo, I know. Fans of any number of teams could whine about this, and while a few fan bases might have more claim to gloominess than Brewers fans, there aren’t many. (Pirates fans, maybe. I’ll listen on the Mariners or Royals.) It’s dark, and I don’t see a light at the end of the tunnel. I’m not sure there is an end to the tunnel. Despite what has the potential to be a potent offense, they haven’t even won enough games in May to make the “original promotion” worthwhile. This wanting-to-cry is based in selfish sadness, and a general fragility of spirit.

Yet there’s another type of wanting-to-cry here, too, and it’s even more foolish. Ryan Braun is making $8.5million this year, and he’s got $150million in guaranteed income through 2020. And, of course, that doesn’t include endorsement deals and other ventures. That is, he can probably afford to subsidize some tickets. But those other ventures, like this ticket deal, show a commitment to and investment in Milwaukee — a place that could easily be dismissed as flyover country by a Cali boy who colleged in Miami and affects considerable swagger — that is so rare that it’s almost confusing. Robin Yount played his entire career as a Brewer; Bob Uecker probably could have moved on to a bigger venue at some point, but chose to stick it out in his home town. Still, Braun’s enthusiasm for being a part of Milwaukee just feels different, even if it is appears gimmicky at times. Braun really likes Milwaukee, and wants to prove it.

I’m a small person, maybe, for hoovering up that sort of affirmation of my town’s worth. So be it.

What was that you just said?

Well, that’s simply preposterous, and B.J. Upton does not believe it.

Oh, it’s not that Bossman distrusts you personally, it’s just that he doesn’t believe much of what he hears these days. Or sees. Or smells. In fact, the only sense that he trusts at all these days is taste. Perhaps if Bossman could have somehow tasted Evan Gattis’s grand slam on Wednesday, he might believe it. If he could but taste the bullshit that you are spewing right now, he might believe you, too (but he would probably barf, if he could taste it).

Bossman has nothing against you, like he said. Bossman is cool. In fact, hey, he’s sorry for referring to what you were just saying as “bullshit.” Unbelievable is a better word, probably. Bossman doesn’t believe much of what he hears or sees or smells, but he is amused and befuddled and excited by it all. He just gets worked up, gets too excited.

So, Bossman is sorry: you’re amazing, you’re unbelievable — but that’s just the thing: Bossman don’t believe you.

Now shut up and have some candy — tastes like Truth.

One would be hard-pressed to find two people more different in stature than the author’s mother and Arizona Diamondbacks’ ace-in-the-making Archie Bradley. When one compares their use of social media, however, one finds two beings whose concerns, pleasures, and use of language are not that different at all.

Love pitching when family is in town! Great win for the #baybears had great hitting and solid defense! Time for dinner with mom!

— Archie Bradley (@ArchieBradley7) May 19, 2013

Celebrities: They’re just like us and/or our moms!

The idea of a world without Garfield has already been fully realized. But what of a world without Andrew McCutchen?

I’ve often wondered — fantasized, even — about what it would be like if I just disappeared from my life. Like, just totally evaporated. Usually, it’s difficult not to imagine a net positive. One less “first world” carbon footprint couldn’t hurt. The world — especially Carson Cistulli’s world — might be better off with far fewer very predictable jokes about genitals. Someone with more talent and ambition would inevitably fill my position at a very worthwhile nonprofit. The overall quality of NotGraphs would improve. My mother would not have to waste her time tediously preparing lectures to give me about my debt; she could actually enjoy her retirement. The list goes on.

When Andrew McCutchen disappears — just totally goes invisible — the world (well, the Pittsburgh Pirates, at least) still experience a net positive for an entirely different set of reasons. Really, it’s the same set of positives that McCutchen provides while not being disappeared. In his absence, he still catches balls while leaping into the wall, he still hits home runs, he still keeps the outfield at PNC Park clean of debris while maintaining an amiable demeanor.

Indeed, some people are such a positive force in the world that even in the absence of their corporeal self, their force continues to make a difference. I am not one of those people, but I am happy to know they exist.

Thanks, ‘Cutch.

The following GIF depicts the Gwinnett Braves not understanding baseball. It comes to you from indispensable friend-to-NotGraphs Well-Beered Englishman.

The following tune comes to you from the Harlem Globetrotters, by ways of YouTube, by ways of a website that rips YouTube audio and turns it into MP3s that you download. To me, the Globetrotter’s theme has always been especially evocative of the embarrassment they dole out to their opponents, of the unpreparedness or haplessness of said opponents.

This has been “A GIF and a Tune”. It is a Tuesday.

Billy Buckner is famous for, well, you know what he’s famous for.

But did you know that, since retiring from baseball, he’s had serious work done by Flavor Flav’s orthodontist? Well now, thanks to this week’s edition of the Friday Grill & Bill, which is as efficient as it is a waste of the reader’s time, you do know about Bill’s grill.

“Grilly” Buckner

In conclusion,

Last Saturday, while I convened with Master Cistulli regarding the Discretionary NERD Scores for that day’s games, the Master — past whom nothing gets — noticed, via an uninvited glance at my desktop, my Largely Unnecessary, Decidedly Large, Neatly Organized, and Fully Computerized Collection of Digital Baseball Images™.

Why?

“Why do you have so many images that, one guesses, might be easily found on the internet at any given time?” Master Cistulli asked, not without the condescension common in those who readily identify themselves as both “raised in the Northeast” and “fond of boarding schools.”

My initial response — “For ease of access” — has become unsatisfactory to me in retrospect, and has caused, of late, something of an existential crisis. It should probably be noted, though, that something as minor as one of my cats sneezing is enough to send me into hours of contemplation and deep feelings of meaninglessness.

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Gil Hodges’ large hands probably helped him to become a pretty good baseball player. The first-baseman hit 370 HR and had a career WAR of 41.8.

Those same hands might have made him good at murder, too.

Sure, Gil Hodges would be happy to crush your skull for you!

It’s easy to find several photographs of Hodges that highlight the size of his hands. Apparently, their size distracted both photographers and the public from the fact that Hodges always very literally had blood on his hands.

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Hopefully, dear reader, the weather where you are is nicer than the weather where I am. Should that be the case, mayhap you are gearing up to patio-grill some foodstuffs for dinner this evening — delicious flank steaks or cheesy broccoli in foil packets or build-your-own kebabs.

Before doing so, however, please consider abandoning your fancy foodtsuffs and your weak-ass grill in favor of building yourself a new Baseball Monster Grill using the following schematic.

The grill is portable, so that you can easily wheel it around your cul-de-sac, frightening neighborhood child and suburban rodent alike (who would likely try to steal your grill-things as you cooked them!). Use the Grill to clear the area of such pests before proceeding with preparation of the food. The wheels and handles also facilitate travel by airplane or motorbus, or a quick, evasive maneuver into an alleyway (zero turn-radius).

You might be compelled to ask, upon viewing this schematic, “Why would a baseball have a bat in its mouth?” It does not. Instead, that is a fifth of whiskey, built to the scale of the baseball’s face, fueling it with the menace necessary to frighten the aforementioned children and rodents. The whiskey also fuels the brain-flames of the Baseball Monster Grill.

Also please notice in the schematic: the Drunken Baseball Monster Grill is meant to grill in-can Chef Boyardee products and loose potato chips ONLY. Attempting to grill anything else will result in annihilative mutiny on the part of the Grill Monster. Should you bring that fresh tuna steak from Whole Foods within five feet of it, it will turn on you the way you previously turned it on the pests of the neighborhood.

This has been Your Friday Grill.

As for your Friday Bill, please allow me to (re)introduce more horror into your lives, readers: Billy Koch, a talented relief pitcher, you’ll remember, had his career ended early (at age 29) by the mysterious Morgellons disease.

This has been a very-appetizing-indeed Friday Grill & Bill.