Because I don’t understand Spanish so good, I can’t tell you exactly what’s happening in this video, but my guess is that it’s something along the lines of “Everyone is punching everyone else.”

What I can say is that the principal figures here are baserunner (and former Diamondback) Jeff Salazar, second baseman Oswaldo Morejon, and pitcher Alejandro Martinez, who (i.e. Martinez) not only throws the errant pickoff attempt but also launches himself at Salazar.

NotGraphs can confirm that, in terms of discinplinary action, both Salazar and Morjeon were ejected from the game and Martinez has been fined $25,000 by the NFL for unnecessary roughness.

H/T: Vin Scully Is My Homeboy

Recently, in these pages, I made a case for a way of discussing books in a manner conducive to NotGraphs. You can read those exact words, if you want. Alternatively, you can just believe me when I say that the basic idea is to share lightly annotated passages and ideas from interesting baseball-related books.

The Text in Question
Dollar Sign on the Muscle: The World of Baseball Scouting by Kevin Kerrane

On This Book and Why I’m Reading It
Despite the fact that it might disappoint my mother, it’s a fact: if Rob Neyer told me to jump off the Brooklyn Bridge, I would effing go jump off that bridge, stat.

Why? Probably for like a thousand reasons. Like, because Neyer is the freshest of princes. Like, because while some people* cling desperately to their spot in the public consciousness, Neyer has repeatedly used his notoriety to celebrate and recognize the work of those less well-known. Like, because Neyer remembered my frigging birthday — something even my jerky college friends can’t be bothered to do.

So when, this past summer, Neyer mentioned that Dollar Sign on the Muscle is more or less the definitive book on scouting, it immediately became a priority for me.

*I can’t put up with those people because they’re bastard people.

Read the rest of this entry »

Readers over the age of 28 or so will almost definitely remember this very famous Billy Ripken card for at least two reasons: (1) because it was worth a whole bunch of money, and (2) because it had a swear on it and swears, according to all manner of research, are awesome.

In an interview with Bo of weblog Baseball Cards Come to Life!, longtime Fleer photograher Steve Babineau explains how the Ripken card happened.

Boom, blockquote:

I shot the Billy Ripken card – it was definitely not intentional. I was at Fenway, and everyone is out there doing BP. Billy is the only one wearing a game uniform with the number in the front. Everyone else is wearing their orange BP top. For everyone else I would need to make sure there was an identifying marker like a glove, or I would take their picture as they walked away to get their uniform number. I didn’t have to magnify Ripken’s card because the number was clearly visible. In the past Fleer used to send us full color sheets, which we would use to check for reverse negatives and other problems with the picture.

That year, to save money, they just sent us blueprints that were in three shades of blue. Your eyes don’t focus on something like that. After the card came out, my boss called me and told me to look at the knob of the bat. “Please tell me it says ‘slick face,’” he said to me. I had to look at it with the magnifying glass and tell him that that was not what it said.

The next year the first team I went to see at Spring Training was the Orioles, playing the Expos in West Palm Beach. I went up to Billy and he says “Thanks for making a nickel card into a thirty dollar card!” He told me he started using that bat as a BP bat on a road trip in Detroit or Cleveland before coming to Fenway. He said it was his brother that wrote that on his bat. I heard that he actually started signing that card for kids but had to stop.

As you can see from the other image here — one featuring the principal figures in baseball’s memorable Pine Tar Incident — not all of Babineau’s photos included swear words.

H/T: UniWatch

I’ve almost definitely mentioned, at some point in these pages, that, before my life as Semi-Professional Baseball Writer, I read and wrote poems quite a lot — sometimes to the point of a stranger actually publishing them.

If the reader is under the impression that most poems are terrible, then the reader is under the correct impression. In fact, most poems are written with the express purpose of emotionally scarring American high school students. However, there are other writers — ones who receive less attention, maybe — with the novel idea that poems could actually be enjoyable. These are the ones from whom I’ve shamelessly stolen everything.

In this game I made up, what you do
is think of exactly ten hundred things
better than discussing the role of poetry
in today’s society. If you’re looking
for an example, here’s one: “the role of
a donkey’s nads in today’s society.”
And also: “crackers — either in the racist,
or every other, way.”

Which, that reminds me:
you’ll never guess who I saw at the frigging
library yesterday. Former baseballing great
Dick Allen! He was doing some bizarrely intense
research on the historic Burlingame Olympics.
He was dressed in a jacket made exclusively
from the lapels of other jackets. When I saw him,
I was all, “Dick Allen! You suffered the slings
and arrows of outrageous Philadelphians! What possible
coping mechanisms could you have developed?” —
which question he answered by quietly lathering in Wite Out
all, or close to all, of his myriad interior scars.

Image stolen directly from Dick Allen Hall of Fame

The whens and wheres and whys are unclear, but NotGraphs is able to report with certainty that what you’re seeing in this photo right here (courtesy of the team’s Twitter feed) is Twins manager Ron Gardenhire and new Twins middle infielder Tsuyoshi Nishioka both modeling a garment known as the Sluggie.

The Sluggie, as you’re hopefully unaware, is a Justin Morneau-inspired and perhaps -designed variant of the Snuggie — i.e. the sleeved blanket that has also doubled as pop-culture phenomenon. The entirety of its (i.e. the Sluggie’s) existence has been chronicled by the Star Tribune’s Michael Rand.

As for the people in the back there, while their identities remain unknown, we’ve confirmed that they’re the only ones in this photo enjoying the benefits of basic human dignity.

H/T: My friend Dan

But now, thanks to Kevin Burkhardt of SNY, you can!

Burkhardt joined R.A. Dickey in the latter’s Nashville home to ask the Met pitcher about his successful 2010 campaign, the art of knuckleballing, and three or seven other things.

The home viewer will do well to note, additionally, that Dickey has an unnaturally gentle speaking voice. Like, really gentle. Like, I want him to come over my house and read a bedtime story, is what I mean.

H/T: Mets Blog

Recently, in these pages, I made a case for a way of discussing books in a manner conducive to NotGraphs. You can read those exact words, if you want. Alternatively, you can just believe me when I say that the basic idea is to share lightly annotated passages and ideas from interesting baseball-related books.

Text
Reggie Jackson: The Life and Thunderous Career of Baseball’s Mr. October by Dayn Perry

A Note on Very Bad Behavior
One impression that is impossible not to have while reading Mr. Perry’s book is how poorly behaved basically every single one of its protagonists is. A’s owner Charlie Finley? A miserly emotional terrorist. George Steinbrenner? Less miserly than Finley, but more — I don’t know — nakedly tyrannical (?). Billy Martin? Almost definitely a victim of untreated borderline personality disorder. Jackson himself? Less self-esteem, and a greater proclivity for drama, than every 15-year-old girl everywhere.

Read the rest of this entry »

Here’s the early trailer for MLB 11: The Show (which game was treated in these pages yesterday, too).

I don’t know if we learn much about the game here. On the other hand, it’s nice to know that Carl Orff is still composing music some 30 years after his death.

H/T: 7 Train to Shea

*Note: As commenter sgardner notes, Justice has actually been sensibly critical of the Houston front office, leading one to imagine that Justice’s tongue is firmly in his cheek here. That said, it’s still interesting to consider how a regular reader might respond to Justice’s post differently than a casual one, like myself.

Life can be scary. Starting around 21 or 22 years of age (generally speaking), one is tasked with the responsibility of feeding and clothing oneself — a not-unsubstantial chore, indeed. Not long after that (again, generally speaking), one is asked, in addition, to feed and clothe other, smaller people, as well. This is particularly burdensome, as there are laws against ignoring or throwing off bridges these smaller people — laws that could force one to spend the rest of his life in prison.

On top of all this, there’s also the sense that — in addition to providing enough in the way of financial compensation — that the work one chooses ought to be fulfilling in some way. “If I’m going to spend 40 hours a week doing something,” goes the reasoning, “it ought not to be something that represents a constant assault on my values and/or taste.”

Understanding this — i.e. that life is fraught with all manner of difficulty — helps us feel sympathy for each other. Certainly, it’s something that a reader should keep in mind when approaching the most recent dispatch from Richard Justice of the Houston Chronicle — an article that begins with this headline:

Read the rest of this entry »

The image you see above these very words is the computer-generated likeness of Minnesota catcher Joe Mauer, and it (i.e. the image) is relevant to these pages not merely because Mauer has redefined the use of sideburns in American culture, nor for the fact that he’s served admirably as a spokesman of MLB: The Show, but because Mauer himself has just today (maybe) been announced as the poster boy for the 2011 edition of The Show, as well.

If you want a review of the game, you’ll have to read every last one of Jon Robinson’s words on the matter. In the meantime, though, here are some of those words, regarding one of the game’s biggest changes — i.e. analog controls for almost errything.

Read the rest of this entry »