Wherein I skip the Rangers and the Angels because there don’t seem to be any rappers willing to wear their chain, not because I don’t like them.  I couldn’t find anything sweet enough from either team to grace the hallowed cyber-pages of NotGraphs, and I’m betting you, dear reader, can’t either.  Prove me wrong, preferably in the form of a cordial comment below. 🙂  

Two things worth talking about when talking about Rap in the AL West.  1, that MC Hammer was a bat boy for the Oakland A’s, and 2, that there’s this rapper from Seattle going by the moniker Macklemore and he’s pretty damn fresh.

The Part About MC Hammer

It goes like this – when Stanley Burrell (the kid on the left) was a kid growing up in Oakland he would hang around the A’s parking lot, doing his thing.  He eventually caught the eye of A’s owner Charlie Finley, who made him a batboy.  Reggie Jackson started calling the kid ‘Hammer’, because he looked so much like Hank Aaron, and the rest is rap history.

The Part About Macklemore

Macklemore, a rapper named Ben Haggerty from Seattle, knows what he’s doing.  And the dude loves baseball.  Last year he released a track called “My Oh My” in memory of longtime Mariners radio announcer Dave Niehaus. It may be the best rap song about baseball, and the video honestly brings chills. I just found it today, and I’ve probably watched it at least five times.

Every year XXL magazine compiles a list of rappers to watch called the Freshmen list. This year they’ve released a list of 50 finalists, and have opened it up to the public. Macklemore made the cut. He’s got my vote.

Wherein we rank the American League Central franchises by how fresh their logo has been repped in rap history.

5. Kansas City Royals

The absolute only instance I could find of a rapper steppin’ out with a Royals cap is this picture of Kanye West, which we can probably assume was some sort of mistake, and that the guy in his entourage who lays out his clothes was fired the next day.

And also, this:

Read the rest of this entry »

WELCOME TO THE WASH SHOW I AM THE MOTHER F**ING HOST.. #WashTime

— LeVon Washington (@L_wash) December 13, 2011

By day LeVon Washington is a minor league outfielder for the Cleveland Indians, but by night he is the mother f**ing (although we can’t be sure what F-word he meant to bleep out, I’m going to guess it was the normal one, despite not having enough letters) host of the Wash Show, the hottest minor league twitter in the game right now.  He’s still looking for his swag on the diamond (.218/.331/.315 split in A ball last year), but believe me, he’s dripping with it all over the internets.  It’s a legitimate crime that he has only 782 followers, so I’m passing the #FF buck to you, dear friends. 

Bill Simmons recently appointed me the ‘czar’ of MiLB twitters (much to Carson’s chagrin), so I have the power to name LeVon Washington top dog in the inaugural NotGraphs Twitter Prospect List, and also to issue this official word of warning @TheRealTPlush:  Your crown as craziest baseball twitterer is in jeopardy.  Consider yourself on mother-f**ing notice.  Batton down the hatches while you still can, because it’s bout to be #WashTime #WashTime #WashTime #WashTime #WashTime #WashTime #WashTime #WashTime #WashTime #WashTime #WashTime #WashTime

This photo, taken last week during Mr. Reyes’ official introduction to the mighty Marlins of Miami, shows Mr. Reyes, amidst all the pomp and circumstance of this happy occasion, transfixed, his gaze caught on something (or someone) unknown to us in the distance. Assuming that he is not blind or a robot, please answer the following question to the best of your ability: What did he see?

A. The contents of the briefcase from Pulp Fiction.
B.  Krampus.
C. A mirror, causing him to finally see how goofy the new Miami uniforms are.
D. Clifford, the big red dog, doing something inappropriate.

Extra Credit: What could have possibly disgusted Ozzie Guillen enough to provoke this facial outburst?

(Here’s a hint: the answer’s Sean Penn)

Othello (or O., as the kids are calling it these days), is ostensibly about revenge (or racism, as any collegiate Shakespeare survey course worth a damn will tell you),  revolving around Iago and his plan to unravel the titular character.  Said plan is devious and complex, involving multiple moving parts and perfect timing.  I haven’t read it in a long, long time – and I haven’t even thought about it since I was dozing off in the back of forementioned Shakespeare survey course worth a damn – but I do remember that things end up pretty badly for all involved.  And that there was something important about a handkerchief. 

Anyways, this prank is kind of like that.

I’m going to go ahead and file this one in my ‘utopia’ folder, because while I would love to live in a world where baseball cards and rap lyrics are allowed to mingle freely without fear of prosecution, I realize that it’s just not a practical idea. With that said, I salute you, 1999 Skybox Thunder, for refusing to let anything get in the way of your vision, for laughing at tradition, for daring to include not just stats or ‘fun facts’ on the back of your baseball cards, but also carefully crafted player-specific rap lyrics. They aimed for the moon and missed, but, contrary to what the poster said in my middle-school gymnasium, they did not land among the stars, mostly because the raps just flat out suck. You can read a much more thorough account from a superior writer here, or you can bear with me for like thirty more seconds.

There are over three hundred of these cards, and while I’m sure that each one is literally the best thing ever, I’m only going to give you one for the road: #H8, a special Mark McGwire ‘Hip-No-Tized’ Insert, which can be had for only six American dollars.

Here it is written out, so you don’t have to strain your pretty little eyes (because it’s all for you reader): Popeye… King of Swing… Big Mac… Does it really matter what we call you? It’s all good, ’cause we think you’re the greatest home run hitter of all time. More dingers per at-bat than anyone in history. Even The Babe can’t touch that stat. True that. True that.

I can’t knock the ‘hustle’, but I absolutely can knock the rhyme scheme. C’mon homies, that’s a soft verse.

Dramatic Irony (n.) – irony that is inherent in speeches or a situation of a drama and is understood by the audience but not grasped by the characters in the play.

Here’s to you and your humanity Mike Bordick.

It’s like that old adage says: “Some days you play the trumpet, whilst other days Jay Johnstone plays you.”

Yahoo! Answers is probably the best thing about the internet, and certainly the best place to go to get a good gauge on the hottest topics in baseball.  Just quickly dipping into the ether is an immediately gratifying experience, but I would also like to encourage you to proceed with a certain degree of caution, and to echo the sentiment of the opening words of American Psycho: “Abandon All Hope Ye Who Enter Here.”  Now, just a few of the many questions posed, all in the last 24 hours:

Who is the quintessential replacement player?

Why is Yuniesky Betancourt considered a terrible player?

If you have ordered “wholesale jerseys” from japan how was your experience?

I need a Video of Mike Schmidt on the Internet?

What do you need to be able to do to make a small high school team like Troy, OH with a pop. of 25,000?

How would you persuade a cubs fan that the cardinals are a far superior team? 

How much would a Louis Tiant singed baseball be worth? 

What are my chances of making it to the MLB? 

What do you say to old ladies when you see them at a baseball game? 

Why do most players steal a lot fewer bases as they approach and pass 30 years old?

Ah Bartleby! Ah Humanity!

This is Keith Olbermann interviewing an actor portraying Christy Mathewson about what really happened during – no giggles, please – Merkle’s boner.

I don’t know why this isn’t a more common-place gimmick: imagine Babe Ruth going on about how good ballpark hot dogs were in the ’20s, or Joe DiMaggio dishing out some naughty Marilyn details, or Ty Cobb in a roundtable on whether Matt Kemp or Ryan Braun should have won the MVP (That would sure be a fun discussion). I think a casting call is in order, Baseball Tonight.

And yes, Olbermann’s moustache is funny.

… to former Blue Jays reliever Mark Eichhorn! (not to be confused with Einhorn, er Finkel – Einhorn is Finkel, Finkel is Einhorn, Einhorn is a man!), a natural NotGraphs favorite due to his swingin’ sidearm and even swingier mustache.

We gonna party like it’s my birthday.

His story is pretty cool – after damaging his arm during his first brief stint in the majors in ’82 he lost all his velocity and was forced to try out the uber-quirky submarine style.  It took him four years to master it, but when he got his next shot in ’86 he made the most of it, posting an outrageous 5.3 WAR campaign as a reliever – and he was only five innings away from qualifying for the ERA title with a 1.72 in 157 innings.  He bounced around to a few more teams before coming back to Toronto just in time to win two World Series Rings.

And with that: Happy 51st Birthday, Mark Eichhorn from all of NotGraphs!

(Other November 21st birthdays include Stan “The Man” Musial and Ken Griffey, Jr. aka “The Kid”, but who cares about them*)

*this is actually a funny coincidence because ‘”The Man” and “The Kid'” are the main characters of The Cincinnati Kid where Steve McQueen plays Eric “The Kid” Stoner and Edward G. Robinson plays Lancey “The Man” Howard.  Griffey is, essentially, the real-life Cincinnati Kid, and Stan Musial and Ann-Margret (who’s in The Cincinnati Kid!) both appeared in the same episode of CBS This Morning on October 21st, 1991.  Spooky, huh?