1. Travis d’Artagnan, C, New York (NL). d’Artagnan was captain of the Toronto Musketeers, a semipro team led by Louis Merloni and killed when a ball hit him in the throat at the Siege of (Kevin) Maastricht in 1673.

2. Gary Sanchez, C, New York (AL). Far too distracted making Will Ferrell movies.

3. Francisco Lindor Chocolate Truffle by Lindt, SS, Cleveland. Lindor used to be 175 pounds, until he started to eat all twenty varieties of hard chocolate shell with smooth chocolate filling. Now he is 425 pounds, and has the second-lowest range factor in professional baseball, ahead of only some guy on the Yankees.

4. Mike Old, 3B, Texas. Not to be confused with Mike Olt, Mike Old turned 106 last October.

5. Kaleb Coward, 3B, Los Angeles (AL). Afraid of the ball.

Buzzfeed offers its picks for The Ultimate Fictional Baseball Team. A little too much Major League for my taste — Jake Taylor, Pedro Cerrano, Willie Mays Hayes — but can’t really quibble with most of it.

My pick for the best fictional team is the 2013 Astros.

Your picks in the comments.

Carefully posed portraits of all of your 2013 St. Louis Cardinals.

Courtesy of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and photographer Chris Lee.

Ty Wigginton scares me.

Buried at the bottom of a story last week at MLB.com:

The New York police officer on trial for allegedly plotting to kidnap, murder and eat 100 women was high school baseball teammates with Mets outfielder Mike Baxter.

Also in the news:

Former Braves catcher Bruce Benedict next in line to be Pope.

Ramon Castro, Jason Castro, Starlin Castro said to be under consideration to succeed distant cousins Fidel and Raul in Cuba.

JUPITER, FLA. — The Cardinals of the National League of Professional Baseball Clubs moved deliberately but inexorably on Tuesday toward the selection of a new pope after the resignation of Bruce Benedict XVI, meeting for a third time for discussions and to hear speeches — both inspirational and informational.

Roger Dean Stadium officials said the Home Dugout, the traditional location of the conclave that chooses the pope, would close at 1 p.m. on Tuesday in preparation for the gathering of the Cardinals who will elect Benedict’s successor.

Read the rest of this entry »

NotGraphs reader Zac Hinz wins a Most Valuable Correspondent award for sharing this amazing spreadsheet he created (Google Docs) compiling the upcoming season’s promotional giveaways for all 30 teams.

His thoughts, all well worth sharing (and slightly edited):

* Every team does the magnetic schedule, but Toronto notes that they give you it on exit. Bravo, Toronto, Bravo! I’ve gotten the magnetic schedule before (on entering), and it’s like, what am I supposed to do with this for 3 hours? Also those adorable Canadians list their September 29th giveaway as a toque.

Read the rest of this entry »

COLORADO — After a disappointing 2012 season, the Rockies knew they would have to take a hard look at their entire organization, and figure out how they could be sure to improve going forward. What they never expected was that a leaked memo from a leading technology company would inspire them to make a change that they hope will change their fortunes in 2013 and beyond. This past week, it was revealed that Yahoo was requiring all employees working from home to instead come into the office, where they could theoretically be more productive, creative, and showered than they were in their living rooms.

Upon reading this news, Rockies GM Dan O’Dowd had a brainstorm. If it was the right policy for Yahoo, perhaps it was something to think about for the Rockies. All season, there had been a terrible gap in the infield, as Todd Helton, Josh Rutledge, Troy Tulowitzki, and Chris Nelson had all taken advantage of the team’s generous telecommuting policies to work from home instead of coming to the stadium or heading out on the road. This had led to countless ground balls sneaking through to the outfield, an endless number of missed at-bats, and, at least in Helton’s case, bizarre decisions to drive drunk and play the lottery. While the team had sought to make it easier for its players to balance work and life responsibilities by letting them play the field from their home offices, nearly 100 losses on the year made O’Dowd start to wonder whether this was the right plan for the Rockies going forward.

Thus, just this morning, the team has issued an urgent news release:

To become the absolute best place to play, communication and collaboration are important, and we need to be physically fielding side-by-side in order to stop most grounders. That is why it is critical that we are all present at the stadium. Some of the best baseball is played by people who are actually on the field, wearing uniforms, and cheering on our pitchers. Bat speed is often sacrificed when we work from home. We need to be one team, and that starts with physically being together.

Beginning in June, we’re asking all players with work-from-home arrangements to show up to the games ready to play. Yes, we’ll sacrifice April and May, but, hey, we’re trying. If this impacts you, our manager has already been in touch with next steps. For those of you who occasionally have to stay home for the cable guy, the inground pool installer, the divorce lawyer, or the financial planner, please use your best judgment in the spirit of collaboration. Being a Rockie isn’t just about posing for pictures on baseball cards, it is about actually playing baseball. Sometimes.

The team looks forward to winning perhaps as many as three additional games this season thanks to the new policy.

ESPN Deportes reported that Ramirez has reached a verbal agreement to play for the EDA Rhinos of the Chinese Professional League.

It is shaping up to be quite a battle in Florida for the Cardinals’ final bench spot, with three candidates who all brought out the big paragraphs in an interview with Fox Sports Midwest earlier in the week. I think it’s pretty hard to call this one:

Adron Chambers:

“I just want to get on base. I want to steal some bases. I have Willie McGee and Ozzie Smith out here helping me and they were great ballplayers and great base stealers and the kind of player I want to be, not necessarily home run hitters but could run and had great athletic ability and could do some damage on the base paths and create some things.”

Shane Robinson:

“I learned a couple hard lessons that nothing is guaranteed in this game so I’m just going to go out there and do what I can to the best of my abilities and hopefully put that seed in the coaches head that this is the guy they want. I want to show the coaches that I’m the guy they want. I don’t want to be on the fence with anything. I want to bust my butt and do all the things right that I need to do and when it comes to when they are picking the team, I don’t want to be the guy that’s on the fence. I want to be the guy they say, ‘this is the guy we want on the team, no ifs, ands or buts about it. He hustles, he does all the right things. He’s smart. That’s pretty much it.”

Justin Christian:

“Everybody here is a heck of a player. For me just being able to have the opportunity to come out here, every year I’m pretty much in the same situation where you have to fight and scrap to prove yourself year in and year out. For me it’s just an opportunity to come out here and I’ve been well received over here with the Cardinals. I’m excited. I’m just a guy that’s going to give it 110 percent every day, whether I’m starting or not starting, I’m going to go out there and be a team guy and play hard every day. Every time I’m in the lineup I’m going to try to bring to the table some good defense and some situational hitting and try to steal some bases.”

Winner?

There were four entrants to the David Price facial hair contest. And, therefore, four winners.

Honorable Mention, sent in by Steve Madden:

Third place, sent in by Matt Saunders:

Second place, sent in by Kyle Davis:

First place, sent in by Cody Griffin

Congratulations, Cody!