Did we get him? Fuck yeah, we got him.

When I was asked to join the NotGraphantasy Draft, I was at once honored and horrified at being included in any project that Carson Cistulli would actively try to ruin by being himself. But I soldiered on because I’m a hero. Speaking of heroes, let’s talk about my team, which I chose strategically and with malice of forethought. The goal was to put together a team that would be as much fun to follow as possible, that was the most loveable. Fuck “poetry” and all that. Give me some guys I can root for. That said, I did make a couple of picks I’d take back if I could, to which mistakes I’ll uncharacteristically own up and explain what I should have done differently. So without further ado, I present:

The Bates-o-Matic Fun Machine

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Over the many months that I have worked here at NotGraphs, I have never asked for anything from you, the reader. I have provided you with at least a couple minutes of amusement, if not always intentionally and often at my own expense. I have provided this amusement free of charge. My work has cost you nothing, except perhaps your eternal soul. And I have come to believe that we are connected now in that great cosmic sense where people are connected to one another. We are bound together. I have given, and you have taken.

But the scales demand balancing, my friends. They do. This cannot be a relationship where we are unequal to one another. I cannot be your teacher; we must teach each other. Otherwise, certainly, there will be a growing resentment between us, and that would break my heart. My heart that I keep pouring out to you, in the hopes that you would have something to return to me. And yet, you have given me nothing.

Thus, in the name of all that is fair and just, I command you to go out and buy this for me:

Here are some “better” images of it:

Yes, it is an exceptionally creepy figurine of indeterminate material that may or may not be very old and rare that the seller is asking $1,500 for. Between the literally tens of you who will read this post, it hardly seems like too much to ask for you to band together, pool your resources and make us even-steven.

You ask why do I want this? What will I do with it? “Shut up,” I say. That’s not really any of your business right now. Your business is to buy me this thing that I want.

I get that after you buy it, you’re going to want to know that I appreciate your purchase, and that I’m giving it its proper respect in my home. You want to see it on display. I understand this, and I will be happy to show you how it is reverently displayed. But until then, my business is my own. My desires are my own. My plans are my own, and I will not have them called into question. That would be rude, that question calling.

So go. Talk in the comments. Figure out who is going to buy this for me and how best to get them the money. And bring me this small baseball figurine cast from indeterminate material. Do my bidding. Show your gratitude. Make us equals.

Here at NotGraphs, we have often tried to shine a light on how spectacles make the game of baseball better. How much better? Well, it’s hard to quantify. But I think it’s safe to say “lots.” They make baseball lots better.

But there is a spectrum of spectacles. On the one end are these monstrosities worn by Vance Worley, which understandably led to a 7.21 ERA and a 5.55 FIP for the Twins in 10 starts:

 Now compare them to these spectacles worn by Kurt Russell during his three seasons as a minor league second baseman baseball in the Angels’ system from 1971-1973: Read the rest of this entry »

This game. This…baseball, like life itself, can be a harsh mistress. Whether you’re playing and making outs in seven out of ten at bats, or watching your Twins devolve into the second worst team in the American League (hey, thanks for that, Astros), or you’re a vendor who just needs to find a place to poop before you sell your snowcones (again, thanks for that, Astros). Failure is so endemic to baseball that it’s refreshing to see anyone who can take whimsical, unadulterated joy from such cruelty.

That is why, as I slide headfirst into middle age, I’m leavinging my moribund, dumpy Minnesota Twins and getting a younger, hotter baseball team that wants an older fan because it has daddy issues. Someone who can keep up with me and maybe even challenge me a little in the energy department and with their joie de vivre. Someone who is still young and naive, and hasn’t yet learned not to fall for my bullshit. Somebody like the University of Cincinnati Bearcats. Seriously, how can you not love these guys?

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Pictured Above: Old-Timey Basestealing

Today, a public service. This, dear readers, is a baseball player named Rickey Henderson. You probably haven’t heard of him. He was a fairly well known player prior to the turn of the century, so you could hardly be expected to remember him, and he was elected to the Hall of Fame, where he’s enshrined with other great stars of yesteryear like Ed Delahanty, Amos Rusie, and Tommy McCarthy. He has faded into relative historical obscurity.

But that’s not very fair to a man who was, by all accounts, one of the better out fielders of his day. So I’m going to dedicate this post to maintaining his memory and to spreading the word. Based on painstaking research, here are a dozen (mostly) true facts about Rickey Henderson:

1) Rickey Henderson is the all time leader in runs (2295), stolen bases (1406), and caught stealing (335). The modern record holders are Albert Pujols (1399), Juan Pierre (597), and Juan Pierre (193). It was a different game back then.

2) This story is probably apocryphal, its origins lost to the mists of time. But Rickey signed as a free agent with the New York Metropolitans in 1999. During Spring Training, he noticed John Olerud was playing 1B with a batting helmet on. Rickey walked over to him and said, “Hey, I used to play with a guy in Toronto who used to do that.” Olerud said, “Rickey, you’ve got an amazing memory to be able to remember that far back.” “I know,” Rickey said. “My teammates are more important to me than anything in the world.”

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Yesterday, my friend and fellow NotGraphs content-vomiter David Temple wrote about his utter and complete failure to finish a work of children’s fiction, The Kid Who Only Hit Homers. Finish reading it, I mean. It goes without saying that all of us at NotGraphs are frustrated failed novelists of some stripe or another, with at least one unfinished semi-autobiographical manuscript floating around on our hard drives, but Temple’s aborted attempt to read 130 pages of shockingly simplistic prose will go down as one of the more embarrassing literary admissions to grace these digital pages (the most embarrassing of which is still, by quite a large margin, the cover of Cistulli’s book).

But maybe we shouldn’t be so hard on David. With his weak will, he’ll never make it as a Green Lantern, but at least he was attempting to read a book that wasn’t about angsty sparkly vampires who ruin the game of baseball, an increasingly rare effort in what is passing for our culture in 2013. He could have, instead, simply waited around until this Fall, when he could have watched the television equivalent on ABC:

Let us dissect:

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In the epic battle that is cake vs. pie, I’m relatively certain we’ve all already chosen our sides, dug in our heels, and prepared to kill our own brother if necessary. Personally, I’m a cake guy because, like the estimable Paul F. Tompkins, frosting makes all the difference to me.  And I never much liked my brother anyway.

This debate has largely been left to arena of actual desserts, however, and we have not delved into the quandary that is Cake vs. Pie, Baseball Edition!  Choose your sides carefully: Read the rest of this entry »

Pity the poor Ismael Valdez, whose pitching so uninspired the photographers at Upper Deck that they denied him his very livelihood on this circa-2000 baseball card. It’s like they knew his career was about to go into the proverbial turlet thanks to shoulder trouble, and were suggesting that discerning fans would derive more joy watching him hit in the first year of the new willenium, rather than pitch. No one should have to endure such an indignity, to have his accomplishments so cavalierly tossed aside and misrepresented.

When our memories fade, and we look back on his career, will we remember him as he was, or as Upper Deck would have us remember him? When untold generations come wondering about Ismael Valdez, and they find this card, what will they think about a man so inconsequential that no one saw fit to document him doing what he did best? What he loved best? How could we have allowed this to happen?

Ismael Valdez deserves what any man deserves, to be remembered for what he was. Not canonized or marginalized. He averaged 199 innings from 1995-1999 with an ERA+ of 117. He was a fly ball pitcher who faired well in Dodger Stadium, but who struggled when he hurt his shoulder and moved on to Wrigley Field. He never again reached the dizzying heights he experienced as a 23 year old. He finished one game under .500 for his career, at 104-105, with a 4.09 ERA. He was not a Cy Young candidate. He was not cannon fodder. He was part of baseball’s great faceless middle class, about whom no one is ever going to write a biography and who few will ever talk about again. He will not be remembered, at least not as he was. The world is a cruel place for men such as these.

Unquestionable authority on all things related to the American cinema, IMDB.com, took advantage of the opening of 42 to name what it thinks are the 10 greatest baseball movies of all time. Or at least what managing editor Keith Simanton thought qualified as the best baseball movies. One of those movies is Fever Pitch, in which Jimmy Fallon and Drew Barrymore ruin the 2004 World Series by running onto the field and celebrating with the players (I assume that’s the plot, having refused to see it on principle). He also elevates Bernie Mac’s Mr 3000 and Ken Burns’ Baseball (which is not a movie, but a miniseries). About the only good thing about the list is that Simanton apparently realizes that Major League is so good it doesn’t even qualify as a baseball movie, having transcended the genre and elevated itself to become cinematic masterpiece that defies definition and label. At least that’s what I assume happened, since it’s not included on the list at all; or maybe Simanton simply hates Bob Uecker and freedom.

Anyway, in honor of Simanton’s terrible list, here are the baseball movies I want to see get made that would all presumably be better choices than Fever Pitch: Read the rest of this entry »

This week marks the 66th anniversary of Jackie Robinson re-breaking the color line in Major League Baseball, thanks to his incredible talent and the forward (and opportunistic) thinking of Branch Rickey. 42, the movie based on Jackie’s exploits in the game and how he apparently invented rap music opens everywhere this weekend. If you don’t go to see it, it’s probably because you’re a racist (or you’re a parent of small children who doesn’t get out to see movies very often).

You know, we make a big deal out of Branch Rickey’s audacity at challenging baseball’s racist unwritten rules, but we don’t talk at all about perhaps his bravest work to raise bow tie awareness on What’s My Line?

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