Archive for Actual Thing

Via The Big Event comes unsurprising word that the Oakland A’s 2012 calendar is chock full of infelicities and grim reminders. The belowly embedded image, much like my revenge-fists, shall do the talking:

Mr. Peter Hartlaub goes on to tell us that within the A’s 2012 calendar we find four months devoted to players traded, one to a player injured, one to a manager fired, and one to the dark heart and ways of Cliff Pennington.

Depressing stuff for any A’s loyalist, no? So in order to cheer them up, here’s Davey Lopes with enough devil-may-care jubilance to go around:

America is dealing with some of the hardest economic times she has seen in recent years. Although professional baseball players tend to make a decent amount of coin, even they can’t remain blissfully aware of the plights of us plebeians. Observe the sight which befell Torii Hunter yesterday:

Times r getting hard out here twitter.com/toriihunter48/…

— Torii Hunter (@toriihunter48) January 11, 2012

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Ok, so this exists:

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This Marquis May Well Be More Beneficial to the Twins in 2012.

For a brief stretch, it appeared that someone else might have the most ‘Twins’ offseason this year rather than, well the Twins.

Much like offseasons before, the Twins let its veterans walk via free agency, permitting them to sign deals that are considerably above Terry Ryan’s insanity threshold. Remember the Torii Hunter deal?

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Is the world ready for Bud Krampus?

Thanks to everyone for your nominations for the MLB Krampus. There were a lot of them — too many to include in a single poll, in fact. So, I pared away some potential nominees that I didn’t see fitting into the Krampus way of life. Sorry to disappoint anyone.

There were some nominees that I expected (Selig, Cobb), some that were frightening surprises (Joe West), and some dark horses that I was hoping someone would nominate (Marge Schott).

I hope you’ll all vote, and vote carefully. Remember, the crowning of the Krampus is a serious matter: he determines how your children taste when they are eaten by other children.

I’ve included photos of all of the nominees, for your viewing pleasure horror.

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The Briefest of Krampus Primers

If you’re not a Christian from an Alpine country, you might not be familiar with the Krampus, a satyr-like (in some manifestations, “satyr-like” is a very euphemistic way of putting it) creature that, over time, became a counterpart to Jolly Olde Saint Nicholas or Santa Claus.

Hi, it’s me, the Krampus. Do you like my rumply boot-socks?

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The image below depicts an actual product available for actual purchase on MLB.com’s internet shop:

This is Cubs Jenga, which is the same game as Regular Jenga, except emblazoned with CUBS all over it.

Cubs Jenga would be a very bad gift idea for Steve Bartman, if you were like a Secret Santa or family member or something where you needed a gift idea. Because, you know, the idea of him reaching out at some Cubs-related thing and seeing it implode before him as a result, that could, you know, bring back some bad memories of that time he did that very same thing to the actual Cubs.

So, guys. Don’t buy this for Steve Bartman. Okay?

As every survivalist knows, it’s not always possible to offload your pressing emergencies onto the broad-shouldered likes of John Buck. Sometimes, one must take matters into one’s own hands. So what follows is useful for the fan of base and ball who is also concerned about the rise of a global currency, a resident of any Michigan city center, suspicious that the other shoe is about drop, of the steadfast belief that the Rubicon has been crossed, and or a damned loon:

Post-modern side table or instrument of a homesteader’s righteous and bloody justice? Yes, it would seem.

(Ham radio and canned foodstuffs: Dwell Well)

As you all undoubtedly know, I spend about half my waking hours researching my Fangraphs pieces, which means about 5 of the 20 daily hours I spend working at the computer go the sole scouring of Wikipedia, our culture’s depository for generally agreed-upon knowledge. Anyway, for reasons somewhat beyond me, I ended up recently at the Wikipedia entry for the Caribes de Anzoátegui, a top baseball team in the Venezuelan Winter League, wherein I spotted this subtle typo:

I dunno, perchance it’s just society, but I am not certain whether (1) the author merely misplaced a G, or if (2) the author — likely an ESL such person — tried to sound out “foreign” and ended up with a meng-like solution. And therein lies the quandary: Does the mere doubt make me a racist?

Yes. Probably.

I take comfort in assuming, however, that my colleague Dayn Perry — Mississippi native — would have only considered the second option, while Boss Carson Cistulli (Boss ‘Stul for short) — who spends literally half his time in France, the other half travelling to France — would not have even noticed the error in his French-addled mind.

Reader: Also take note that Dmitri Young is no longer on the Caribes. Which is sad.

🙁

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Forgive me, but this post is (largely) not very funny. Some of you might argue that my posts are never funny. Those people are wrong. Wrongity, wrongity, wrong. To quote the great Lt. Steven Hauk:

Anyway, there are a couple agitators in the comments section around here who are distraught…in every post…that Tim McCarver has won the Ford C. Frick Award. On the one hand, it’s a little understandable. Tim McCarver has been off the top of his game for quite some time now. He still has a strong handle on what a pitcher and catcher are thinking at a given moment, and especially about catcher technique, but it’s entirely reasonable for someone to conclude, based on his recent body of work, that McCarver’s selection is ridiculous.
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