Anaphora is a rhetorical device wherein the author begins consecutive lines with the same word or phrase, generally to create a crescendo-like effect.

It can be used to give the impression of writerliness and/or to mount an offensive on the reader’s faith in human potential, as demonstrated by Mitch Albom in his Detroit Free Press article on Justin Verlander’s AL MVP victory, the relevant excerpt of which article you can read here (bold is mine):

And here’s the best part:

He earned it.

He earned it because he went 24-5. He earned it because he owned his starts from June through September. He earned it because he had 250 strikeouts and was as close to a sure thing as you get in sports. He earned it because he rested the next day’s bullpen every time he pitched into the seventh, eighth or ninth.

He earned it because whenever the Tigers slipped on a banana peel, he was there to catch them, breaking possible slumps, keeping climbing opponents at bay.

He earned it because he was dominant. Because he was lights out. Because he threw a no-hitter and threatened a couple more. Because he got stronger as the game went on, relying on placement early and bringing the heat late. Who throws FASTER in the eighth inning? Are you kidding?

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Late Seattle prospect Greg Halman’s death is no more or less significant than all the other deaths today — certainly not to the families and loved ones of all the other respective deceased. However, owing to the startling circumstances under which Halman’s death occurred — and to the fact that Halman was a baseball player — it’s only natural that some readers of NotGraphs will feel the pang of mortality more strongly this morning than on others.

If that is the case, might I humbly submit that you add the following fragment by Greek philosopher Epicurus to your reflections. It’s from his Vatican Sayings, and part of a collected works that can be read in a short afternoon.

Vatican Sayings, No. 14 (tr. C. Bailey):

We are born once and cannot be born twice, but for all time must be no more. But you, who are not master of tomorrow, postpone your happiness: life is wasted in procrastination and each one of us dies without allowing himself leisure.

Not, not, not, not, not pornography.

Beyond its propensity for killing cats, curiosity has other virtues, as well — namely, in that, by placing our trust in it, we’re led effortlessly to our respective vocations and become the people we’re meant to be.

Does that idea sound Emersonian to you? Shut up, it is.

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Inspired by the events that transpired last night in the world of baseball (!!!!!) and in the world of Project Runway finales, I spent the afternoon making my own Game Six Win Probability Graph t-shirt (apologies to Dave Cameron, who surely never meant for this to happen).

I hope the judges don’t knock me for my styling

You can make your own memento of the %^(*$%%(@RFJingest game ever. Instructions, kind of: I printed the win expectancy graph and went over the lines with my trusty Sharpie so they would pop when I traced them… Then I just slotted the page under a white t-shirt and traced the lines with a fabric pen. I sewed red beads onto my shirt for hot playz, but you could also just do it in a different color. Embroidery would also be an option and a pretty easy one if you have a water soluble fabric pen (and who doesn’t), but I didn’t have time for that today. Then I cut the collar and sleeves off of my shirt because I’m a girl. Viola!

Well, that was quite the Game Six.

Where are you going to watch Game Seven? I’m going to be hanging out with Patrick Newman in Palo Alto at the Empire Tap Room. Good beers, better baseball/TV setups than other Palo Alto bars with good beers, should be empty enough at happy hour Friday to carve out a spot for the game. If you are in the bay area, you can even take the train there, sorta. Meet me there?

I don’t promise that the game will be as good as Game Six (how could it be). Or that anyone nearer to you will respond on this post to let you know where they will be tonight so you can meet up with them and talk nerd. But I feel like I need to do this, Game Six was that good. I haven’t even cleared this with my wife or the Dark Overloard yet. F it, I’m a rebel.

So! Where are you going to watch Game Seven tonight?

The Buckner ball is up for sale, and apparently current owner Seth Swirsky’s asking price is in the neighborhood of $1 million (he bought it in 2000 for $63,500 from Charlie Sheen, who paid $93,500 in 1992).  It’s easy to get why it’s valuable, but I don’t know how easy it is to justify it.

There’s a great moment during the second season of Mad Men when Bert Cooper explains to Harry Crane why he purchased a Rothko painting (in the clip it’s around the 2:45 mark).  “People buy things to realize their aspirations, it’s the foundation of our business.”  He pauses.  “But between you and me and the lamppost that thing should double in value by next Christmas.” 

It’s kind of a funny moment because of how true it is – in the art world, that’s basically how things work.  People buy paintings either because they like the aesthetic or because they think it could double by next Christmas.  But a baseball?  It’s become pretty commonplace to bash on nostalgia (a recent, pretty-great book by Simon Reynolds called Retromania talks about it fairly well), but that argument seems like it might make sense here.  No one would buy a Picasso because of it’s ties to the past, but someone might buy a signed Mickey Mantle baseball for just that reason.

This particular baseball has some obviously strange vibes surrounding it. It is steeped in significance and meaning, but it’s a little different for everyone.  Semiotically, when I say ‘tree’ we all see in our mind’s eye some similar version of what a tree is, but when I say ‘Buckner baseball’, a Red Sox fan is going to feel differently then my 87 year-old grandmother, who probably has no idea who Bill Buckner is.  What I don’t get is why anyone would feel good owning this?  It’s cool, sure, in the way that having something that no one else has is cool, but it doesn’t really say anything more than ‘I like things that are expensive and identifiable.’  It’s connotations, if anything, are mostly negative. 

Comic book artist Todd McFarlane famously bought Mark McGwire’s 70th home run ball for $3 million in 1999.  I understand that a little more, but it’s still a lot of money for a baseball.  Someone’s going to buy this ball, maybe around the million dollar asking price, and they’re going to be happy they bought it, and they’re going to take it home and tell all their friends, but I wonder where, in three or four or twenty years, that ball will be.  On the mantle?  A safety deposit box?  In a dresser drawer?

Not suitable for work — or so says “society.”

I’ll begin this piece by directing the reader’s attention — if he hasn’t directed it there yet himself — to Ryan Campbell’s two-part interview with Oakland right-hander and 2011 AL FIP leader Brandon McCarthy from Friday. While there are a number of things to enjoy about the McCarthy-Campbell piece, the most notable for our purposes is McCarthy’s sense of self-awareness and his capacity both for understanding and articulating what it is that makes him successful (and, conversely, what has caused him to fail in the past).

While McCarthy’s voice is an entirely welcome one in these pages, he — and the interview in which he participates — are exceptional specifically because this sort of self-awareness and -understanding appear to be rare in baseball.

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Ralph Waldo Emerson loved pretending to read.

As discussed this morning in some detail by Bradley Woodrum and, more generally, by the concerned citizens of the internet, the Red Sox and Cubs are currently engaged in talks over what sort of compensation the former team should receive from the latter for the right to realease from his present contract, and sign, (quasi-) former Boston GM Theo Epstein.

The situation is a complicated one — and when complicated matters arise, the only prudent course of action is to appeal to Important Voices of Yore. We look not for a precise answer to our own particular dilemma — that would be impossible — but at least for foundational ideas on which we can arrive at our own conclusions.

Fortunately, for our purposes, we find among the works of celebrated American thinker Ralph Waldo Emerson an essay actually titled “Compensation”. As a service to the reader, I’ve spent the afternoon in my richly paneled study, drinking deeply both of Emerson’s text and some really expensive scotch that I just drink whenever I want to.

Does Emerson speak directly to the quandary in which the Bostonians and Chicagoans currently find themselves? In a word: no. And in two words: absolutely not. And in three, largely blasphemous, words: Oh God, no.

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Let’s face it, reading a baseball site like FanGraphs (but not NotGraphs, of course!) is pretty nerdy. If you want to double down on being a baseball nerd, the best route is fantasy baseball. But what if you want to triple your nerdity?

To the Academy!

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While I’m inclined to agree with the author of Ecclesiastes* — in a general sense, at least — that there’s “nothing new under the sun,” I’ll also submit that the particulars of all the things under the sun change with enough frequency that it’s important for humans to taxonomize them, lest we (i.e. humans) are overwhelmed and compelled by fear to crawl back into all our mothers’ wombs**.

*Part of my habit of deferring to anyone who identifies himself as “son of David, king in Jerusalem.”

**Awkward, gross.

And so it’s without anxiety, but with a small mustard stain on my shirt, that I submit this confidently worded statement on two popular 21st century games and the respective pleasures they provide.

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