Archive for Breaking

COOPERSTOWN, NEW YORK — In a tradition that now has spanned 75 straight years, the voting process for the National Baseball Hall of Fame — and all the shit throwing, posturing, statement making, and overall pissy attitudes that go along with it — has succeeded in turning pretty much everyone into an asshole.

“We could not have asked for a bigger outpouring of dickish attitudes and self-absorbed douchebaggery for our 75th anniversary,” said Jeff Idelson, president of the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum. “I mean, have you been on the Internet lately? They’re using language my father wouldn’t have used when he served in Vietnam. This blogger is calling this columnist a name, then the columnist fires back but misspells a word and everyone goes bananas over that. One dude let a website fill out his ballot, then that dude got freaking suspended. Oh man. This is really a display of toxic vitriol and human degradation befitting our great organization. It’s like everyone is screaming at each other while jerking off on a picture of themselves. That’s the way we like it here in Cooperstown.”

“Who do you write for?” asked a national baseball writer when approached for comment. “How did you get this number?”

“What, you think you’re better than me?” one blogger responded when asked for a statement.

When asked if the Hall will possibly make some suggestions to the Baseball Writers Association of America — the voting body for the hall’s museum — to prevent future backlash and shitty behavior, Idelson was indignant.

“Why should we? When this great institution and induction process was founded, it had one goal. To get a whole subset of people to behave in the most childish, selfish, arrogant, and idiotic way possible. When you start something like this, I don’t care what it’s for, you want everyone involved to act one way, like a bunch of pompous fucking assholes. I may be biased, but I’m really proud of how we were able to accomplish that feat.”

The hall of fame ballot for next year should be just as contested, with almost-certain shoo-ins like Pedro Martinez and Randy Johnson becoming eligible for induction for the first time. Regardless of the outcome, Idelson is certain the voting process will be just as horse-fucked.

“Oh yeah, total shit show. We can’t wait.”

DETROIT — Tigers general manager Dave Dombrowski accidentally hit save Monday, which inadvertently made his trade of pitcher Doug Fister irreversible.

“Nooooooooooooo! Shit! Shit shit shit shit shit!” Dombrowski shouted into his computer monitor. “God damn it! Now what do I do?”

It was reported that Dombrowki’s trade of Fister was a test to see what kind of players he could get back in a hypothetical transaction, with the full intent of closing without saving, so as to retain his starter as he continued to test the market.

“It was time for dinner, so I closed the window,” the GM said with a visibly red face. “That stupid window popped up asking me if I wanted to save before I closed, and without thinking, I clicked on ‘YES’ like a fuckin’ dummy. The same thing happened when I signed Torii Hunter. Luckily, that actually worked out. I hate these damn things sometimes,” he said, making a gesture toward a PC sitting on his desk.

Multiple inside sources have said that Dombrowski has since clicked that little checkbox requesting that he not be notified on closing the window from this point forward.

“We told him about that checkbox, but he never used it. We forced him to now,” one head-office source said. “I’m surprised it hasn’t happened more, to be honest. He would have traded Miggy that one time if the power hadn’t gone out.”

The NotGraphs Investigative Reporting Investigation Team was able to confirm that Dombrowski did try turning it off and on again.

MINNEAPOLIS — In a turn of events that residents are calling sad and uninspired, a local writer of baseball “comedy” poorly Photoshopped an image of a pizza onto an image of Tampa Bay’s Tropicana Field, in a failed attempt at producing humor.

“I don’t get it,” one neighbor said. “I mean, I guess if there is funny text to go along with it, then maybe. But this on its own isn’t funny.”

“It sounds to me like he’s flat out of ideas,” a woman claiming to be the writer’s wife said. “This happens every so often. He just finds it hard to be creative. I mean, he isn’t really creative anyway, but you know what I mean. Whatever, it’s not like anyone reads that site.”

Preliminary reports indicate that the writer had high hopes for the image, and perhaps planned on writing a faux news story about it. But once the story was started, the writer quickly realized the piece had no merit. Yet, without any other real ideas to contribute, he knew he was stuck with the image. Witnesses say he proceeded to delete the entirety of the accompanying text, replacing it with yet another faux news story about the actual act of Photoshopping the picture. At least one witness claims that that text is what readers are reading at this moment.

Police are also following up on eyewitness accounts claiming that the writer has no idea how to end the article in a funny or amusing way.

**NOTICE TO ALL MLB PLAYERS**

Effective immediately, MLB will be expanding the list of banned substances, per the Joint Drug Agreement. Testing positive for any of the following substances will result in an immediate 50-game suspension. In the interest of transparency, we are including the “street names” of these substances, so that you may comply in a quick and easy fashion, and without confusion. If you have any questions about these substances, such as their chemical makeup, feel free to contact your agents, your MLBPA union representatives, your doctors, or a combination thereof. This is not a complete list, only new additions. A detailed and thorough list can be obtained from the League office, or your MLBPA rep.

NEW BANNED SUBSTANCES FOR 2014:

• Fling
• Spit
• Cheese
• Knuckle
• Goober
• Swamp Foot
• Bela Fleckstacy
• Control Alt Defeat
• Brown Skittle
• South by South Pacific
• Jesse Camp
• Midnight Train to Georgia (the Country)
• Grease 2
• Parker Full of Posey
• Creamed Corn Row
• Ram Jam
• Ronny James Dios Mio
• Fart Barrel
• Hose Face
• Knight to E6
• Friendster
• Popamatic Bubble
• Ian Ziering
• Hitler’s Pyramid
• Bubb Rubb
• Black Lung
• Black Bung
• William Hung

NEW YORK –Days after initial reports surfaced regarding Boston Red Sox first baseman Mike Napoli roaming the streets of Boston without a shirt, new findings indicate that Napoli is still on the loose.

The above image from Twitter user @FrankTheKoala_ posted on November 2nd shows Napoli on the streets of Boston, presumably celebrating the recent World Series victory by the Red Sox.

However, the NotGraphs Investigative Reporting Investigation Team has uncovered grainy footage that shows Napoli has made his way to New York City. He has appeared to have befriended an African American man, and has participated in exercise activities with that man.

Stay tuned to NotGraphs as we continue to provide updates on this story.

OAKLAND — The sports world and entertainment world collided Monday, when the celebrity couple of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie officially claimed infielder Adam Rosales. Jolie, who has a history of adopting children from impoverished nations, reports that she finalized the paperwork this morning.

“It’s always been a priority of mine to save children from dire positions, and those instincts kicked in when I heard about Adam’s situation,” Jolie said in an official statement. “It’s clear that Oakland and Texas, Adam’s two guardians, are not fit to provide him with the support and care that he needs. He needed to be removed from that toxic environment. It’s no different then when I adopted my other children, except that Adam is a 30-year old man. And a millionaire.”

Rosales, who has been the subject of a heated custody battle between the Athletics and Rangers told reporters that he’s just happy to finally have a home.

“I’ve been shuttling back and forth between homes so much recently, I’m not even sure where my stuff is. I think I have nine apartments in my name right now. And I lost track of my car like a week ago. It’s going to be weird to not play baseball anymore, but it sure beats living out of airports.”

Athletics GM Billy Beane, who, in a slight twist of fate, was portrayed by Pitt in the film Moneyball, could not be reached for comment. Rangers GM Jon Daniels did voice his displeasure.

“I really wanted Adam to be a Ranger,” said Daniels. “I mean, not enough to keep him on the roster for longer than, like, a couple days, but the desire was there. Mostly, I just wanted to fuck with Billy, though.”

INTERNET, USA — In a move that would be considered shocking if anyone actually cared, baseball-nerd homepage Fangraphs has traded Eno Sarris to another site for baseball pencil pushers, Baseball Prospectus, for a 2014 first-round pick.

FanGraphs CEO and self-made millionaire David Appelman lauded Sarris as “being very good at whatever it is he does,” and added “we’ll be sorry to see him go, I’m sure.”

Sarris was unable to be reached for comment but did tweet “wut” soon after the news broke, which was immediately followed by a tweet ranking a beer no one has ever heard of. Sources indicate that Jeff Sullivan was originally in the mix for a trade, but Sullivan indicated he would exercise his 5000-posts rights, given to writers who have logged 5,000 posts on a site.

Baseball Prospectus editor-in-chief Ben Lindbergh plans to use Sarris and his BBWAA card to ramp up coverage of awkward interviews in locker rooms all over the bay area of California. “It’s an obvious missing piece from our site,” said Lindbergh on a conference call with reporters. “I mean, he’ll do fantasy stuff too,” he added. “But I’m really excited to land that coveted interview about comic books with Pat Neshek.”

Signs are not yet clear as to how FanGraphs will use their 2014 first-round pick, as those things don’t actually exist for baseball writers, but insiders suspect Appelman will try to package it with Dayn Perry’s contract in a move to acquire additional server space.