Last August, the author invited the readership to celebrate what one might call the “untamed beauty” of Kansas City reliever Kelvin Herrera’s changeup. In the intervening months, he (i.e. the author) has turned his attention to other matters — many of them involving variations on the theme of bed rest.

Herrera’s inclusion on the Dominican Republic’s WBC roster, however, reminds us once again both that (a) he (i.e. Kelvin Herrera) exists and that (b) like a nude woman descending a staircase, so is Kelvin Herrera’s changeup likely to become the subject of an important Cubist painting.

Here are three changeups thrown by Herrera since that last post — all three to Jarrod Saltalamacchia and all thrown, in fact, consecutively on August 25th.

For strike one:

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This GIF of Mike Piazza on stage with Alter Bridge at the 2005 Home Run Derby is provided for the reader after the jump not because it is such a large file that it would render the site inert were it on the front page — although this would definitely happen — but rather because the reader, were he (or she, certainly) confronted by such footage sans warning, his (or her, certainly) heart would explode, like in that one movie where the guy’s heart just explodes.

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The Hall of Fame and who belongs in it appears to be a subject of some import to many fans of base-and-ball — and also of some import, one assumes, to those former players whose careers are the object of much public scrutiny on days and nights like this one.

Were the present author tasked with building a Hall of Fame from scratch, it (i.e. said Hall) would be (a) quite different than the present one and (b) very poorly managed and (c) full of gratis scotch (although not in that order, necessarily).

Also, it would most certainly have an entire wing dedicated to gentleman ballplayers flipping their bats — like in this GIF of Mike Piazza, New York Catcher, flipping his goddamn bat.

Credit to James Kannengieser for bringing author’s attention to — and to Eric Simon for manufacturing with American sweat — the GIF in question.

I’M NOT SURE THE SOURCE OF THIS DOUBLE-SPICY GIF, BUT IT’S JUS’ ABOUTTA BURN THESE SERVERS DOWN!!!

Update: The author is not actively seeking credit for this GIF. In the meantime, follow @james_in_to. I won’t tell you why.

If a butterfly flaps its wings in Japan, a hurricane can happen on the coasts of Florida. If new Oakland A’s shortstop Hiroyuki Nakajima flips his bat in Japan, however, Jeff Sullivan will definitely capture video of it, render it into GIF form, and then optimize it for the people.

Science, is what that is.

Footage from series of Nakajima videos posted at Mercury News.

Brazil beat Colombia in World Baseball Classic qualifying on Saturday (box) — giving the Brazilians (a) two total wins in the Qualifier 3 bracket and (b) two more wins than a reasonable person would have expected them to get in the Qualifier 3 bracket.

Notable from their Saturday victory was the relief performance of 24-year-old right-hander Gabriel Asakura, who struck out five of the 10 Colombian batters he faced — including longtime major-leaguer Edgar Renteria. Asakura himself is less of a longtime major leaguer and more of a recent senior at Division II school Cal State L.A.

Here’s Asakura getting a swinging strike on what appears to be his changeup (or maybe a splitter) against Cleveland prospect Giovanny Urshela:

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Some men smoke a cigarette after making love. Other, more virile men — like Luis Tiant, Sr., for example — smoke a cigarette while making love. It’s a practice borne out of necessity, of course: Luis Tiant, Sr., is always smoking and he is always also making love.

A hat tip to Jason Brannon of Baseball Nation for sharing this delightfully painful image of Yadier Molina’s bat trembling with what we must assume is knuckle-rattling torque:

Exhibit A:

Exhibit B:

The prosecution rests, Your Honor.

As noted minutes ago in these very same electronic pages, the author is watching the Nats-Cards game via Postseason.TV. One benefit of that sort of thing: four Pete Kozmas hitting a home run. Or, at least, four concurrent shots of the home run Pete Kozma hit, like, 10 minutes ago.