Do not stare at Joba Chamberlain’s mustache. And do not, no matter what you do, look directly into the eyes of Mr. Chamberlain, for he can see deep inside your soul. I did, and I’ll never be the same.
Frankly, I’m not sure where the hell you should look.
Image credit: Elsa/Getty Images. Elsa will never be the same, either.
H/T: The one, the only: @MikeAxisa.
Whoa, whoa, whoa …
What the fuck did you just say to Rich Gale? What in the living fuck did you just say to this 6-foot-7, 225-pound sum-buck?
Rich Gale will set those gold-rimmed Foster Grants aside — maybe hand them for safekeeping to Pete LaCock, who will mutter, “Shit, you shouldn’t have said that,” — give a considered stroke of his mustache with thumb and pointer finger and get the shit down to business. Don’t let the feathered body wave fool you: If Rich Gale’s smoky baritone doesn’t get through to you, then these got-damn soup bones will do the rest of the talking.
Yes indeed, I’d pump the brakes over there, tadpole, lest you want Rich Gale to use these meaty shilelaghs to beat some wits into you. Within the last fifteen minutes, Rich Gale has factually pinched off a crap bigger than you. Say something like that again, and Rich Gale’s going to get around to tenderizing some meat.
You started in on him, and he told you that tiny boats should stay near the shore. But you kept at it. And now he’s giving you that smoldering, 12-gauge glare that says it looks like it might be time to take out the trash. Maybe what’s coming — and what’s coming for you is a mouth full of bloody Chiclets — will give you pause the next time you take a notion to nip at the heels of Rich God Almighty Damn Gale. Shoulda left your mouth at home, you dumb dumbass dummy.
Yeah, this is gonna hurt you a whole helluva lot more than it hurts Streets of Fire Rich Gale.
This is a man — Mr. F. Rodney — capable of setting the ERA record for relievers and tossing 34 shutdowns with only 2 meltdowns in 2012:
This is the naked version of that selfsame man:
Guess which version blew the save in Sunday night’s key Caribbean Series game?
Imagine two Kodiak bears, each walking alone through the forest. Strong, powerful, furry. They have no fear, no predators from which to run, and seemingly no enemies. Then, a twig snaps, and one bear looks up to find himself within 20 yards of the other. They growl at each other. They stand on their hind legs, they bare their teeth, and they roar menacingly. When these two bears meet in the woods, it is a scientific fact that they will fight, the fight will be epic, and that one of them will limp off to die alone.*
*Do not look this up.
I had never seen two bears walking through the forest until last weekend, when at the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome for TwinsFest. You are skeptical, obviously. How could a bear even make it into the Twin Cities, let alone into a pressurized, domed stadium with revolving doors? “Chillax,” I say. “These are metaphorical bears.” These are bears in the form of circa 1973 Luis Tiant and Willie Horton, whose baseball cards I located glaring across from one another in a binder at the largest baseball card show in the Upper Midwest on the Metrodome field, their forced colocation adding to what was already a tense scene. Feel it:
Those are some intense staredowns and some very intimidating mustaches. As Tiant and Horton stared each other down from across the book, I worried for what would happen if they faced each other any longer, so I purchased one of them and David Temple, oft of this space, also purchased one and we separated them before any damage was done to the surrounding cards.
But we never resolved the question of which bear would have won the inevitable conflict. And as gentlemen of science and fine breeding, coming to a satisfactory conclusion was compulsory. Thankfully, we know that Tiant pitched against Horton’s Tigers five times in 1973, and Horton played in three of those games. And so it was when Willie Horton dug in against Luis Tiant in 1973 that we learned who was Ursa Major, and who was Ursa Minor, for here are the results of their struggle: Read the rest of this entry »
Once upon a time, there was a man. That man was me, although I had a stupid pseudonym back then. And there was another man, woman, child, or self-aware robot defense system reading this, and that was you. You probably didn’t have a pseudonym, and were better for it. And for almost a full year, we were kept apart. But now, thanks to the questionable judgment of your reluctant hipster overlord Carson Cistulli, we’re back together again, bonded forever by our shared love of me, Vin Scully’s magic powers, Wally Moon’s unibrow, and Don Zimmer’s average face. And so shall it ever be.
If I was the same man I was a year ago, I would be over the moon to be back with you all, so sure of the bright future that awaits us all, like a whispily mustachioed Terry Felton back in Spring Training of 1982.
Oh the puppy-dog like earnestness in Felton’s face! The optimism! The certainty that his mustache will kick in and fill out before too long, like his talent.
Alas, it was not to be. Felton spent the entire season in Minnesota and went 0-13 to finish his career 0-16 with a 5.53 career ERA. No one else in baseball history has ever started their career with 16 straight losses. No one else has finished their career worse than 0-12. He was never again to throw a pitch in anger, joy, fear, or lust for a Major League team.
Why do I tell you this? Why do I bum you out even further on a day where we’ll surely find out that no one has been elected to the Hall of Fame? Because despite what early 1982 Terry Felton might think, life is full of disappointment. His mustache will forever be inadequate, as will his fastball. Your Hall of Fame will be short one Bagwell, Biggio, Piazza, Raines, and Trammell for at least another year. People you are counting on will fall short of your expectations, just as you fall short of theirs. Get used to it. Don’t get your hopes up. Set your sights low.
There. Now with our meager expectations, the only way we can go is up. Together. Like Sylvester Stallone and plucky band of survivors in Daylight. Some of us will make it, but a bunch of you are going to die along the way. Sorry. Excelsior.
Currently, Matthew Williams is a right-hander for Sydney of the Australian Baseball League. Before that, he was a pitching prospect in the Twins organization for six years. Before that, he lived his entire childhood naked and alone in the woods before emerging — with the same crudely designed spectacles as shown here — from the forests of his own accord.
Three weeks ago, the New York Times ran an incredibly important article about Keith Hernandez’s mustache that, of course, we here at NotGraphs had to cover.
This past weekend, the crucial follow-up story.
Keith Hernandez shaved his mustache.
He might grow it back.
The Earth is still spinning on its axis.
The reader will likely know that Kevin Youkilis was recently placed on — and has, even more recently, returned from — paternity leave by the Chicago White Sox. What our Investigative Reporting Investigation Team has learned in the meantime, however, is that Youkilis’ absence was not designed to facilitate his presence at the birth of his first human child. Rather, it allowed him time to sire, bear, and deliver the mustache (pictured above) favored by constables of all seven continents and probably space, too.
Indians prospect Eric Berger has a mustache.
Let us crush the uprising.
Let us check our chained pocket watch before signing the railroad deed.
Let us agree not to speak of the colonel’s history of ravishment.
Let our wives die in childbirth.
Let our sons die of the catarrh.
Let us poach buffalo from the dining car.
Let us build, in the town square, a monument to the general on horseback as he watches the slaughter through his opera glasses and from the safety of a garrisoned hillside.
Let us ponder the imponderable while the minister intones.
Let us perpetrate a mining disaster so as to smother the union.
Let us agree that the issue will be decided by the men in this room.
Let us decide that the mining disaster will be our casus belli.
Let us toast the decision.
Let us make sure that all the pine boxes of dead Christians will fit in the vessel’s hold.
Let us backhand the maid-servant as punishment for her lowliness.
Let us over-murder the mewling settlers.
Let us pass the vicar a clod of dollars in a handshake.
Let us threaten the constable with a glance.
Let us see that those coxcombs and jackanapes, so promiscuous with their complaints, are seen to.
Let us pound the the scroll-top desk upon reading the telegram.
Let us sign the order of execution with a plumed quill.
Let us sip absinthe alone in the dark.
For Indians prospect Eric Berger has a mustache.
For some reason, this seemed like a baseball thing.
You know what. With a slight tweak, it really IS kind of baseball-y.