This being the Space Age of the Computer Future, it behooves even the retired gentleman to cultivate a grasp of the ColecoVision and other emergent gadgets. As such, it’s heartening to see that the great Bert Blyleven, age 60, knows a thing or two about a thing or two about Twitter. Exhibit A:

If you’ve read Mashable and other authoritative guides to this social medium, then you know that the best way to announce oneself to Twitter Nation-State is to, a, tell Johnny Bench to kiss your ass and then, b, inform him when he’ll be home and in his bed with the lights out. Exhibit B:

If it weren’t already self-evident, then I’d tell you why this Tweet is the sign of an Internetting Gentleman of Triumph.

It’s possible there could be a better Tweet than this, but that Tweet would necessarily be a breathless dispatch informing us that you just saw Bert Blyleven at Cracker Barrell, pork chop upon gullet.

Papelbon continued by referring to Charlie Manuel as his “personal Norman Schwarzkopf,” Bud Selig as “a Ban Ki-moon-like figure,” and his NL East foes as “[redacted] frigging [redacted].”

What I love about Twitter is that it’s opened — I mean swung wide open — the lines of communication; it’s put all of us on the same digital page. Have a favorite team? Follow its beat writer. Actually, follow your favorite beat writer. They’re all tweeting; posting lineups, plugging stories and blog posts, and dropping other useful nuggets of information. Twitter’s become part of the job. I work in a newsroom, albeit not a traditional breaking news kind of newsroom, and it’s become part of our jobs, as producers, too. It’s crazy. (And, before I forget, peep this piece by Dave Kindred, at SportsJournalism.org, about beat writing, and how technology — Twitter, iPhones, iPads, and RIM’s BlackBerry — has changed it. It’s fantastic.)

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Today, a liberally literal interpretation of this fine tweet by Torii Hunter.

Mathematics shows us that three apes, hitting keys at random on typewriters for an infinite amount of time, will almost surely produce Hamlet. Reality, however, shows us that a Nokia 8210 left alone in the pea-coat pocket of well-respected baseballing journalist Peter Gammons will produce the above tweet.

The words “It’s on like Donkey Kong” were not uttered expressly (not from Jerry Crasnick’s mouth, at least), but it is, most assuredly, on — and in a manner very similar to, if not precisely the same as, the aforementioned Donkey Kong.

Today we answer the most important question of the last 30 or so seconds — namely, “Which of the players in the Milwaukee Brewers lineup for Game Five of the 2011 NLCS — which of those players’ names appear in the Oxford English Dictionary?”

Answers below. You’re frigging welcome, thousand people who read this.

1. Hart, RF: Noun. The male of the deer, esp. of the red deer; a stag; spec. a male deer after its fifth year.
2. Hairston, 3B: N/A.
3. Braun, LF: Not in OED. But braunite is. Noun. An anhydrous oxide of manganese, a brittle dark brownish-black mineral occurring both crystallized and massive.
4. Fielder 1B: Noun. A person who or animal which works in a field. (Rare.)
5. Weeks, 2B: Not in OED. But it is a plural of week. Noun. The cycle of seven days, recognized in the calendar of the Jews and thence adopted in the calendars of Christian, Muslim, and various other peoples; a single period of this cycle, i.e. a space of seven successive days beginning with the day traditionally fixed as the first day of the week.
6. Betancourt, SS: N/A.
7. Gomez, CF: N/A.
8. Lucroy, C: Not in OED. But luctation is. Noun. Struggling, wrestling; an instance of this. (Obsolete.)
9. Greinke, P: N/A.

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Texas Rangers pitcher Derek Holland, whose twitter name is Dutch_Oven45 (let’s just leave it), posted this tweet last week:

fantasy football can deff make u very frustrated at times, few guys had awesome days today on my bench , so happy

My interpretation of these fine words is above, the first in what will be a series of me taking things literally on paper.

Briefly, between pitches, please take note:

Now, fans of baseball, back to the game, as the urgent breaking update suggests.

As the Senior Baseball Reporter for Sports Illustrated, Jon Heyman spends a lot of time on airplanes chasing scoops and so forth. Jon Heyman is also a quite prolific Tweeter. For what should be obvious reasons, this is an unfortunate combination. If there is anything worse than airline complaints, it is Jon Heyman airline complaints.

See, it would be one thing if Jon Heyman were to express his (frequently unlettered) thoughts to close friends and family. So long as we don’t have to hear it, it is not a problem. But the trouble with Jon Heyman being on Twitter is that it is quite literally the only medium in existence through which he can instantly broadcast his airline aggravations to 100,000 people.

For example:

Dare to see more? Click here.

And yesterday we were treated to this:

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