Professional athletes require a supreme amount of self-confidence to weather the daily ups and downs of competition on a national stage.

For Major League Baseball hitters, that’s especially true: as the old adage goes, if you fail 70% of the time, you’re doing pretty good.

Sometimes that confidence extends into hubris, which might be the case with Marlins outfielder Justin Ruggiano:

@ken_rosenthal no we don’t. I got this.

— Justin Ruggiano (@justinruggiano) November 29, 2012

Ruggiano’s breakout 2012, in which he posted a triple-slash of .313/.374/.535 with 13 HR and a .390 wOBA in 320 PAs for the Marlins while playing all three OF positions, is giving him the confidence to claim far more than just starting CF job for his team in 2013. In fact, he’s ready to solve all manner of problems:

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According to the thinkers, how we are measured by whoever is doing the measuring lies in no small part in how we handle adversity. It’s called “grace under pressure”, as Hemingway liked to tell his poor wife Martha it while he shot down adorable zebras from the back of his rented Jeep.

We see it in Hemingway’s own Catherine Barkley, protesting mildly as she bleeds to death on a Swiss operating table. We see it in Oscar Wao, standing in the sugar cane, losing everything and yet finally a man. We see it in Rubashov, holding to his flawed ideals even with the pistol pressed to his temple. We see it in Hector, pitted against the Gods themselves, thinking only of the honor of his burial.

We see it in all these cases and a million more, the plight of every man and woman caught in conflict with an unfeeling and unyielding world, and knowing themselves in their defeat.

And we see it in Cyborg Tommy Hanson, caught in his own tempest, raising his cry against the heavens:

NO

— CYBORG HANSON TOMMY (@CyborgHanson48) November 30, 2012

And for a full minute, the timelines of everyone on Twitter were filled with naught but the hollow echoes of Cyborg Tommy Hanson, who finally learned what it is to be a man.

Jason Motte is many things. He is a man, beard owner, baseball player, and, according to this tweet, semi-professional etymologist.

Lack of punctuation aside, Mr. Motte brings up an interesting point. WHY IS NO ONE TALKING ABOUT THIS?  What makes a milkshake a chocolate milkshake? Mr. Motte feels that the simple addition of chocolate syrup does not fill the requirements. He suggests also using chocolate ice cream, a choice that may contribute to a BMI in the “overweight” range. Nevertheless, he has drawn a line in the sand. That line is tangential to chocolate (and now also sandy) ice cream.

If I may offer a counterargument to Mr. Motte:

All milkshakes are made with vanilla ice cream you fucking dummy. You add chocolate syrup to make it a chocolate milkshake. You add caramel syrup to make it a caramel milkshake. That’s just the way it is. Do you make a butterscotch milkshake with butterscotch ice cream? Do you make a strawberry milkshake with strawberry ice cream? No. You do neither of those. What you are suggesting is not a milkshake. You are suggesting a disgusting cup filled with pulverized ice cream and corresponding flavor syrup. It’s gross, it’s far too sweet, and it’s an assault on America. If you want to drink your diabetes smoothie, go right ahead you dullard. But leave the word milkshake off of it. WHY CALL IT APPLE PIE IF THE WHOLE THING ISN’T MADE OF APPLES? WHY CALL IT CHICKEN SOUP IF THE BOWL ISN’T MADE OF CHICKEN!? Your logic has holes, profligate.

Tune in next week when I take down Cody Ross regarding his lax definition of what constitutes a “burrito.”

The following tweet is entirely and in-no-way altered from the original (click to embiggen):

…. Puppies are being shot.

— Henry Schulman (@hankschulman) November 12, 2012

Henry Schulman, who covers the baseball Giants for the San Francisco Chronicle, is either finishing an idea here from a previous status update or has the saddest possible offseason newsbeat imaginable.

Right-hander Jeremy Jeffress was traded Thursday from Kansas City to Toronto. What follows is an entirely and in-no-way altered tweet concerning his (i.e. Jeffress’s) contract status (click to embiggen):

Braden has made good progress in coming back from shoulder surgery, believes he will find a job: “I’m left-handed and have a heartbeat.”

— Susan Slusser (@susanslusser) October 30, 2012

True fact: over half of the active writers at NotGraphs were hired on the strength of this exact pitch.

7:56 himno nacional, 7:59 lanzamiento ceremonial, 8:05 #Giants sale al terreno, 8:07 primer pitcheo del juego. #SerieMundial2012

— Enrique Rojas/ESPN (@Enrique_Rojas1) October 25, 2012

Here’s a thing the author knows: that foreign-language acquisition is miserable, more a function of daunting repetition than engaged and creative thinking. Here’s a thing the author doesn’t know: Spanish. In light of the former point, however, the latter one is unlikely to change.

That said, as a follower on Twitter of ESPN’s Enrique Rojas, I sometimes — just by virtue of the common language of baseball — I sometimes find myself accidentally learning Spanish. Am I in danger of reading and then writing a compelling thesis on the works of Jorge Luis Borges? Likely not. However, even just owing to the tweet embedded here, I now understand, like, 50% more Spanish than I did a second ago — and I’ve derived the translations by means of context alone!

To wit:

Himno nacional? National anthem!

Lanzamiento ceremonial? Ceremonial first pitch!

Giants sale al terreno? The Giants go out to the terreno!

In conclusion, here’s a Learning Spanish Accidentally with Enrique Rojas! checklist:

The following tweet is entirely and in-no-way altered from the original (click to embiggen):

The writeup for the BOS/NYY should be done in Comic Sans #mlb #yankees #redsox

— dianagram (@dianagram) October 3, 2012

Resident of the internet @dianagram has requested — for reasons as beautiful as they are mysterious — has requested that the recap for Tuesday night’s Red Sox-Yankees game (box) be reproduced in what the students of Rundlett Junior High School named the Most Stirring Typeface of 1993, Comic Sans.

In his perpetual quest never to disappoint anyone, anywhere, the author has executed the aforementioned demands, from the Associated Press’s able recap of the game in question.

To wit:

NEW YORK (AP) — Raul Ibanez tied it with a pinch-hit homer in the ninth inning, then had an RBI single in the 12th, helping the Yankees remain a game up on Baltimore in the AL East with one game to go by beating the Boston Red Sox 4-3 on Tuesday night.

With a second comeback spurred by Ibanez in the last 10 days, the Yankees need a win or Orioles loss on the final day of the season to secure their 13th division title since 1996. The Orioles beat Tampa Bay 1-0 earlier.

If the teams end up even after Wednesday’s games, they’ll play a tiebreaker Thursday in Baltimore.

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