Archive for Uncategorized

This is slightly late, naturally, with the first round of MLB’s interleague play having concluded this past weekend. My Milwaukee Brewers were not involved, but we were still treated to some excellent rivalries that elude us during boring old intraleague play, including but not limited to: Seattle vs. San Diego! Minnesota vs. Arizona! and Detroit vs. Pittsburgh!

Ah, the memories. But I digress. One thing that caught my eye on MLB.com as interleague play raged onward was this largely hidden logo used for interleague play:

Via SportsLogos.net, click to embiggen.

The imagery is clear: two eagles, one representing each league, fighting over a baseball, much as the teams and leagues fight for superiority on the field. Personally, I think it’s a solid logo, although I think it would be improved by using more lifelike eagles as opposed to the semi-cartoony look employed here.

What do you guys think. Is it a good logo? Should it be featured more?

While not as loin-stirring as, say, woodsy and mead- and pipeweed-fueled coitus with an elf, hugging a dragon would be quite nice, I think we can all agree. And if you were one of 5,615 fortunate souls recently meandering through a particular semi-major American city, you know this firsthand. And you helped Charlotte Knights mascot Homer the Dragon (pictured above, first from left) make Maximum History.

Indeed, Homer has approached, reached and overtaken the record for “Most Hugs by a Mascot Given in a 24-Hour Span,” which is a threshold as timeless and enduring as the trilobite fossils entombed deep within the bottommost sediment of the Yangtze. So bless his heart.

Sure, our dear, departed Gary Gygax might prefer the arms of dragons to be more murderous than loving, but Homer deserves your admiration for cutting a swath of unconditional affection through the boulevards of Charlotte. Know hope, citizens.

In the ninth inning of a tied game on Wednesday, the Royals had two runners picked off of first base. Now it seems that night’s lineup card gives a little insight to the cause of the blunders.

Glove slap: kcemigre

In the second inning of Monday’s Brewers-Dodgers game, Carlos Gomez made a fantastic play in center field to rob Juan Uribe of a home run. You should really watch it, as it was pretty dang awesome.

More important, though, was Ryan Braun’s celebration of the play, pictured below.

(Click to embiggen, of course)

Again, this picture is but another reason to watch the video linked above, as images cannot truly capture the magnificence and grace of Braun’s celebration of that thing that other guy did. But the image is pretty good by itself, too.

The great Jerry Coleman is many things: decorated fighter pilot, accomplished major leaguer and member of the Radio Hall of Fame. It’s as a broadcaster that he’s given us moments of accidental genius not equaled since Dostoyevsky, absorbed in the probing thoughts of the memoirist, stumbled upon the first customized van.

Fortunately for us and the shadowy, sky-scraping figure known only as “Mr. History,” the Baseball Almanac has assembled a pirate’s booty of Coleman’s finest moments on the mic. And there’s more to be found here. What follows is a representative sampling …

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Born in a blowout.

ottoneu creator Niv Shah wasn’t always a Cleveland Indians fan. In part one of this two-part piece, we covered the beginning of that night when Niv called friend Chad Young (currently blogging about being a member of the FanGraphs Experts League) and said he had some tickets to the game that night between the Rays and Indians.

Though there might have been some resistance to the strange formatting, the die is cast. The format has been decided. Chad got Niv to the game, it turned into a blowout, and yet they stayed to appreciate the Jake. Now it’s time to bring this night to its thrilling conclusion!

Eno Sarris: Do you remember a moment when you were like, hey wait a minute, let’s sit down? A player at the bat, or some cheering or something?

Niv Shah: i honestly don’t think we did. i remember a point where we were like, wait a minute, we might come back here – i think it was fryman’s homer in the 7th… definitely a home run in the 7th that was like “Wait… we are not down that much”

yeah

david f*cking lamb too

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Other than signing Mattingly as their headcoach, doesn’t it seem like the Boys of Chavez Ravine have really opted for the hard way at every turn? I mean, it’s one thing to say “Damn the man I’m sticking to my guns,” but the squad, or should I say front office, really missed the boat Wednesday night.

Let me explain.

Wednesday night was an epic — no, make that an ever-so-mediocre — match up of Big Z Zambrano of the Chicago Cubs versus Ted Lilly of the Brooklyn Dodgers. Whaaaa? Yes, the BROOKLYN Dodgers. This was a mere novelty for everyone in attendance (I’d guesstimate all 200 of them) except for Vin Scully and Tommy Lasorda, who probably woke up at one point in the game quite confused thinking it was 1954 and they were back in Brooklyn. But to be fair, how much does Echo Park (home of the Dodgers) really differ from Brooklyn these days?

The team wore their powder blues and the music was a charming selection of era-appropriate selections, such as Eliminate the Negative (which also served as a funny double entendre for the team’s current affairs). But what it lacked and I hope they greatly consider is some old-timey announcing chock full of archaic expressions. How about …

“That Kemp, he may not be a flapper but he sure is swinging out there.”

“Zambrano is a pitching a gem, he’s the bee’s knees today on the mound.”

“This break to the bullpen is brought to you by State Farm because like a ‘Good Neighbor’ policy, protect yourself from — and by using — unilateral aggression”

…okay that’s a reach. But you get the point.  If you’re going to do an old-timey game, use old-timey expressions.

Why.

I like to think that NotGraphs fills a niche for indirect, informal meditation on fandom. But what about that other niche, the niche for direct, formal meditation on fandom? Will no one plug its conspicuous emptiness?

Possibly anticipating my above lament, earlier this week Leon Neyfakh published a piece in the Boston Globe entitled “How Teams Take Over Your Mind.” This article discusses academic efforts to understand why people get attached to sports, efforts which so far have produced the theories that: a) it’s about the need for narrative, b) it’s tribalism, or c) it’s the opposite of tribalism.

Maybe not groundbreaking. But there are some interesting things in the article that I didn’t previously know:

ONE
RISD American Studies professor Daniel Cavicchi has an excellent blog called “The Ardent Audience” that you should visit upon completing today’s FanGraphs buffet.

TWO
There’s something called “CORFing,” which means “to cut off reflective failure.” There’s also something called “BIRGing,” which means “to bask in the reflective glow.” That’s what those acronyms mean. Don’t even waste your time thinking about what other things they could mean, because their meaning needs have already been filled. Really please just move along.

THREE
In 1999, two guys named George Milne and Mark McDonald developed a scale of fandom. Neyfakh describes Milne and McDonald as “fanologists.” “Fanology” does not have a Wikipedia page and is therefore at risk of not being an actual thing. However, a Google search for “fanology wiki” turns up the entry on “Flirting,” presumably on account of the following paragraph, which contains a lot of things that I didn’t previously know:

The fan was extensively used as a means of communication and therefore a way of flirting from the 16th century onwards in some European societies, especially England and Spain. A whole sign language was developed with the use of the fan, and even etiquette books and magazines were published. Charles Francis Badini created the Original Fanology or Ladies’ Conversation Fan which was published by William Cock in London in 1797. The use of the fan was not limited to women, as men also carried fans and learned how to convey messages with them. For instance, placing the fan near your heart meant “I love you”, while opening a fan wide meant “Wait for me”.

Turns out, most things are S for W when your job is playing baseball.

Let’s get a few things straight before we dive down my social-media rabbit hole.

1. I don’t like Twitter. Or I didn’t.

2. Twitter and Facebook played small, if any, real role in the Middle East revolutions.

There, I said it. But you know what Twitter is good for? Yep, you guessed it: Knowing about Logan Morrison’s junk-shaving habits. Hint: he shaves it.

Why do I know this? That’s right, @LoMoMarlins likes to delight the world with his manscaping habits, while not talking about anything and everything else… Did I (@PatrickGCain) mention that I don’t like Twitter?

But I do like knowing some players are “good guys” and have a sense of humor. So, without further ado, I give to you some highlights from Logan Morrison, OF/1B of the Florida Marlins…

1. He’s selling his cast.

2. He painted his case pinstripes to match his uniform.

3. He’s very active in responding to fans.

4. He’s following his fictitious silverback Gorilla @LoMoDimples and his strained arch @LoMosarch.

5. He’s unabashedly following webcam girls, despite not knowing what NSFW means. Then again, webcam girls may be very SFW in his line of W.

This, my friends, is your future friend.