Loyal reader Larry Holt sent me this screen grab:
Thanks to the LA Times for being on the case. Clearly a little bit of facial hair goes a long way when it comes to Home Run Derbies. Next year, look for each of the competitors to simply sport one long hair coming out of some part of his face, with the rest of it clean-shaven.
Yasiel Puig: Defecting from the United States back to Cuba, where at least he might make an All-Star Team.
Shin-Soo Choo: Fulfilling his South Korean military service.
Jacoby Ellsbury: Getting injured.
Josh Donaldson: Trying to poison Jim Leyland by figuring out a way to get him addicted to little white sticks filled with dangerous substances that will kill him.
Scene: Alex Rodriguez speeds up the Amazon River on an airboat, trying frantically to outrun the MLB investigators that are right behind him. He turns, and shoots his gun, barely missing his pursuers. One of the investigators, probably played by Bruce Campbell, takes steady aim and fires a shot that severs A-Rod’s fuel line, causing his airboat to catch fire. Rodriguez jumps into the Amazon just before an explosion rocks his airboat. He is fished out of the water by Campbell.
Campbell: Gotcha, A-Rod. This is your third strike, and you’re out.
Campbell knocks Rodriguez unconscious with a single punch. A-rod is cuffed to the MLB investigators’ airboat. The camera zooms in on A-Rod’s boat sinking, and on several barrels riddled with bullet holes marked HGH, as they slowly, ominously, slip under the waves.
One week later, giant piranhas, anacondas, and crocodiles begin wreaking havoc on local fishermen. A brilliant wildlife expert, probably played by Amanda Bynes, puts two and two together, and meets with Bruce Campbell to tell him that A-Rod’s HGH did something to the river. Campbell and Bynes have to visit A-Rod in MLB jail. Read the rest of this entry »
2014. Yasiel Puig (LAD) hits a home run off Taijuan Walker (SEA) in the 9th inning to win it for the National League.
2015. Mike Zunino (SEA) smacks a ground-rule double in the 7th inning off Zach Wheeler (NYM), driving in Eric Hosmer (NYY) with the game-winning RBI for the American League.
2016. Red Sox player-manager David Ortiz (BOS) hits an 11th inning grand slam, driving in Manny Ramirez (TEX), Alex Rodriguez (CHW), and Jose Reyes (MEX) and giving the American League its 2nd consecutive victory.
2017. Jeff Francoeur (SF) walks with the bases loaded to force in the winning run off Aaron Sanchez (TOR) and lead the National League to victory.
2018. Byron Buxton (MIN) hits two home runs– the first off Gio Gonzalez (WAS) and the second off Rick Ankiel (STL)– and wins the game’s MVP award.
2019. Michael Ynoa (OAK) strikes out nineteen batters over three innings, but David Wright (JUP) hits a 6-run homer to win it for Jupiter and the newly-formed Galaxy League.
2020. Unfrozen Ted Williams (BOS) triumphs over Glork (SAT) and the rest of the Galaxy League pitching staff to win the game by a score of %#$ to &^&.
Earlier today, one Dayn Perry, who is a public disgrace to himself, his nuclear family, and his ancestors, and who is not unknown to you in these pages, declared something he felt merited public consumption. This was that declaration:
There needs to be a rapper named “Killa-Brew.”
— Dayn Perry (@daynperry) July 15, 2013
1) Dayn Perry does not get to decide what goes on in the world of hip hop. That’s Suge Knight’s job. Mark this Dayn, lest Suge hang you off of a hotel balcony by your ankles until you sign away the rights to your next middling paperback.
2) Dayn, you ignorant slut, how quickly you forgot:
A meaningless competition to precede a meaningless competition. Oh boy, July doesn’t only mean that everything on TV is a rerun, but it also means that for three days, the only baseball we get to watch is even more meaningless than usual.
In this year’s Home Run Derby, I don’t see how you can root for anyone but Pedro Alvarez, especially since last year’s revelations of widespread abuse at his high school, Horace Mann.
Sorry about bringing that up. Way to be a bummer, Hopeless Joe. Let me try that again.
In this year’s Home Run Derby, I don’t see how you can root for anyone but Prince Fielder, given the well-publicized difficulties Fielder has had with his father, with Prince quoted as saying, “my father is dead to me.”
Oops. Got downbeat again. My apologies. Let me try once more.
In this year’s Home Run Derby, I don’t see how you can root for anyone but Yoenis Cespedes, given the struggles he went through last year when his family was arrested as illegal immigrants in the Turks and Caicos Islands while they were trying to join him in the U.S. They were finally released from a detention center this spring.
Wow, it’s hard to keep these things positive. Okay, putting a smile on my face. I’ll make this work.
In this year’s Home Run Derby, I don’t see how you can root for anyone but Robinson Cano, forced to deal with his name appearing on the initial Biogenesis documents, even though no evidence has emerged to link him with the clinic.
Shoot. Starting this over again.
In this year’s Home Run Derby, I don’t see how you can root for anyone but Chris Davis, demoted to minor leagues as recently as 2011, and for years failing to live up to his potential.
Okay, I can do this post happy. I can do it.
In this year’s Home Run Derby, I don’t see how you can root for anyone but David Wright, who for hours in 2007 feared that his brother was killed in the Virginia Tech shootings.
In this year’s Home Run Derby, I don’t see how you can root for anyone but Bryce Harper, who used to have poor vision until he got contact lenses.
In this year’s Home Run Derby, I don’t see how you can root for anyone but Michael Cuddyer, who likes to do charity work.
PREDICTION: Cuddyer and Davis are the final two, and Cuddyer pulls out a victory, donating his winnings to the Pedro Alvarez Prince Fielder Yoenis Cespedes Robinson Cano David Wright Bryce Harper Fund to prevent teachers from abusing students in the Turks and Caicos Islands, stealing their signing bonuses, canceling their eye exams, and making handwritten lists labeled “Steroid Users” with their names on them. Congratulations, Michael Cuddyer.
Tim Brown, of Yahoo! Sports, tries ably to defend young punk Yasiel Puig today. But, as Pedro Gomez laid out yesterday, Puig’s a young man going down a dark road, full of not respecting his elders and trying to get women to pay attention to him. It’s that very same path that led a young Dorian Gray to a lifetime of debauchery, disgrace, and murder most foul.
But Gomez doesn’t even report the half of what Puig has done since debuting on June 3. Indeed, his list of crimes against human decency are myriad and shocking. They include, but are not limited to:
Devastating the confidence of pitchers – Pitchers are fragile creatures, and any time they are being abused as Puig has been abusing them (.397/.429/.630) they are prone to suffer greatly from a crisis of confidence. Who knows on what deep spirals of shame they might descend, or what may become of them? Clayton Richard is hiding on the DL right now, afraid to come out of his room and talking about shaving down his shoulder, all to avoid facing Puig again. Adam Ottavino won’t stop crying. Remember poor Sybil Vane, who swallowed prussic acid after disappointing her Dorian, and fear for what might be.
Still doesn’t speak English – Puig has been in the United States for a full year now, and still needs an interpreter because he’s not fluent in the language he had no cause to learn or speak until one year earlier. If I can still remember how to ask where the bathroom is in Spanish (Donde aste la biblioteca?) surely he can learn enough English to speak to reporters who are desperate for him to say something wrong.
Contributed to the generation of fisticuffsmanship with his face – If Puig had been a better ducker, maybe the Diamondbacks and Dodgers wouldn’t have brawled, and there wouldn’t be so much bad blood between them today.
Bat flippery – 
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Freddie Freeman = REAFFIRM NEEDED
(Honorable mention: DEFER DREAM? FINE)
Craig Kimbrel = CRABLIKE GRIM
(Honorable mention: KARMIC GERBIL)
No, no, go not to Boston, nor lose that twist
glove waggling, spinning, confusing the swine;
Nor allow thy stats to suffer away from Wrigley mist,
By dollar signs, and contract time;
Make not your bed of 75% cotton, 25% linen, all green,
Nor let the batter assuage his fears.
Your fancy whimsy Waggle, and split finger change,
Are all a function of some forgotten dream;
For age comes to all pitchers, and not too drowsily —
To drown the wakeful anguish of the soul.
I don’t understand why this is getting so much news coverage.