Unquestionable authority on all things related to the American cinema, IMDB.com, took advantage of the opening of 42 to name what it thinks are the 10 greatest baseball movies of all time. Or at least what managing editor Keith Simanton thought qualified as the best baseball movies. One of those movies is Fever Pitch, in which Jimmy Fallon and Drew Barrymore ruin the 2004 World Series by running onto the field and celebrating with the players (I assume that’s the plot, having refused to see it on principle). He also elevates Bernie Mac’s Mr 3000 and Ken Burns’ Baseball (which is not a movie, but a miniseries). About the only good thing about the list is that Simanton apparently realizes that Major League is so good it doesn’t even qualify as a baseball movie, having transcended the genre and elevated itself to become cinematic masterpiece that defies definition and label. At least that’s what I assume happened, since it’s not included on the list at all; or maybe Simanton simply hates Bob Uecker and freedom.

Anyway, in honor of Simanton’s terrible list, here are the baseball movies I want to see get made that would all presumably be better choices than Fever Pitch: Read the rest of this entry »

Sometimes it might feel like we are mere dwarves among the giants that play this game. And, if you’re standing next to Jon Rauch or Giancarlo Stanton, you’re probably right. But, sometimes the players themselves are rendered tiny by this beautiful game.

Thanks to Joe Frisario for the big bat pictures.

Seriously, people. Just give someone (or lots of people) a God-damned hug today. Chances are, at least one of you will feel better.

(h/t to April for the pic)

There’s no obvious reason why it would be the case, but if the reader woke up this morning with a newfound resolve just to like the hell out of Dodgers outfielder Tony Gwynn, this video of him playfully mimicking a particularly vocal member* of the outfield bleachers (during a PCL game, it would appear) is going to be rather helpful in that endeavor.

*And/or Sam Kinison impersonator?

Video courtesy balls.ie, it appears and brought to the author’s attention on Facebook via Seth Stohs.

Provocative Cincinnati Reds prospect Tony Cingrani will make his first Major League start on Thursday, and the pant-groins of stat nerds everywhere are dampening.

This past Sunday, on the way to see 42, my incongruously attractive significant other (AKA NotGraphs commenter GoldenJerseySparklePants) and I were discussing the significance of such a debut as Cingrani’s. At one point I muttered, “…Cingrani’s been dominant…” to which she responded, “What’s Venn-Dominant?”

I had started to correct the miscommunication when we simultaneously realized: Tony Cingrani is Venn-Dominant. Like Doc Brown with the Flux Capacitor, an image immediately popped into my head:

Clicking will embiggen.

You see, Tony Cingrani is so dominant in the categories of Strikeouts, Prospect Swagger, and Italian Name Sounds that they orbit around him, move through him. In him, they have melded into a perfect being. Does this sound contradictory? It’s a teleological matter, probably: are the presence of strikeouts, prospect swagger, and Italian names the cause of Tony Cingrani? Did the molecules align just so? Was he designed by a god, a first mover? Or perhaps the Essence of Tony Cingrani always was, and is just now taking a bodily form. I haven’t the fineness of mind to distill this all…

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I would like to see a collage of smiling baseballs right about now.

I would like rounded edges and a background hue that suggests an institutional sense of calm. I would like for whoever assembles the collage to be as undaunted by clip-art watermarks as Cartier before the St. Lawrence. The glimpse of a wee penguin might help, too.

I would like to see a collage of smiling baseballs right about now.

That was disappointing.

Jay-Z wants to be an agent. Though there may be a certain demographic gulf between the baseball and hip-hop communities, the two also share a long, proud history of casual dalliances. Today we celebrate that history by acknowledging the greatest ballplayers ever to appear in Mr. Carter et al.’s lyrical corpus.

C Johnny Bench
I’m fancy, man, I tickles like the French
Not Johnny but like Bench I press on like Lee
– Ynot, on Common’s “Chapter 13 (Rich Man vs. Poor Man)”

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Thinking of Boston today, of course. And spent a few minutes trying to find a relevant video online to convey something about that. I don’t know that I have anything profound to say, but the Boston Pops performing the National Anthem at Fenway seemed like a reasonably appropriate thing for me to spend a minute watching this morning. (Apologies that it requires a click-through to MLB.com.)

[From April 13, 2012.]

Vitals:

Game: Out of the Park Baseball 14 (OOTP14)
Platform: PC
Developer: OOTP Developments
Modes: Franchise, Online Franchise
Cool Features: Incredible contracts system, massive player and coaches database, complete customizability, plenty of add-ons, and a robust online community.

Categories:

Realism: 10/10.
Graphics: 8/10.
Difficulty: 10/10.
Details: 10/10.
Playability: 10/10.
Intangibles: 50/50.

Total Score: 98/100 (A+)
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If you’ve spent more than five minutes with my mother, you likely have been told that she’s from Brooklyn. She’s not shy about telling you, whether you are someone she meets at church, a friend of my sister or mine, or a complete stranger that had walked into the Subway wallpapered with New York subway maps that she used to own. So when 42 was first announced, I knew that I would want to see it with her. And see it with her I did.

One of the very well-done posters for 42.

When Jackie Robinson broke into the majors, my mom — who recently turned 70 — was the tender age of 4, so she doesn’t remember his debut. Growing up, I never really asked my mom too much about Robinson. I knew who he was, and I knew that she knew who he was and that she appreciated what he meant to baseball and this country in general, but that was about as far as it went. The only thing that my mother always volunteered about the Dodgers was that her time as a sports fan abruptly ended when the team tucked tail and moved to Los Angeles.

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