Here’s an animated GIF of Texas prospect Joey Gallo’s home run from the sixth inning of the Futures Game on Sunday:

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Tonight marks yet another installment of the Home Run Derby, a chance for baseball fans to marvel as the biggest hitters in the game flex their muscles while swinging for the fences. It’s also a chance for fans to flex their prediction muscles by putting a little money down on their pick to win the bash-fest. So, who should you pick? We here at NotGraphs have the answers. Here are our five best bets for the Home Run Derby.

5. Don’t bet on the Home Run Derby

You don’t really want to bet on the Home Run Derby. It may seem like a fun, harmless way to enjoy the event a little more, but it’s a silly thing and you shouldn’t risk your hard-earned money on it. Just watch the big bombs and have fun. Don’t sully it by making it real. Do you even know how to place a bet? Are you going to give your credit card info to one of those shady off-shore web sites? Do you have any idea how to find a bookie? As I yell at my dogs all the time, Leave It! Just walk away. You won’t wake up tomorrow wishing you’d bet money on the fucking Home Run Derby.

4. Save the money you were going to bet on the Home Run Derby.

Say you were going to put down a $50 bet. Take that cash, and put it your winter coat. Then, when winter comes around … BOOM! FREE FIFTY BUCKS! It won’t technically be free money, but you know what I mean. You’ll still feel like a winner, and you won’t have to had to demean yourself to the point of betting on an exhibition baseball event.

3. Giancarlo Stanton

Look, if you’re going to do it, pick the favorite. The payout is the worst, but Stanton should at least give you a chance at not losing your money. Don’t get cute and bet on Todd Frazier or some shit. If you’re bound and determined to risk real money on a fake thing, you might as well go chalk.

2. http://www.gamblersanonymous.org/ga/hotlines

This is the web site to find your local Gamblers Anonymous Hotline. I know I was being cute and jokey before, but if you are seriously considering doing this, you may very well have a problem. This is obviously some sort of compulsion for you, and it’s probably best that you deal with it as soon as possible. Don’t end up being a disappointment to your friends and family. This is the first day of the rest of your life. Click. Call. Choose to be a better person.

1. Give me the money you were going to bet on the Home Run Derby.

My Twitter handle is in the byline below. Send me a DM. I’ll get you my PayPal info. I can’t say for sure what I’ll spend it on, but if you’re going to just give your money away, give it to someone who could use it. I promise I’ll spend it wisely on something like food for my family, my Internet bill, or anything else that isn’t gambling on the Home Run Derby. I’d really prefer you’d pick option 2,4, or 5, but if it’s just burning a hole in your pocket, give me your money.

There you go! Remember to turn to NotGraphs for all your gambling-advice needs. Good luck and good betting!

Today I received the following letter from my Uncle Cletus.

Well, me and the missus finally went to our first professional baseball game last night and boy let me tell you what, it’s no wonder them boys don’t have to sell possum meat to Roy Bob at the Kountry Kitchen. They can play themselves some ball! How much do you think they make? I bet it is upward of 40 dollars.

Say, speakin of money, Kountry Kitchen’s got 2-for-1 garden burgers.

Anyhoo, as you know, Mama and I have always listened to games on our transistor radio, the one the bank done give us for payin back the outhouse loan on time, but no, we never seen a game till last night. Now that was a miracle in itself, due to us gettin pulled over on the way to the park. You don’t ever think a raggedy old truck is gonna get pulled over, especially when a team of mules is tuggin it, but pulled over is what we done got! Course it was our fault. Last week on the way to church we shot that stop sign down with pair of double-barrels, mostly for shits and giggles but also cause we needed the metal on account of the hole in the side of the house. Frankly we didn’t mind the breeze so much as the neighbor watchin us poop.
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Bob Hendley is occasionally remembered for going toe to toe with Sandy Koufax, but his major accomplishment, without a doubt, was the magnificent topiary that sat athwart his ample noggin. Today we honor one of baseball’s most unmistakable manscapes in the best way we know how: by putting stuff on top of it. Those who wish to contribute will not be discouraged.

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This comes courtesy of a comment from a previous Mike-Trout related post:

As I’m never one to ignore the filthy masses/turn down an idea for a post, I present Mike Trout Robbing Mike Trout of a Home Run.

Behold:

Though I’m not quite sure what type of something this is, it is indeed something.

Now that the season has entered its merciless grind, we often hear players praise the stolid nature of their manager by saying, “Yes, you’re right, insightful post-game reporter: He doesn’t let us get too high or too low.”

Well, thanks to our crack historical research team – and by the way, fellas, you really should focus more on baseball’s past than on the golden age of buttocks cleavage – we know that whenever managers do allow players to get too high or too low, the consequences can get pretty consequential.

– In July 1866, Boston skipper Cornelius “Corny” Joak responded to an eight-game win streak by allowing his players to climb the tallest building in nearby New Hampshire. The result? Catcher Poppy Popperlin suffered a sprained right wrist when he tumbled the 10 feet from the observation deck.

– In June 1872, New York manager Talleopholous “Tally” Wacker responded to a 12-game losing streak by encouraging his players to do the limbo at an afternoon luau. What followed was not the “squad cohesion” that Wacker had envisioned but, instead, a bloody brawl that began when shortstop Bendy Bender accused pitcher Stiffy Stiffler of having “twisted to the side, like this” when he went beneath the limbo stick. Per the archives, Stiffler further defrauded his foes by shouting, “Look over there!” and then blind-siding them with a pair of pineapple-beef kebabs.
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Hey there, citizens of those Majestic Gleaming States of Hot Sexy America, you must be sick to death of the World Cup by now, right? All that socialist teamwork and not using your hands to move the ball into the thing at the end.

Why do all the games end 0-0, right? Have you ever noticed that the score 0-0 looks like John Lennon’s glasses? Bloody peaceniks.

I, your English correspondent, am here to baseballize things for you. So here’s some World Cup photographs from Mexican newspapers that I’ve made Coulter-and-Shaughnessy-friendly.

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Derek Jeter in the New York Post on Alfonso Soriano being designated for assignment:

“He is like a brother to me. He should be proud of what he was able to do.”

Soriano, in response:

“A brother? Did he say that? Well, I say Derek Jeter is like a father to me. Older, wiser, a father who can no longer hit with authority, unlike me, who is just having a down year, but I will be back for six, seven, eight, fifteen more productive years in the major leagues, while my father, Derek Jeter, floats off into retirement. Maybe he is even more like a grandfather to me. After all, I am only thirty-eight years old, and how old is Derek? Sixty? Sixty-five?”

Jeter, after hearing Soriano’s remarks:

“I was misquoted earlier. Alfonso Soriano is like a great-aunt to me.”

Soriano:

“Derek Jeter is like the ancestor who comes to me in a dream and tells me that if I don’t treat people with more kindness, I will be alone forever, and also something about Tiny Tim (Collins).”

Jeter:

“Soriano is like the fossil I dug up under the dugout.”

Soriano:

“Jeter is like my favorite Cro-Magnon shortstop.”

Jeter:

“Soriano is an amoeba from before life on Earth progressed beyond single-celled organisms.”

Soriano:

“Jeter seems to have taken a science class.”

Time and again, I have tried to educate you on the inadequacy of democracy, only to have you continue to prop up this chaotic and unpleasant system where the strong dominate the wills of the weak. It is, you understand, incredibly frustrating to see you again and again vote your consciences, rather than submit your consciences to the divinely inspired will of a benevolent despot. For, almost invariably, your consciences suck.

Now, however, I find myself in the awkward position of having to temper my rage at the tyranny that the majority wields through the franchise with a greater sense of justice. For now democracy has a chance to finally put right what once went wrong, and hope each time that its next leap will be the leap home.

Rarely does such an opportunity present itself, but with the MLB All Star Game Final Vote, finally we can honor a man whose worth has gone largely unrecognized over the years: the great and powerful Bobby Grich.

Spurred by enlightened-despot-in-his-own-right Mike Trout, Angels fans have been working tirelessly to bring recognition to Grich, who batted .266/.371/.424 with 224 home runs over 17 seasons, while winning four consecutive gold gloves in recognition of his fine work as a second baseman for the Orioles and Angels, with the #VoteGRich hash tag. Trout and his throng of devoted apostles want to elect Grich to his seventh all-star team, despite not having played baseball in 28 years. Such a move is, of course, almost unprecedented. After retiring in May of 1989, Mike Schmidt made the All Star team that year, and did not play. But that’s understandable, as Schmidt’s selection was an immediate nod to his long years of excellence. To recognize the contributions a player who has been out of the public consciousness for so long, rightful MVP Mike Trout demonstrates that wisdom is indeed his sixth tool.

So quickly, my friends. To MLB.com’s Final Vote page, which I have yet to visit and behold in all its majesty! Give MLB all of your personal information! Sign up for all their newsletters! Allow them to contact you at home AND at work! Anything to allow you to punch out more digital chads next to his beautiful, mustachioed face before tomorrow at 4:00, when our opinions stop mattering. Let’s all work together to get Bobby Grich to the All Star Game in 2014. Let’s all #VoteGRich!