“I don’t give a [expletive], frankly. I just want to play and get to the playoffs,” Bailey said. “Whatever role they see fit, that’s what I’m going to do. If it’s setting up, if it’s doing whatever, that’s fine by me and we’ll address it next spring.”
But that’s only the beginning. Here at NotGraphs, we’ve been able to get our hands on the rest of Bailey’s interview:
Wait a minute. I said all that [expletive] because I assumed the Sox were still in playoff contention. You’re telling me we’re in fourth [expletive] place, ten [expletive] games out? What the [expletive]? I know I said I didn’t care if I was the [expletive] closer, but [expletive]! [Expletive] [expletive] [expletive]! If we’re not even going to make the [expletive] playoffs, it’s a little [expletive] ridiculous for me to take a [expletive] bullet for this [expletive] organization and agree to do whatever the [expletive] they want. I want a [expletive] multiyear contract at the end of this [expletive] season, not a [expletive] minor league [expletive] invite after I throw fifteen [expletive] mop-up innings and don’t [expletive] show anyone that I can still [expletive] pitch. They don’t even show me the [expletive] standings over in [expletive] rehab. They let all of us [expletive] think we’re [expletive] rolling to a division title and now you [expletive] tell me we’re one [expletive] spot from last [expletive] place? The [expletive] Blue Jays are a half game below us? The [expletive] Orioles are three and a half games ahead of us? The [expletive] Orioles? [expletive]! This whole [expletive] [expletive] is crazy, man. Of course I want to [expletive] close. I need [expletive] counting stats. I need to get the [expletive] out of here. [Expletive]. I don’t know what the [expletive] I was talking about. I have to call my [expletive] agent.
Few people have the capacity — the necessary on-the-moment machismo and swiftness of mind — to both brag about their 1% television set while also, quite simultaneously, laud their own physical attributes. Ladies and gentlemen, I present the hyper-licensed C.J. Wilson.
After about minute 1:07 in the following video, I began to lift Mr. Wilson to a new level of esteem. At first, I thought perhaps he is a modern-day Andy Kaufman, straight trolling the universe. But then I began to suspect that Wilson is in truth what the famed drinker of Dos Equis is in jest: The most interesting man in the world.
Which makes us ask: Would I actually hate hanging out with the most interesting man in the world, would I think of him as a living turd?
Also, Wilson reportedly has light switches to turn on and to turn off. Few things boil the pot of wealth jealousy than the ownership of light switches.
Many thanks to E. Moore for shoving this delightful video our way.
Daniel Straily has been called up, analyzed, gushed over, and well-wished. Now he has also been drawn in a manner attempting to channel my inner seventh-grader with a crush. Consider this his NotGraphs rookie card. Good luck out there, ginger face! We love you!
It would seem natural to declare that by wearing a hat with a team logo on it, you are making a simple act of supporting that team. The political realists among us, however, would argue that this not entirely true. We live in a zero-sum world; support provided to one team is, consequently, support taken away from that team’s enemies. Alliances are unavoidable.
Perhaps, ordinarily, you have no issue with these secondary repercussions created by your headgear. This is well, but keep in mind that there will inevitably be times when you need to cover your head and maintain your explicit love of baseball, while at the same time avoiding the hypersensitive people with whom you share existence.
To this end, I offer the following options, all purchasable on your local internet:
The Implicit
It has its advantages: simple, cheap, and it confers a Zen-like embrace of nothingness. You can buy four dozen of them for sixty bucks and rest easy knowing that you have enough hats to last the rest of your life, available in whichever color suits your current mood. It also has its disadvantages: worn with casual clothing, you may be confused for an actor in a pharmaceutical commercial and/or a coach in a Tom Emanski training video. Other potential advantages: bedazzling!
It may be hard to imagine, fair readers, but baseballers didn’t always live the luxurious lives they do now. Before the contract boom of the later 20th century, members of local nines made a fairly modest living, all things considered. Many don’t know this, but before Lou Gehrig came to prominence, his weekly pay consisted of $11, a handshake, and a coupon to a house of ill repute in Sacramento. John Thorn told me that story.
Many players of yesteryear actually held other jobs in the offseason to supplement their meager earnings. Many did manual labor in shipyards and warehouses, while others would travel north for lumberjacking jobs. Some players would try to cash in, if you will, on the fame attached to their names by opening their own businesses. While this plan was not flawed in concept – people have been capitalizing on their 15 minutes of fame for a very long time (see: Christ, Jesus) – the execution and/or business plans of some of these establishments left quite a bit to be desired. Behold:
Dusty Baker, the manager of the currently-first-place Cincinnati Reds, came from a long line of bakers, hence the name. His pastry lineage goes back to the 1700s, and his parents expected him to continue the family business when he came of age. But Dusty had a penchant for baseball, and showed some skill at the sport, so he defied his family’s wishes and signed with the Atlanta Braves. Years later, he tried to appease his father, now on his deathbed, by starting his own bakery. He hoped this gesture would make amends, and repair the relationship broken for so many years.
But there were hundreds of bakeries in Los Angeles, and so Dusty tried to make his stand out by incorporating his name into the theme of the business. It did not work. Customers complained of the air quality, and the atmosphere made all the goods sold taste like a fireplace or construction site, depending on the day. The bakery shuttered a mere two months after its opening. The day after it closed, Baker’s father died of scurvy.
Whitey Ford’s Whitey Ford Dealership (est. 1955, closed 1960)
Whitey Ford was an All-Star pitcher for the New York Yankees. This did not, however, provide him with the luxuries he thought he deserved. Hoping to benefit from America’s new love affair with the automobile, he and his business manager “Racist” Pete Henderson opened a sprawling dealership in Stony Point, NY. Though the clientele was limited by choice, Ford’s dealership did well initially, becoming the best-selling dealership in the county after its first year. They sold a record number of Fairlanes after running ads in the local paper stating “The Ford Fairlane: A Superior Car for the Superior Race.”
Ford’s dealership closed shortly after the 1960 World Series, when the Yankees lost the series to the Pittsburgh Pirates in dramatic fashion. Fans, upset that Ford was unable to relieve in Game 7, blamed Ford for the series loss, because Yankees fans have always been the worst, apparently. The costs to remove graffiti and repair the constant damage inflicted upon his business became too great, and he sold his assets off in November.
Giants pitcher and celebrated fop Woody Abernathy knew he didn’t quite have the stuff to last in the Majors, so he moved quickly to establish his clothier featuring garments made exclusively from wood.
Though he found a modicum of success with a line of underpants made from birch bark, Abernathy ran through his life savings quickly, and struggled to stay afloat. Despite the fact that he was in a great deal of debt, he was lucky enough to be current on his insurance payments, as his shop mysteriously (and quite easily) burned to the ground in 1947. Three casualties were reported as result of the blaze.
Ugly Dickshot’s Ugly Dick Shots (est. ?, closed ?)
No image found since I refuse to do a Google Image Search for Ugly Dick Shot
Johnny “Ugly” Dickshot hardly made any money as a player, but was given coins as charity by people who simply felt sorry for him. He saved his nickels and he saved his dimes, and eventually opened Ugly Dickshot’s Ugly Dick Shots. Little is known about this establishment, including what it actually did. This author provides the three following possibilities:
It was a portrait studio selling photos of ugly people named Dick.
It was a place where one could, if one were so inclined, get kicked in the crotch for a small fee.
It was a film studio, specializing in capturing footage of grotesque male genitalia.
—–
Though large contracts and sponsorships have curtailed named-based businesses amongst current baseball players, there are still opportunities to be had. Possible endeavors include Andre Ethier’s House of Ether, Hunter Pence’s Fences, and Mikes Trout and Carp’s Mike’s Trout and Carp.
It was a wild ride at Rangers Ballpark in Arlington last night. The visiting Angels took a 10-7 lead in the top of the tenth inning capped by a two-run Albert Pujols shot.
The home team was not to be out-done. Their rally began in the bottom of the tenth with a mammoth solo HR by Nelson Cruz, who was met back in the dugout by an excited Elvis Andrus:
Elvis Andrus nodding approvingly and enthusiastically, arms akimbo and wagging, yawping endearingly, and, finally, clapping one time
Andrus himself would later hit a walk-off single as the Rangers went on to win 11-10. Isn’t it joyous? Isn’t he handsome?
[If the above GIF is running slow, check out the video I made.]
If there’s one principle at the very core of my personal philosophy, it’s that no cockle should be left unwarmed. I was, therefore, thrilled recently to be entrusted with a reader’s chilled cockles and given explicit instruction on how to warm them. Although they were too demure to share the state of their own cockles, several of said reader’s colleagues were clearly in need of similar attention. And so, being the service-oriented writer that I am, I put together the following.
This past weekend, outfielder Lew Ford was called up to the Orioles after not playing in the major leagues since 2007. Here is a sampling of the reaction on Twitter.
A story I wrote about Lew Ford a month ago, when he said he would be shocked to be back in majors: bit.ly/QpTOiL#BEscores
First, righteous gratitude to Dangerous Don Hammack for the championship photo edits seen above.
The nomination process, which was decidedly racist but included an open bar, is complete, and now you may select from the 10 fate-groped names to follow. Who among these men of finger-licking standing and breeding should be known forevermore as “Colonel Sanders’s Drinking Buddy”?
Citizens, let us vote like no one’s watching, even though several deputized sociopaths are indeed watching …
