I’m sure we all had the same thought when the starting lineups for this year’s All-Star Game were announced. Namely: Who, WHO will portray these gentlemen in the inevitable Hollywood dramatization? That dramatization became somewhat more evitable once the National League opened a can of whup-ass on Justin “For the Fans” Verlander, but the question still burns. Luckily, we now have MyHeritage.com’s powerful and sophisticated Celebrity Face Recognition service to replace the notoriously fallible decisions of human casting directors. Here, then, is the cast, and for the full revelation of startling and often haunting doppelgangerhood, please do embiggen by clicking.

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Q: Thoughts on Gose getting called up to the bigs? And will he stay up when Bautista comes back?

A: Who knows, but I hope Gose is enjoying it, because this is probably going to be the highlight of his entire life, and, how old is he, 21? Odds are he fails, just like everyone else who tries to do anything, and even if he doesn’t fail, he’ll probably get injured. So my thoughts are that he should get a long-term deal in place by the end of week or else start reading some toilet repair books for his future career after he completely washes out.

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As if this guy:

Couldn’t get any creepier, he went ahead and did this number to his face:
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Most baseball fans will know that Homer Bailey is a right-handed pitcher for the Cincinnati Reds. Fewer — but still many — will know that Bailey was a seventh-overall draft pick out of a Texas high school in 2004 and appeared on Baseball America’s top-100 prospect list four times — including two appearances (in 2007 and -08) in the top 10.

What no one probably knows about, though — or, at least didn’t know before last night’s WTMJ radio broadcast of the Reds and Brewers in Cincinnati — is Bailey’s rich family history.

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Phillies right-hander Vance Worley currently possesses a swinging-strike rate of 5.5% — which swinging-strike rate would typically produce a strikeout rate of about 12%. Instead, at 20.6%, Worley has a considerably higher strikeout rate than that. That he features the lowest opponent Z-Swing% (that is swing rate against pitches within the zone) among qualified pitchers goes a long way towards explaining how Worley has been successful — namely, by inducing a great number of called strikes three.

But you needn’t take my — or even LeVar Burton’s — word for it. Indeed, here are five actually different audio clips from Worley’s Friday night start against San Francisco (box):

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When you talk about Carson Cistulli, what you’re talking about is a guy who knows how to first (a) watch a baseball game one night and then (b) make three GIFs from that game at some point during the following afternoon, with a view to justifying his existence on the company payroll.

In this case, what Carson Cistulli has done is to make three GIFs from Thursday night’s A’s-Yankees game (box), during which game Cuban emigre Yoenis Cespedes hit a home run that compelled veteran right-hander Freddy Garcia to discover physics again for the first time.

For the benefit of the reader, who is likely busy using large-bosomed women as barbells on the sandiest possible beaches of the Florida coastline, I have taken the liberty of organizing last night’s events in chronological order, clearly demarcating the order of those events with clarity.

Note: all GIFs are clickable, embiggenable.

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The year is 1989.  Milli Vanilli has invaded the airwaves. People are excited about the new Batman movie. Michael Dukakis is off crying, cold and alone somewhere, probably hiding from bears. Prospective athletes everywhere are buying Chris Sabo goggles in droves. Baseball cards have surpassed precious metals as the most convenient and failsafe investment in America.

Baseball cards are now, of course, worthless; the ink used to produce them is universally recognized as poisonous, and many foil-stamped parallel sets are faintly radioactive. Certain states have outlawed the sale of baseball cards and many hobby owners, who once made millions profiteering from hapless collectors during the junk wax era, have been driven into hiding in the Mojave Desert, only surfacing to socialize with each other at card shows housed in middle school gymnasiums.

But O, in that innocent time, with its afternoons stitched into endless tapestry! Huddled together in playgrounds, sipping their juice boxes after soccer practices, they spread their anonymous, clandestine rumors. The Billy Ripken, it was told, could be found in the pack second from the bottom on the top left corner of the box. Andy’s brother’s friend Chris found one there, so it was undeniable fact. They bragged to each other about the number of Gregg Jefferies rookies they owned, and which brands.

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Fair NotGraphs Readers;

Today is a pretty shitty day.

I’ve spent the morning searching for a way to heighten spirits as much as I could, all things being considered. Being at a loss for ideas, the best thing I could come up with is Carson Cistulli, our fearful leader, dressed as Katy Perry.

I wish you all a safe and fun weekend. Be excellent to each other.

Study closely the countenance of American Baseball Broadcaster Jeff Huson …

You’ll note the solemn look of disapproval in tandem with the finest in Evangelical’s Choice Menswear and Hair Tonic.

The entirety of it provides Huson with a mise en scène that is known variously as “Pastor Cocaine” or “Comptroller of Jonestown.” The look suggests a glowering reproach directed not at unruly adolescents but rather at the repugnant iniquities of those Mather brothers, Cotton and Increase. It also suggests a long history of groped receptionists and several powdery lines of fucking primo white lady followed by sweaty prayers hollered into a cordless microphone.

In closing, Jeff Huson might be going to hell but not before he sends you there.

I wanted to follow up on Kevin Youkilis’s return to Boston, so I was looking at pictures from the Red Sox-White Sox series. Yesterday, the [White] Sox got pummeled by the [Red] Sox, 10-1. I happened upon this picture, which, at first glance was exactly the sort of thing I had hoped to find.

There Youk sits, fully aware of the camera, disgusted with the eminent outcome of the game, with the outcome of the series so far (Chicago outscored 20-8, and down two games to one), perhaps longing for the comforts of an eggy frappe, perhaps bubbling with a hatred that even he doesn’t understand, perhaps ready to kill. His neck itches; his groin is a little sweaty.

But Youk is just one figure in this picture, which might very well represent the full gamut of human emotion and experience.

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