Love that scruff.

If this picture was worth a thousand words, maybe about nine hundred of them would be about hair. And as anyone who has seen my twitter feed might know, I appreciate hair.

It’s too bad that our sport has to be played with a cap on, in some ways. Looking at the 1978 Phillies, the rarity is an un-interesting ‘do.’ The butt-cutts, the afros of all persuasions, the mustaches, the chin straps, the hints of mid-eighties style beginning to emerge – it’s all awesome. If they were allowed, like in basketball, to play with their freak flags flying, we might have had some really interesting pictures of that era – not that the sight of Oscar Gamble with a hat on didn’t have its’ own charm.

But if we did have a game without hats – if we did, we could then have an interesting hair watch here at the NotG. Heck, maybe we’ll do it anyway.

H/T: Tommy Bennett pointing to the Mighty Flynn on Tumblr

This is Brandon McCarthy’s actual Twitter profile photo. Yes, really.

For those wondering, Brandon McCarthy is firmly in the sweet potato camp, and I’m not talking about an attractive-soft-around-the-edges person. Then again, who’s to say he isn’t into that. But sweet potatoes – the vegetable – yea… McCarthy can get jiggy with that.

How do I know?

Is it my access to clubhouses? No.

Is it that I saw him at an all-you-can-eat sweet potato buffet? No, but I wish.

Is it because I follow his twitter feed? You betcha.

For those who argue Tweets are the banal inner monologue to the bored, I’d say, sure you’re usually right. But McCarthy – or as he dubbed himself, “the West Coast Joe Blanton” aka WCJB – has made having an account well worth my vastly dispensable time.

And without knowing any of you, I’m sure it’s worth your time, too. But what’s your favorite tweet of his? And WCJB, if you’re reading this, I too feel you on Arrested Development. Just do me the favor of buying a really nice suit (because you, not I, can afford it) then continually mention how much it costs.

Now that you mention it, I would like to buy a Volvo.

One thing I find interesting about the MLB.tv experience is the “commercial breaks.” To my knowledge they don’t show actual TV ads. Instead, they show either 1) the team logos or 2) MLB promos or 3) pictures of Volvos (and other static image ads).

Contrast this with other inter-inning experiences. In the olden days, watching games on cable TV, commercials gently enwrapped my attentions from the moment the game action paused until the moment it returned. Unless I desperately needed the fridge or some other domestic facility, I’d stay put between innings. At the ballpark, by comparison, there isn’t a lot of worthwhile inter-inning entertainment (apologies to Cotton Eye Joe). Normally I’ll chat with companions or buy beer.

MLB.tv is different. When I’m watching on my computer, I can flip to another game when whatever I’m watching goes into a break. This is fun, although it comes with an ADD factor; I find myself less immersed in the atmosphere and discrete drama of each game when I’m switching between two or more.

The real conundrum is what to do with myself during commercials when I’ve hooked MLB.tv up to my living room TV, because then it’s too much trouble to get up and switch to another game. And until I figure something out I’m stuck on my couch watching slideshows of Volvos.

The MLB.tv-from-the-couch experience is, if you will, the developing world/final frontier of baseball watching, and sitting here at the brink of the abyss I feel a vertiginous indecision over how to conduct myself. Read a book? Check email? Play a very short game of Call of Duty? Think about… junk? Frankly, I’m not quite sure why corporate America is leaving this decision up to me.

The lovely and talented Heidi Watney learns, in the hardest of ways, that here in the Midwest we do atherosclerotic food pairings almost as well as we do unemployment and the vague suspicion that nothing matters …

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1qDjOamp9P0&feature=player_embedded

This is the angina-pains city, and this is what we do.

(Gut-bump: HBT)

Actually, it’s a pretty short list. But I’ll argue that Adam Dunn comparing himself to even one X-Man (singular?) merits some attention.

Discussing his return from an appendectomy, Dunn said the following to reporters:

One thing I definitely don’t want to do is miss Opening Day at home. I’m going home tonight and planning on playing tomorrow and we’ll go from there. If it’s really sore and if I’m feeling like this tomorrow, we might have some problems. I’m anticipating it getting better. I’m a quick healer, like Wolverine. I asked the doctor yesterday how long these things take and he gave me a general answer for the public. I’m subtracting 15 days off it. If I can tolerate [the pain], then I want to play. I don’t mind playing when I’m not 100 percent.

Technically, the emphasis is mine. In reality, the emphasis is everybody’s.

Stolen shamelessly from the Mighty Flynn. Image courtesy Houston Chronicle.

We have, as my man Drew Fairservice, don of ESPN SweetSpot’s Ghostrunner on First, wrote on Twitter this morning, “the best baseball photo of the year.” Already! And he’s right.

If you don’t know by now, touching Adrian Beltre’s noggin is frowned upon. By Adrian Beltre. And by “frowned upon,” I mean: “Touch Beltre’s head, and Beltre looks like he may actually kill you.”

In lieu of flowers, donations for the Marco Scutaro Memorial can be sent to the Boston Red Sox at 4 Yawkey Way, Boston, MA 02215.

Image courtesy Jim Davis at The Boston Globe. A tip of the hat to Ranting of a Boston Sports Fan, where I originally found the photo. I trust the rants will be epic over the next few days. And to Drew, of course. Hat tips, all around, yo. For everybody. Especially Scutaro. What a brave man.

In the vital interests of your fleeting amusement, I’ve done the Lord’s work of going through “The Onion” archives to find the 25 greatest Onion baseball articles in the history of ever.

It is of course possible that you will disagree with my authoritative decisions, but you should know that my opinions are actually facts with large muscles. So instead blame the divining powers of the The Onion’s search function or the immutable laws of this, our grim human existence.

After the jump, the rankings, which I assembled for you at great personal hazard …

Read the rest of this entry »

These two delightful souls were photographed by The Associated Press at the Rogers Centre SkyDome Wednesday night, taking in game two of the three game set between the Toronto Blue Jays and Oakland Athletics. No, they weren’t the only people there, but I appreciate you asking.

I can’t tell you how much I loathe the tweets and stories bemoaning attendance struggles throughout baseball. After a busy Opening Weekend at the gate in Toronto, and back-to-back crowds of 11,077 and 11,684 on Tuesday and Wednesday night, the sky is falling. Again. It fell last year, too.

Anyway, the picture. I love it. That’s fandom, right there. And those two guys are close; they’re tight. All those empty seats, and they didn’t use a buffer. Bros. For life. And I’ve no doubt: His was the most polite heckle in the history of heckles. Now, you tell me, what’s he yelling?

Image courtesy The Associated Press, via the fine folks at Yahoo! Sports.

Now that hat could start a rally.

You’re seeing that correctly – the Altoona Curve have developed a reversible cap that actually looks like something when worn inside out in “rally cap” fashion. This is a brilliant marketing decision by the curve and something that perfectly fits into the rather zany world of minor league baseball (seriously, there’s a team called the Diamond Jaxx).

However, I think there’s something deeper here. No doubt, any time the Curve are down in the 9th inning, they’ll surely bust out the rally side of their caps. Now, what if this rally cap actually produces rallies? This is clearly a situation to be watched as the minor league season continues, and if it works – if the Curve are extraordinarily successful in late-game clutch situations – we may see the rise of the Rally Cap as the new market inefficiency.

(Tip of the hat to Duk at Big League Stew, who plays the part of the Fashion Ump. Dare I say he may be the Joe West of Fashion Umpires? Yes, I dare!)

No, I can’t prove this is The Great Ejector behind the plate in the video below, but — really — what other man in blue would break into applause at the sight of a fallen lawbreaker? Yes, we can assume the hitter had it coming because otherwise Joe West would’ve done what he does and ejected the offending pitcher. In this righteous instance, though, it wouldn’t surprise me if Joe West deputized the pitcher and told him to take care of things or he’d see to it that things got taken care of. He’s clapping because the young man on the mound just cut his teeth in the ways of the (Joe) West.