Below are all the available baseball-related films on Netflix Instant — or, at least the ones that come up when you click Baseball under the genre Sport & Fitness.
I do believe you can click on the image to embiggen it.
I don’t believe you should ever watch something called Pitcher and the Pin-Up.
In case you’re not familiar with the great north, winters here are cold. This weekend, the heater in my century-old classic college house decided to stop heating the house on nights with lows of -8 followed by a balmy (a weather term which is never used non-ironically) 13.
Naturally, as the temperature indoors fell below 55 degrees, I found my extremities were extremely cold – specifically, my ears. Unfortunately, I don’t own any of the hats above – the Trapper 10 and Dogear styles on Lids.com. Not every team has an entry in these styles – for example, Diamondbacks fans are out of luck here. However, most teams are included regardless of their geography, as the picture above shows.
The Trapper 10 style features a logo on the wool front of the caps. However, the coloring of these logos is odd – multiple feature yellow on white – which makes it difficult to pick out just what the logo is. I do love this Kansas City Royals one, though, albeit not intriguing enough to blow 55 dollars on. The Dogear (44 dollars) is simply a typical 59fifty hat with, you guessed it, dog-ear like flaps to cover cold ears. I’ve found this style intriguing for a couple of winters, but unfortunately, none of the four Brewers styles really hold my fancy. For as much as I like wearing baseball hats, I can’t justify spending 45-55 dollars on an out-of-season, only good for winter hat. If I did, I’d probably be as broke as my heater.
This specific pile of money could be yours.
Remember how last year the company that made the baseball video game “MLB 2K10” gave $1,000,000 to the first guy to pitch a perfecto in the game? And how this generated publicity?
Well I guess it generated >=$1M worth of publicity, because 2K Sports is running basically the same promotion for this year’s “MLB 2K11.”
I might just feel this way because I’m the restless, maverick, pioneer-vagabond-trailblazer type, but wouldn’t it be cooler if the $1M accomplishment were switched up for 2011?
There must be hundreds of tough goals besides “perfect game” that could decide which unhealthily dedicated gamer gets a huge nonsensical windfall. For example, 2K Sports could give $1M to the first person to:
• Hit an inside-the-park home run with Pablo Sandoval
• Win the NL East in season mode using not-the-Phillies
• Pitch a perfect game with virtual Jim Joyce as part of the umpiring crew (snap!)
• Prevent Adrian Gonzalez from doubling off the virtual Green Monster for a whole game (good freahkin’ luck! Go Sox!)
This mini Brewer helmet used to have delicious cheese fries in it. Now it’s got my breakfast cereal.
Boom, victory.
You, reader, are probably already aware that NotGraphs has entered what is often colloquially referred to as “the big time.”
As if we had to prove it any further, witness this: our very first advance proof, Neil Lanctot’s forthcoming Campy: The Two Lives of Roy Campanella.
The book goes on sale March 8th, and we’ll provide a review of some sort before that date.
In the meantime, some notes and first impressions:
• So long as the back of this book isn’t lying, Roy Campanella, who joined the Dodgers a year after Jackie Robinson, didn’t particularly get along with him (i.e. Robinson).
• Campenella’s playing career was cut short by an automobile accident, in early 1958, that left him a quadriplegic.
• There’s a chance — a chance — that this book willn’t be “full of jokes.”
• Campanella was MVP three times — 1951, 1953, and 1955 — tying him with Yogi Berra, Joe DiMaggio, Jimmie Foxx, Mickey Mantle, Stan Musial, Albert Pujols, Alex Rodriguez, Mike Schmidt for second on the all-time list.
• Embiggen this image (all players, 1948-1957):
The following comes to us via the Twitter feed of Baseball Prospectus’ Tommy Bennett. Sometimes, there are no words. Prepare to be wowed …
Of course, no YouTube video experience is complete without a quick perusal of the comments section. And to nobody’s surprise, the highest rated comment offers some sage advice on a cold Friday afternoon in early January.
Shut the f*** up, learn to appreciate retarded s*** like this.
I did.
Thank you for sharing, Mr. Bennett. And most importantly: Thank you, Japan.
If there’s one thing Carson Cistulli has his finger on — that is, besides the keys of the uber-sleek netbook on which he’s (read: I’m) currently typing these words — it’s the pulse of the people. And if there’s one thing the people want it’s definitely HELLA PICTURES OF BOOKS. Badly composed, poorly lit pictures of used baseball books, specifically.
In an attempt to capitalize on the public’s insatiable appetite for book-y photos, allow me to offer the following: some pictures I took at The Community Bookstore, located on Court Street in the Cobble Hill/Carroll Gardens neighborhood of Brooklyn.
The Community Bookstore, in the event that you don’t know, looks like this when you walk into it:
Baseballing Journalist Peter Gammons has had, like, seven careers. For years, he wrote for the Boston Globe, with which publication he more or less invented the “baseball notes” form; he spent over 20 years with ESPN, basically becoming synonymous with that network’s rise to sporting media domination; and, according to sources, Gammons has also worked intermittently as a George Plimpton impersonator — you know, for kids’ birthdays and stuff.
It’s not surprising, then, that — given his track record for innovation — that Gammons has taken to Twitter (under the handle @pgammo) without hesitation even as he enters the “elder statesman” phase of his life.
If you like Gammons’ work, you almost definitely will (or perhaps already do) like his Twitter feed. However, Gammons’ most notable quality as a Twitterer is his penchant for the accidental, or pocket, tweet.
Here are the five best from his timeline since this past October or so.
5. This is the sound a person with a lisp makes when he/she sleeps.
Get your mind out of the gutter: not that kind of peek.
Former Baseball Prospecticator Joe Sheehan struck out on his own in late 2009, and in early 2010, he started a email newsletter. What was newsworthy about that decision was that he asked $20 per year from his subscribers at a time when so much great baseball writing on the internet was free. it all stemmed from a twitter conversation he had in response to NBC killing Law & Order and yet keeping The Marriage Ref, with this as the highlight of his opening statement:
Content aggregators are killing content creators, but individuals will recognize and support quality if given that option.
After discussing how lowered barriers to entry – brought on by the internet and anyone’s ability to start a website – has allowed the field to be muddied persay, he adds another important quote:
There are collectives whose business model is built on generating traffic while not paying, or paying an absurdly small amount, for content. They can do this for two reasons: the sheer number of people who want to write for a living, and the conviction that the public won’t be able to tell the difference between what they’re getting and what they could be getting.
Well, there’s a leap there on the second point. It could just be mostly the first point – that there are many quality writers that want to enter the fray, and that the quality is kept fairly high by the sheer number of willing part-timers. Look around at excellent websites like Baseball Analysts and Beyond the Boxscore, and you see great work done for little or no money.
This is not to say I begrudge him his work. Sheehan is an excellent writer. Today he gives us a free sneak peek of the upcoming year of his newsletter, which allows him to write and react as he likes to the news of the moment. In a discussion of steroids, he drops a nice gem that reminds us that good writing is worth paying for:
These are the players we know used. They pissed in a cup and the bell went off. These players are data, and the data is 6’0″, 185 with an 88-mph fastball trying to get to 90. It’s 5’11”, 190 wishing it was six foot tall. It’s not Popeye, it’s Olive Oyl. That doesn’t fit the narrative, so no one writes about it, but this is the face of the needle.
Lucky-best breaking news from the fair isle of Taiwan! The La New Bears are being renamed the Lamigo Monkeys!
Sure, I had never heard of the La New Bears until 15 minutes ago, but a baseball team named the Monkeys? Color me impressed. And if you find that revenge-minded silverback pictured on the flag above to be a bit disconcerting, please know that on the Lamigo Monkeys Facebook page (of which I am now a fan … please join me) we have a rendering that should satisfy you …
The big ears and smile are for the kids; the pompadour, natch, is for the ladies. Most of all, though: Go Monkeys!
Anyhow, I can now cross “Monkeys” off my non-exhaustive list of team nicknames I’d love to see used by actual franchises. A sampling:
– Hamburgers
– Cowards
– World Champions
– Commodore Vic-20s
– Security Guards
– Monster Lobsters
– Kevin
What am I missing? Go Monkeys!