*It’s come to my attention that what’s below is a semi-irregular feature over at the inimitable Walkoff Walk. That’s a great website — who doesn’t like Shrimp? And this is a good idea. So I’ve taken the reigns this week.

No, your eyes are not deceiving you. Yes, that is a Twitter Fail Whale cake pictured above. Just when you thought you’d seen it all, you’re reminded why you read NotGraphs.

Twitter. A window, 140 characters small, into the life — no, the soul — of a Major League Baseball player. What wisdom, over the past seven days, have the 124 current and former baseball players, according to Tweeting-Athletes.com, imparted on the masses, now that they’ve taken to the tweets?

Well, that’s what we’re about to find out. Without further adieu, I present: The MLB Tweets of the Week …

First up, Carl Crawford, @CarlCrawford_. After signing his mammoth contract with the Boston Red Sox, Crawford took to Twitter to answer the question of all of us had on our minds:

Yes for those asking, I am going to open a bookstore. Details to come

Is it weird that I want to manage Crawford’s book store? I think it’s kind of weird.

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Here’s the early trailer for MLB 11: The Show (which game was treated in these pages yesterday, too).

I don’t know if we learn much about the game here. On the other hand, it’s nice to know that Carl Orff is still composing music some 30 years after his death.

H/T: 7 Train to Shea

As Dan Shaughnessy or any self-aware electron will you, it pays to go negative. So in keeping with that wisdom, we’re going negative in this space and handing out a few “Anti-Awards” for the 2010 season.

First, though, something must be said. Even lousy major-league baseball players are better at baseball than I am at anything in the world. Now I feel better.

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*Note: As commenter sgardner notes, Justice has actually been sensibly critical of the Houston front office, leading one to imagine that Justice’s tongue is firmly in his cheek here. That said, it’s still interesting to consider how a regular reader might respond to Justice’s post differently than a casual one, like myself.

Life can be scary. Starting around 21 or 22 years of age (generally speaking), one is tasked with the responsibility of feeding and clothing oneself — a not-unsubstantial chore, indeed. Not long after that (again, generally speaking), one is asked, in addition, to feed and clothe other, smaller people, as well. This is particularly burdensome, as there are laws against ignoring or throwing off bridges these smaller people — laws that could force one to spend the rest of his life in prison.

On top of all this, there’s also the sense that — in addition to providing enough in the way of financial compensation — that the work one chooses ought to be fulfilling in some way. “If I’m going to spend 40 hours a week doing something,” goes the reasoning, “it ought not to be something that represents a constant assault on my values and/or taste.”

Understanding this — i.e. that life is fraught with all manner of difficulty — helps us feel sympathy for each other. Certainly, it’s something that a reader should keep in mind when approaching the most recent dispatch from Richard Justice of the Houston Chronicle — an article that begins with this headline:

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MLB released the 2011 Chase Field All-Star Game logo yesterday.

I find the color scheme interesting, but aside from that, this logo is flat out boring. It’s a desert… with a mountain… and a sky. The lettering is done in, naturally, the font of the Arizona Diamondbacks. It’s not a terrible logo or anything, and it doesn’t affront the eyes by any measure. There’s not really an easily identifiable problem with the logo. It’s just… there.

The drabness and overall corporate feel of the logo are represented perfectly in Diamondbacks CEO Derrick Hall’s take on it.

“It incorporates a little bit of the mountains, it’s got our font, a Diamondback feel about it,” Hall said. “I’m very pleased with the way the logo turned out. It looks good on merchandise, it looks good on baseballs, it looks good on caps.”

I guess it’s hard to say what else we really should be looking for in a logo, particularly one like this which is essentially only used to market this three day event. As I look at the list of past All-Star Game logos, however, I can’t help but feel like this is one of the least inspired of them all. Almost all of them have some sort of baseball related or city related icon that makes it feel like the logo is part of something besides a marketing campaign. This one, though, just feels like it’s there to move some hats and get this whole thing over with.

To which I say: Whatever.

We hate it when our friends become successful/And if they’re northern…

With Joey Votto winning the NL MVP this year, Canadians have scooped 3 of the last 28 MVPs (Larry Walker in 1997, Justin Morneau in 2006). That’s pretty amazing considering how there are only something like 20 Canadian Major Leaguers. Hooray Canada, right?

Wrong! At least, so says Alison Korn of the Toronto Sun.

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The image you see above these very words is the computer-generated likeness of Minnesota catcher Joe Mauer, and it (i.e. the image) is relevant to these pages not merely because Mauer has redefined the use of sideburns in American culture, nor for the fact that he’s served admirably as a spokesman of MLB: The Show, but because Mauer himself has just today (maybe) been announced as the poster boy for the 2011 edition of The Show, as well.

If you want a review of the game, you’ll have to read every last one of Jon Robinson’s words on the matter. In the meantime, though, here are some of those words, regarding one of the game’s biggest changes — i.e. analog controls for almost errything.

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Recently, in these pages, I made a case for a way of discussing books in a manner conducive to NotGraphs. You can read those exact words, if you want. Alternatively, you can just believe me when I say that the basic idea is to share lightly annotated passages and ideas from interesting baseball-related books.

Text
Reggie Jackson: The Life and Thunderous Career of Baseball’s Mr. October by Dayn Perry

A Note on the Notes
Today’s edition of Readings is both bullet- and trivia-heavy.

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During the Winter Meetings Wrap-Up Podcast Spectacular, Messrs. Palwikowski and Cameron brought up the strange ambiance at the Winter Meetings in the age of Twitter. It was truly weird to witness the crowded media room, full of writers tracking stories on various websites, and contemplate why we had all gone through the trouble of arriving in one space to do so. Couldn’t those writers stay home to do the same thing?

There are, of course, a couple of events that require a physical presence. Managers hold interviews that run like mini press conferences, there’s the job fair, and the Rule Five draft is the closeout event. Then again, beat writers are most interested in their own teams’ manager, and the manager interviews are not surprisingly best attended by writers from that team’s city. It seems those interviews could be held in the home city without much of a difference in tone or effectiveness. That leaves the job fair and the Rule Five draft – and I doubt as many media members would arrive for that event alone, as interesting as those events might be.

No, the “reason” for the event is the face-to-face time that the lobby – and the lobby bar – provide. After spending almost a day’s worth of time in that lobby, though, it’s worth wondering if the meetings will survive this digital age. While some front office members came down to the lobby, the top of the organizations were conspicuously absent. If they wanted a player, agent or other GM to meet with them, they could either call them, chat them, or invite them to their room. I did not witness a single GM in the lobby while I was there, and asking around, it seemed to be a rare event. In fact, it seemed that teams even sent one specific member of the front office (not the GM) down at certain times to gather rumors and return to the teams’ suites.

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The Washington Nationals introduce new outfielder Jayson Werth today at 1:00pm ET and, thanks to the wonder of the internet, you can watch the relevant press conference live, live, live via CSN Washingon’s website.

Though we’ve been unable to substantiate the rumors, NotGraphs has gotten word that the Nationals have had to employ extra security for the event on account of how everyone will be trying to throw their panties onto the stage.

H/T: Nats Insider