Top Second-Half Nonstory Lines

Dear Thought Catalog,

Woke up this morning, made a couple of egg sandwiches, took a pic of my cat. Sat down with my egg sammies and my laptop, started a Third Eye Blind playlist in iTunes, opened Twitter. Saw a Buster Olney tweet about second-half story lines.

Went to the NotGraphs WordPress dashboard, checked to see if any NotGraphers had “second half story line” posts scheduled for today or tomorrow; they didn’t; started this post.

Started by typing the title and “nonstory lines” just popped in there. Googled “nonstory”, saw this

and thought, “Hey, this is a journalism term. I’m supposed to be doing ‘journalism.’ I can write a nonstory. I can write a bunch of nonstories!”

Thought about how exclamation marks should be used sparingly to never in journalism. Thought, “Balls.” Set to work on the following nonstory lines for MLB’s second half:

Will Alex Rodriguez Choose New Frames?

Back in January, Dayn “Death Knell” Perry alerted the NotGraphs readership to the existence A-Rod’s eyewear, which made the Yankees third-baseman an instant expert in craft brews and allowed him to entertain two lady-models instead of the customary one.

“Oh, Cindy, I can see your mole so clearly…”

Word is that A-Rod now wants a pair of bifocals so that he can see both his testicles and his toes, in focus, simultaneously.

No eyes will be on him in the next few months when he might be shopping around for a pair.

Will Bronson Arroyo Still Cook for His Teammates?

In one of my favorite nonstories of Spring Training, I looked at Bronson Arroyo preparing simple, healthy meals for himself and his teammates. I discerned that, in addition to helping get his team lean and mean for the upcoming season, Bronson wanted to prove that he could still hang in there with the youngsters.

Bronson and his blurry wine.

Approximately one person will be paying attention to whether Bronson still got the canned goods, or if he still get the hands sticky, or if he still got the crazy juices pickling in the ol’ kitch’-kitch’ as we head into the dog days of the season. It probably has nothing whatsoever to do with whether the Reds go on to win the division title.

Will Zack Greinke Play In Your Charity Golf Event This Fall?

Maybe two or three blokes will spend significant time speculating, from now till October, whether or not ZG might play in their celebrity/charity golf outings. Said blokes might even drop a few hints around Zacky about playing from now till then.

Don’t even bother asking, dude.

But when the time comes for these blokes to ask, ZG will just say, “No. Why would I do that?” and the blokes will go on to weep. If those blokes were NotGraphs readers (or Posnanski readers), they’d have known: no chance.

Will Elliott Johnson Buy Stock in Urban Outfitters?

Earlier this year, Summer Anne Burton relayed to NotGraphs fanatics that the Tampa Bay Rays “did the nerd thing.” Elliott Johnson clearly had a hipster’s sense of irony about it, purchasing his entire “nerd costume” at a place we style horses refer to as “Urban.”

Methinks those are Levi’s 510 Super Skinnies.

Should Johnson buy stock in his new fav’e clothier, most hipsters, aside from Carson Cistulli, aren’t genuine enough baseball fans to have heard of Elliott Johnson, so they won’t give a shit what he does. Conversely, most genuine baseball nerds probably don’t care about ballplayers’ personal investments. Thus, we have the perfect nonstory on our hands.

Who/What/Where Will the Spirit of Carl Sagan Touch Next?

We all know, in retrospect, that the spotless soul of Carl Sagan smiled down on Matt Cain’s perfect game.

Perfect.

The question then becomes, who will Sagan smile upon next?

Since the Spirit of Sagan in known to appear only after a smiled-upon event happens, there’s no use in speculating, though up to a half a dozen people — present party included — might do so regardless.