Category Archives: Misc.

Twitter Feeds We Need

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There is a Twitter Feed that lets you know when Yasiel Puig comes up, and when Vin Scully says something cool or profound. What other Twitter feeds do we need? I have some thoughts…

  • A feed that lets you know whenever the benches clear.
  • A feed that lets you know when Mariano Rivera is entering a game.
  • A feed that tells you when a position player is pitching.
  • A feed that tells you when a expected starting pitcher is switched for somebody else
  • A feed that tells you when there is a rain delay and when the rain delay ends
  • A feed that tells you the results of mascot races
  • A feed that updates you on when guys have no-hitters or perfect games going after a certain amount of time.
  • A feed that tells you when a pitcher has had 10+ Ks.
  • A feed that updates you on long hitting streaks.
  • A feed that consists entirely of Ichiro Suzuki quotes.
  • A feed that tells you when a non-MLB baseball game is on TV or Streaming.
  • A feed that consists entirely of cool Minor or Indy League Promotions occurring on a given day.

 

Get to work, Internet!

Bizarre Baseball Culture: Goofy shows us “How To Play Baseball”

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In Bizarre Baseball Culture, I take a look at some of the more unusual places where baseball has reared it’s head in pop culture and fiction.

Last time on Bizarre Baseball Culture, we took a look at Pinky and the Brain‘s baseball episode. This time, we are looking at the classic Disney short, How To Play Baseball, starring Goofy. It’s available on Disney’s website.

Screen Shot 2013-07-22 at 4.31.36 PMYes, How to Play Baseball, first released in 1942 to time with the release of Pride of the Yankees, it is one of the classics of the Disney canon, the first of a series of Goofy cartoons in which he tried to play or learn a sport, skill or occupation. While most of the information given in it is more-or-less true, the visuals are exaggerated and done for comedic effect. And, rest assured, this cartoon is hilarious, standing alongside Baseball Bugs as an example of anthropomorphic cartoon animals playing our national game.

(JUMP)

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Peter Gammons now has a Grantland-style website.
That is all.

Can I interest you in Cy Young’s Coffee Pot? (Semi-Humor*)

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While checking eBay for a share to Rochester Community Baseball (no luck!), I instead came across this.

If you don’t want to look at it or the link has gone dead, here’s what it is:

Screen Shot 2013-07-31 at 8.10.39 PMIt’s a coffee pot that belonged to Cy Young‘s estate, and thus, presumably, Cy Young himself. Yes, you too can pour coffee from the same pot as the winningest pitcher of all time for the low, low price of $999! You may think that price absurd, but you are forgetting that you would be having coffee from the same pot as A BASEBALL GOD. Just like how you will be getting the WORKSMANSHIP OF A BASEBALL GOD if you buy a toolbox from the Cy Young estate.

And that’s not all! Thanks to eBay, you also have the chance of having a flower vase that once belonged to Young, for the low price of $199.99! That’s the same price that can get you a hack saw made in 1879 that also was no doubt passed down through the Young family. Throw in an extra $375 and you can get Cy Young’s tie-clasp!

But, these are nothing compared to the crown jewel of Cy Young’s estate on eBay. No, they all pale in comparison to this:

Screen Shot 2013-07-31 at 8.28.38 PMCY YOUNG’S POCKET KNIFE.

Yes, you can buy CY YOUNG’S POCKET KNIFE off of eBay. Just imagine what this knife has been used for! For all we know, Denton True Young may once have gotten into a knife-fight with Ty Cobb using this. I mean, we’ll never know for sure, but it can’t be totally discounted, right?

However, my enthusiasm is dampened by the horrible truth that you may not have been able to glean from the above image. No, to see the truth, you must… ENHANCE!

Screen Shot 2013-07-31 at 8.39.53 PMLas Vegas, Nevada. What would Cy Young’s knife be doing in Sin City? Well, the truth is, it’s only in Las Vegas a nice legal fiction to hide the truth from us. You see, the real location of Cy Young’s pocket knife is actually about 83 miles northwest of Vegas at a US Military Facility. You know it better as AREA 51. And, deep below A51, a secret alliance of the Illuminati, Knights Templar and the Boras Corporation used blood on the knife to begin a cloning process of Cy Young. Sometime in the next 18 to 22 years, a wave of Cy Young clones will enter the majors, bringing with them the ability to throw complete games on short rest. The entire pitching economy will be overthrown, closers and relievers will be driven to the street, the Rolaids Relief Man award will go unawarded… while the conspirators will profit all the while…

You see, that is why they are now selling it, to get the evidence away from themselves.

“But,” you say, “why would they make it so expensive? It’s over 23 hundred dollars!”

And I say: Gambling debts. Even secret conspiracies did not see Florida Gulf Coast coming this March.

…Anyway. Now you know the truth. Yes… the truth.

Use it as you will.

*I say “semi-humor” because while I make several bad jokes and go on at least one bizarre tangent, it is true that this stuff is on sale on eBay.

Bizarre Baseball Culture: Sub-Zero, Shootings, and Blasted Bulbs

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One of the most underused but coolest (no pun intended) superpowers is that involving ice. I’m not sure why I think this. Perhaps it’s because of the Western New Yorker in me who full knows what it’s like to fall on your butt on a icy day, or maybe it’s because it’s a contrast to all the superpowers that rely upon warm temperatures or fire.

Either way, it’s kind of a bummer that so few heroes seem to have it- it seems to be more of a villain power. There’s Mr. Freeze, for example, and Captain Cold. The only ice-hero I can think of off the top of my head is Iceman from the X-Men.

But there is also one called Sub-Zero, a Venusian who landed on Earth and used his freezing powers to fight crime in stories published by Novelty Press.

…I don’t know why a Venusian would have ice powers either. But he did appear in a baseball story, so he’s now going to be in the rare company of superheroes who have been featured in BIZARRE BASEBALL CULTURE!

This story, from December 1940 in Blue Bolt Comics #7, can be found here, starting on page 21.

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Ever wonder what the walk-up music for a certain MLB player is? Well, a site called Designated Hits seems to have the answers.

Cool Link: Diamond Mines Scouting Reports Database

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Continuum Global News has been delayed until the First Anniversary Spectacular this Wednesday. In it’s stead, here is a cool link.

The Hall of Fame is opening an exhibit about scouting, which is neat. But even cooler is that they’ve started a website that has a searchable database of old scouting reports! While there aren’t that many for more recent players (you won’t find any scouting reports for Buster Posey, for example), it’s full of stuff for older players.
Here are some neat ones I’ve found:

A 1985 scouting report of the Cubs’ affiliate in Peoria: Rafael Palmeiro hits well to all fields, but Greg Maddux is not strong enough to be a starter, according to Duffy Dyer.

Orioles scout John Stokoe discusses Mariano Rivera, who he notes threw a rain-shortened no-hitter against Rochester and who he is impressed with. However, he notes that Rivera doesn’t really have any off-speed pitches, and would need one for future success. Turns out he didn’t need a true off-speed pitch. Much like everyone else, Stokoe never sees the cutter coming.

Mariners scouting report declares Alex Rodriguez is “similar to Jeter only bigger and better.”

Satchel Paige‘s faults in 1956? Too old. In 1958, a scouting report on him has “?” for age.

The Royals scout a young amateur Jim Thome… who was a shortstop at the time. Let that sink in. Jim Thome… was a shortstop. Oh, on a similar note, Frank Robinson was a 3B, and Joe Nathan was being scouted as a shortstop.

Mark McGwire pitched a bit in High School, had a body like Dave Kingman and his father was a dentist, according to a 1984 scouting report by Boston scout Joe Stephenson.

And that is just scratching the surface of what this site has… check it out.

Learn words through baseball news: Cacique

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In the Miami New Times article, it was revealed that one of Alex Rodriguez‘s code names was “Cacique”.

So what does Cacique mean?

Well, according to Dictionary.com:

ca·cique

[kuh-seek] Show IPA

noun

1.

a chief of an Indian clan or tribe in Mexico and the West Indies.

2.

(in Spain and Latin America) a political boss on a local level.

3.

(in the Philippines) a prominent landowner.

4.

any of several black and red or black and yellow orioles of the American tropics that construct long, pendent nests.
…
So now you know!

Suggestion: Count in terms of stadiums

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You occasionally hear of weird ways of measuring things. Perhaps the best baseball example is the Altuve, which measures things based on the size of Astros 2B Jose Altuve. But one baseball-related unit of measure I sometimes use when I envision things is based on the capacity of stadiums.

It works to help give yourself some context. Stalin is said to have once quipped that “The death of one man is a tragedy, the death of a million is a statistic.” And, the sad thing is, that is more-or-less true: you may well cry your eyes out if you hear the story of a man dying of cancer, but when you hear that tens of thousands of people have died in a war, it’s far harder to quite grasp the magnitude. Thinking in terms of stadiums changes that, giving you an idea of scale, of just how many or how few of something there is.

For example, when one hears that there are, say 12 thousand Humpback Whales (I’m just guessing that number off the top of my head- it may well be fewer) left in the world, you have no idea of how many or how few that is. But when you consider that the top, standing-room-only capacity of your local AAA ballpark is only a little greater than that, you realize just how few Humpback Whales there are.  Suddenly, you have that perspective

Take a look at some of the numbers in the news recently, for example:

For example, the American economy added 155,000 jobs in December (source), which is sort of a weird number to think about. So, instead, perhaps it’s a better idea to imagine that as about three Yankee Stadiums worth of newly employed people (it’s actually a little more than that as Yankee Stadium’s baseball capacity is 50,287).

Between 600,000 and 800,000 are expected to attend the inauguration in Washington. Or, to put it another way, that’s between 14 to 20 Nationals Parks.

Of course, it gets a little more difficult the higher numbers go. 19 million people watched last night’s Big Bang Theory, and saying that that is the equivalent of a little more than 339 Dodger Stadiums doesn’t quite give a good idea of scope, does it? I mean, other than it saying that a lot of people watched it.

Still, a good way of getting your head around big numbers: use stadium capacities as a guide!

 

Wednesday Links: Mister Baseball

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I’ve featured links to a site that covers Japanese baseball, and a site about Korean baseball, so today, I’m putting up a link to a site on European baseball. It’s called “Mister Baseball“. It has nothing to do with that one movie about Tom Selleck playing in Japan, and instead covers all of the ups and downs of the various leagues in Europe, both the two professional ones in the Netherlands and Italy, as well as the smaller competitions elsewhere, while sometimes also giving some general baseball news.

You can find it above, or in the links section of this blog.