Tag Archives: baseball

Bizarre Baseball Culture: Hideki Matsui’s Godzilla Cameo

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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.

Godzilla came out last weekend, it was a big hit, it was (in my opinion) very good, and there are sequels already on the way and it’s director has also been hired to do a Star Wars spin-off.

But, of course, when most baseball fans think of Godzilla, they think of Hideki Matsui, the great Japanese slugger who had it as his nickname.

Did you know, however, that “Godzilla” actually once had a cameo in a Godzilla movie? In 2002’s Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla, he made this cameo (shown below in dubbed form):

Actually, he made two cameos: Later in the movie he shows up again practicing his swing indoors while the lights go out since Mechagodzilla is drawing upon Tokyo’s power-grid, if memory serves.

So, there you go: Hideki Matsui’s Godzilla cameo.

…Okay, so I guess you probably wish there was more here, so, without further ado, here are other connections between Godzilla and Baseball (I would like to thank the internet for basically giving me all of this information):

  • Shea Stadium was destroyed during a monster fight in Godzilla: The Series, the cartoon series that came out after the horrible 1998 movie that claimed to feature Godzilla but just featured an imposter that had his name.
  • Former NPB player Satoshi Kuroda is married to Chiharu Niiyama, who starred in 2001’s Godzilla Mothra King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack.
  • Oscar-Nominated Actor Nick Adams, who ended up starring in Invasion of Astro-Monster (AKA Godzilla vs. Monster Zero) in 1966 (hey, he needed money), at one point turned down a offer from the St. Louis Cardinals to play minor league ball, mainly because he didn’t like the low pay offered.
  • David Straithairn, who plays a military leader in the new Godzilla film, was Eddie Cicotte in Eight Men Out and also had a role as Ira Lowenstein in A League of Their Own.
  • Thomas Tull, the CEO of Legendary Films and producer of the new film, tried out to be a replacement player for the Braves during the 1994-95 strike, and also made a failed bid to buy the Padres in 2012.

There are probably others that I’m missing, but those are the ones I found relatively quickly.

NEXT TIME ON BIZARRE BASEBALL CULTURE: …I’m not sure yet.

Previously on Bizarre Baseball Culture:

Prologue: “Rockets on the Mound” (short story)

1: Captain Marvel teaches baseball to Martians

2: Fantom of the Fair and exploding baseballs

3: Doll Man fights the Baseball Bandits

4: Tony Stark- Baseball Fan

5: The Other Guys

6: The Little Wise Guys and the Absent-Minded Natural

7. Pokémon: “The Double Trouble Header”

8. Dash Dartwell’s PED use for justice

9. The Shield and the Ballpark Murders

10. 2007′s Triple-A Baseball Heroes

11. 2008′s Triple-A Baseball Heroes

12. The Batman and Cal Ripken join forces

13. Sub-Zero and Blasted Bulbs

14. “Pinky at the Bat”

15. How To Play Baseball 

16. Action Comics #50

17. Superman Adventures #13

18. Billy the Marlin (guest-starring Spider-Man)

19. Brittle Innings by Michael Bishop

20. Shortstop Squad

21. Cosmic Slam

22. Thanksgiving Doubleheader (Dick Blaze and Franklin Richards)

23. Mariners Mojo

24. Ozzie Smith and Tony the Tiger

25. 25th Installment!

26. Stuart Taylor travels through time

27. Captain America in “Death Loads the Bases”

28. Captain America in “High Heat”

29. Spider-Man, Uncle Ben, and the Mets

30. Green Arrow and Elongated Man

31. Hideki Matsui’s Godzilla Cameo (you are here)

 

Bizarre Baseball Culture: Spider-Man, Uncle Ben, and the Mets

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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.

(Note: This article may have spoilers to Amazing Spider-Man 2, since I reference a major storyline that I’m going to guess shows up in the movie. It’s in the second-to-final paragraph before the jump, if you want to know what to skip to avoid the spoiler.)

As the sequel to the reboot of Spider-Man comes out, entitled The Amazing Spider-Man 2, now is as good as any to do a Bizarre Baseball Culture on a comic entirely about Spider-Man and his baseball fandom. Now, ole’ Web-Head is no stranger to Bizarre Baseball Culture, having shown up in the past on at least three occasions (most recently fighting Doctor Doom alongside Billy the Marlin), but those were promotional comics that happened to feature Spider-Man. This time, we are looking at an honest-to-goodness Spider-Man comic: Peter Parker Spider-Man (Volume 2) #33. This issue from 2001 is about Peter Parker’s relation with his late Uncle Ben, and how baseball was a bond between them.

Now, before we begin, I’d like to write a bit about Spider-Man in general. What made the Marvel characters different when they first started appearing in the 1960s was that they were, in general, more relatable and flawed than the DC counterparts and the Marvel superheroes that had been created in the 30s and 40s. The Fantastic Four was often bickering with each other (like an family does), the X-Men were shunned by most of society (Stan Lee has said that being a mutant is basically meant to be a stand-in for being a minority), the Hulk was shunned by basically all of society… and Spider-Man, for lack of a better term, was a loser.

Okay, maybe not a loser, but definitely the closest thing there had been up to that point: an unpopular kid with no parents, only one family member of any sort (Aunt May) and little money. To make matters worse, when supervillains weren’t coming after him, the press and/or the police were. If things could go wrong for Peter Parker, they probably have. Parents? Dead. Uncle? Dead. Aunt? Perpetually sick. First true love (Gwen Stacy)? Murdered (and, amazingly, never came back to life). Second true love (Mary Jane)? Marriage magically annulled in a story far too stupid to talk about. Heck, while I haven’t read it, apparently most recently poor Peter Parker saw his body body-snatched by Doctor Ocopus while he was forced to die in “Doc Ock’s” cancer-ridden body (don’t worry, he got better). But all of this pales in comparison to the greatest, most horrible fate to ever fall upon Spider-Man:

Being a fan of the New York Mets.

(JUMP)

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Bizarre Baseball Culture: Captain America saves a HS ballplayer from Drugs!

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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.

Previously, we covered a Golden Age adventure featuring Captain America, but now it’s time to look at one that takes place in post WWII. This time, we take a look a comic book in which Captain America must protect a high school baseball player from the great threat of… DRUGS!

Yes, drugs. And I don’t mean the performance-enhancing kind, I’m talking cocaine and other fun stuff like that. And, before you ask, yes, this was a comic made specifically to give an anti-drug message, specially in cooperation with the FBI and New York State Life Underwriters. It’s right on the cover:

CapDrugsCover

So, anyway, go below the jump for a look at the 1990 Anti-Drug comic, “High Heat”.

(Get it? High Heat? Because of drugs and because it’s about a baseball player? Oh, nevermind.)

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So, where exactly was this picture taken? AKA: Where the heck would they play baseball in Dubai?

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You may have seen this picture online a few days ago (click to enlarge):

As you can see, it’s a baseball game being played outside of Dubai, with the world’s tallest building, the Burj Khalifa (formerly known as the Burj Dubai) rising in the distance.

Of course, the United Arab Emirates isn’t exactly a baseball hot bed. So I was wondering where this picture was taken. So I did some research… and found it!

Screen Shot 2014-04-24 at 1.26.41 PMAt Al Quoz Pond Park south of Dubai’s downtown is the site of the Dubai Little League. To be more specific, the picture of the game with the Burj in the distance was taken at the large, adult-sized north field. As you can see below, this Little League facility is definitely close enough and in the right direction relative to Dubai’s downtown where the view in the top picture is what batters would see:

Screen Shot 2014-04-24 at 1.31.21 PMSo, there you have it: Not only are there baseball fields in Dubai, but at least one of them has a killer view.

Bizarre Baseball Culture: Captain America in a Golden Age Tale

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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.

With the upcoming release of Captain America: The Winter Soldier, now is the best possible time to unleash upon you not one but TWO stories featuring the Super Soldier of World War Two. One of them features Cap back during the “Golden Age” of the 1940s, while another takes place after he had been unfrozen from a decades-long ice-sleep.

And, man, what a doozy this one is, from Captain America Comics #7 in October 1941 (I read it as a reprint in a 2009 commemorative issue celebrating 70 years of Marvel comics). This is very early in the history of Captain America, before his trademark shield had it’s most notable look and even before Pearl Harbor. Yes, Captain America was punching Nazis before the United States was even in the war. No Nazis in this story, though, nor are there any Japanese or Italians. No, this story has Captain America and Bucky face off against the hooded villainy of… the Black Toad! You know of the Black Toad, right? Right?

Anyway, this is in…. DEATH LOADS THE BASES.

(GO BELOW THE JUMP FOR MORE)

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2014 SEASON PREVIEW (PART 10): Predictions for the Season, without any further explanations (except one)

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It’s time. Who will be the division winners? Who will win the World Series? Time to see my predictions… without further explanation (except for one).

 

AL East: Boston Red Sox

AL Central: Detroit Tigers

AL West: Texas Rangers

AL Wild Cards: Tampa Rays, Oakland Athletics

AL Champion: Detroit Tigers

NL East: Washington Nationals

NL Central: St. Louis Cardinals

NL West: LA Dodgers

NL Wild Cards: Reds and Giants

NL Champion: St. Louis Cardinals

 

And finally….
World Series Champion: St. Louis Cardinals

 

So why do I think the Cardinals are going to win it all this year? Well, it’s partly my gut, but there is also plenty of good logic behind it. While they have lost Carlos Beltran, the fact remains that their young players- and they have some good ones- will be one more year experienced. And, what’s more, many of those young players are pitchers (such as 2013’s postseason hero Michael Wacha and fire-balling reliever Trevor Rosenthal), and as always pitching is the way to October success. Mix that with their experienced players like Adam Wainwright and Matt Holliday, and you have a team that should be one of the favorites to win the World Series in 2014.

2014 SEASON PREVIEW (PART 8): Everything you wanted to know about the opening series in Australia but didn’t ask

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So, it won’t be long before the 2014 MLB Regular Season starts… in Australia. Yes, this year, it starts in Sydney, Australia. You may or may not have questions about this, but I don’t particularly care what you think, so for our latest preview, we look at these two games that will start off the season.

Okay, first thing’s first, give me the basic details of this thing again?

The LA Dodgers and Arizona Diamondbacks are going to play a two-game series at Sydney’s Sydney Cricket Grounds. These are regular season games that count in the standings.

Okay, so when are they taking place?

Game one takes place around 4 AM Eastern (1 AM Pacific) on March 22nd, with the second game taking place later that date at around 10 PM Eastern (7 PM Pacific). The reason for that is due to the international date line- locally the first game takes place a bit past 7 PM on the 22nd and a bit past 1 PM on the 23rd. Fun fact: Due to these games being in the Southern Hemisphere, the MLB season will, for the first time, START in Fall, as opposed to merely ending in it.

In addition, both the Dodgers and Diamondbacks will have exhibitions against the Australian National Team on the 20th (Dodgers) and 21st (Diamondbacks).

Who’s the home team here?

The Diamondbacks will be the “home” team.

Is it on TV here in America?

Yup. They’ll be on MLB Network, with Matt Vasgersian and Tom Smoltz calling it, with Ian Chappell providing further commentary.

The games will also be on the local TV broadcasts in Arizona and LA. The games about the Australian National Team should be available online, for example on MLB.TV.

Who’s Ian Chappell?

One of the greatest Australian cricketers of all time and a major fixture of Australian TV coverage of Cricket, Chappell has a baseball pedigree, and his son had a brief stint in the minors. Presumably he will be there to provide some local flavor, such as information on the Sydney Cricket Ground, some Australian traditions, etc.

Speaking of which where is this being played, again?

The Sydney Cricket Ground, established in 1848 (although renovated and/or rebuilt several times since then), is one of the world’s most storied cricket venues. It has also been used for both rugby union and league, the Commonwealth Games (at the time called the “British Empire Games”), Australian Rules Football, soccer, concerts, and, yes, at one point baseball- the Chicago White Sox and New York Giants played there during their 1914 world tour.

For baseball, the fences have been set up as 328 down the lines, 370 in the gaps and 400 to straightaway center. Here’s how they changed it from cricket to baseball:

So, who’s pitching?

Game 1: Clayton Kershaw vs. Wade Miley (filling in for Patrick Corbin, who is hurt)

Game 2: Hyun-Jin Ryu vs. Trevor Cahill

Where’s Zack Greinke?

Partially not there because an injury screwed up his throwing schedule, partially not there because his rather… unfiltered… thoughts about how he felt about starting the season in Australia. Carl Crawford and Matt Kemp also didn’t make the trip due to injury.

Are there even any Australians on these teams?

Sort of. Ryan Rowland-Smith. AKA “Hyphen”, is fighting for a spot in the Diamondbacks bullpen. He definitely will be playing in the exhibition games- in fact, the Diamondbacks have given him permission to pitch for Team Australia against the Dodgers.

Can you give me a brief history of baseball in Australia?

From my 2013 WBC preview:

The first baseball in Australia was played by American expats and their friends in the 1850s, but it wasn’t until the 1870s that the first organized teams were formed. The sport received more attention during the World Tours of barnstorming MLB players in the 19th and early 20th century and by the time American servicemen arrived in Australia during WWII there was a small but devoted amateur culture of baseball, one that has survived to this day. However, baseball has not yet been able to get permanently get past that amateur status, with two professional leagues (the Australian Baseball league of 1989-99 and the International Baseball League of Australia of 1999-2002) failing and a complete lack of professional baseball until the new Australian Baseball League was formed with MLB help a few years ago.

What will the crowds be like? I mean, you just said that professional leagues have struggled to survive and that it’s amateur baseball is simply “small but devoted”.

Well, they’ve sold out (or come very close to selling out) both games. It’s also likely, if reports are anything to go on, that they are going to be Diamondbacks fans.

Is this going to be one-off, or a regular thing?

Well, baseball has becoming increasingly driven in expanding the game’s reach internationally, and just having the WBC and the occasional opener in Japan isn’t going to be enough. Already there is some talk that MLB could return to Australia in 2018 if this series is a success, and there have also been rumblings about games in the Netherlands. And, just this year, there have been exhibition games in Panama City and, later in the spring, a return to Montreal. So, yeah, this is going to be a regular thing. Maybe it won’t be in Sydney, maybe it won’t even be a return to Tokyo, Mexico or Puerto Rico (although all of those are certainly possible), but there will be more openers overseas in the future.

Like where?

Besides obvious suspects like Korea, Taiwan or the Dominican Republic (none of which, amazingly, have ever hosted an official MLB game), I wouldn’t be surprised if you see rumblings about maybe doing series in other countries that play cricket, since it’s a lot easier to turn a cricket ground into a baseball field than, say, a soccer pitch. So, don’t be surprised if we end up seeing games in New Zealand (where baseball is the fastest-growing team sport) and the United Kingdom (although the weather there could be a problem) in the not-that-distant future.

Can I see the picture of Vin Scully holding the Koala Bear?

Okay.

Next time: More baseball previewing!

The 2014 MLB Season Preview (Part 1): In Which We Set Our Scene

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Last time we saw Major League Baseball- not counting Spring Training- the Red Sox had won the World Series.

And now, we begin again. When the Dodgers and Diamondbacks kick off the season in Australia, baseball, as it always has, will be both radically different but also the same.

Different, in that, for the first time ever, there will be expanded replay, with Football-style challenges added. Players like Robinson Cano will be in new places, while others, like Joe Mauer, will be at new positions. Mariano Rivera has retired. Also, Bryce Harper has been spending time at the gym.

But, it’ll still be the same. It’s still nine innings. It’s still three strikes and you are out. And the Cubs still haven’t won the World Series since the the Ottoman Empire was still around.

In the coming days, as spring training continues and the openers near, the Baseball Continuum will be looking at the 2014 in nearly every way I can think of: the serious, the insane, the funny and the insightful.

Buckle up.

TwitchplaysPokemon, Fan Managing, and the wisdom (?) of the crowd

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Over the past few days-okay, almost a week now- I have been (stupidly) riveted to the tale of “TwitchPlaysPokemon”. It is a social-experiment/massive-game in which tens of thousands and sometimes over a hundred of thousands all trying to control the main character of Pokemon Red. In theory, you would think this would mean good things: thousands of players, most of them having beaten the game at least once, joining forces to send commands to Red, the game’s player character.

In practice, however, it’s a mess. You see, usually it isn’t a democracy, it’s an anarchic mess of random button pushes, with the game more-or-less randomly selecting what ones it’s listening too. So while having the majority of people saying that the character should go right makes it more likely that he’ll go right, sometimes all it takes is one jerk or confused person pressing down to make Red jump off a ledge and forcing you to walk all the way back and start again. Even the “democracy” mode than occasionally kicks in is screwed up, since lag between you and the server means you are at times voting not for what to do but rather what to do next.

As a result, what an average player might be able to finish rather quickly has taken, at last count, at least 12 days…. playing every single second.

So what does this have to do with baseball? Well, as amazing as it sounds, stuff like this has been tried in baseball. With… mixed results.

The first, and most famous, example of the fans doing the manager’s job was “Grandstand Manager’s Day”, held on August 24, 1951 by Bill Veeck and his hapless St. Louis Browns. The Browns won, defeating the Philadelphia Athletics 5-3. At various points in the game, a question was flashed to the fans, who could then determine (through the use of signs) what they should do: should the infield play in double-play depth, should a runner go, etc.

The rest of the American League was less than happy with the stunt, which probably explains why we’ve never seen it again on the major league level.

So, fast-forward to August of 2004. The Brockton Rox, then of the indy Canadian-American League and with Mike Veeck (Bill’s son, perhaps best known for his role in Disco-Demolition Night) as a consultant, recreated the stunt. It was less successful, as the Rox lost 8-2.

But two years later, a team went even farther. You see, in the second half of 2006, the independent Schaumburg Flyers let the internet dictate parts of their team for a web-based reality show. While the show, “Fan Club: Reality Baseball”, has long disappeared from the web, a Los Angeles Times article from that glorious era and a USA TODAY article from the same time gives us a view of the madness that ensued:

  • The team, which had won their division the first half of the split-season, was in last for the second half.
  • One lineup dictated to the manager had the usual 9-hole hitter leading off, a slow catcher batting second, and the clean-up man hitting sixth.
  • Another lineup- the second one ever handed in- had the team’s best hitter riding the bench, the center-fielder at first, and the backup catcher at third base.
  • The longest losing streak in the team’s history happened.

Ouch.

Of course, there are several key differences between a video game and baseball. And there is the biggest one: You can’t control real people. You can’t tell a baserunner to slide a certain way, for example. And even if you can…. they might not listen.

Still, it’s an interesting thought, and, especially considering the rise of Twitter, it is likely only a matter of time until somebody, presumably in the Indy leagues, tries it again. After all, you can’t keep a crazy idea down.

Bizarre Baseball Culture: Stuart Taylor time-travels to the days of the Knickerbockers (only not really)

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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.

Man, I wish I had a time machine to take back all those claims that this was going to be coming out”tomorrow”. Yes, I did just turn my own hectic scheduling errors into a lead-in joke. Deal with it.

Anyway, Time travel. One of the great tropes of Science Fiction. Is it any surprise that Bizarre Baseball Culture also now features time travel?

Yes, it’s time for a tale featuring a dude named Stuart Taylor, who, along with his companions Laura and Doctor Hayward, travels back to the age of the Knickerbockers baseball team (sort of).

The story from Jumbo Comics #135 (May 1950) can be found here, starting on page 29. Go below the jump for the rest of this article.

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