Tag Archives: MLB

Picture of the day: Johan in happier days

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Johan Santana will almost certainly be placed on the DL and is expected to miss the entirety of the 2013 season after a re-tear in the anterior capsule of his left shoulder was detected in an MRI. Surgery is a true possibility, and the last time he had such surgery (in 2010), he was not able to return to MLB pitching until 2012. Now 34, it is quite possible he has thrown his final pitch in the big leagues.

So now, let us remember back during Johan Santana’s glory days with the Minnesota Twins by looking at this picture:

Photo by Keith Allison, used under a Creative Commons license.

2013 MLB Preview part 3: 162 Things Guaranteed to Happen in the 2013 MLB Season (Part 2)

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Did you read the first part of the 162 things yesterday? If not, you should. Go below the jump for today’s things:

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2013 MLB Preview part 2: 162 Things Guaranteed to Happen in the 2013 MLB Season (Part 1)

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What’s going to happen in this, the 2013 Major League Baseball Season? Well, I have 162 ideas- ranging from the serious to the sarcastic. At the end of the year, I’ll look at what my record was. Hopefully I will do better than the Astros.

This is a big and long post, so it can be found UNDER THE JUMP.

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2013 MLB Preview, Part 1: First Things That Pop Into My Mind

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Okay, time to play a bit of a game with myself: For every team in Major League Baseball, I type out the first (printable) thought I have on them. Sometimes they will actually have to do with the coming season, other times they will just be random observations or the name of their best player. This is acting as part 1 of a series of unknown length that will constitute my preview of the 2013 season.

So, here we go:

Arizona Diamondbacks: Kirk Gibson likes guys who are gritty.

Atlanta Braves: No Chipper but 2 Uptons.

Baltimore Orioles: There’s no way they can do it again, right?

Chicago Cubs: Will trade Alfonso Soriano sometime.

Chicago White Sox: Won’t be better than the Tigers.

Cincinnati Reds: Could win the division again.

Cleveland Indians: Terry Francona.

Colorado Rockies: Carlos Gonzalez. Todd Helton is still playing.

Detroit Tigers: World Series favorite.

Houston Astros: Welcome the American League, enjoy last place.

Kansas City Royals: Better but not going to be nearly good enough.

Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, California: Great lineup, suspect pitching after Jered Weaver and C.J. Wilson.

Los Angeles Dodgers: Magic, Money, and Matt Kemp.

Miami Marlins: Pity poor Giancarlo Stanton.

Milwaukee Brewers: Major League Baseball is coming for Ryan Braun.

Minnesota Twins: Rebuilding in progress.

New York Mets: David Wright.

New York Yankees: Robinson Cano and some old guys. Also: Mariano Rivera‘s last stand.

Oakland Athletics: The beard of Josh Reddick.

Philadelphia Phillies: Is Roy Halladay over the hill?

Pittsburgh Pirates: Andrew McCutchen.

San Diego Padres: Chase Headley.

San Francisco Giants: The defending champs.

Seattle Mariners: Felix Hernandez.

St. Louis Cardinals: Albert who?

Texas Rangers: Not what they have been.

Toronto Blue Jays: I need to get a passport so I can go watch them play.

Washington Nationals: The other World Series favorite.

Come back in the coming days for more thoughts and previews of the 2013 MLB season.

Famous for Something Else: Danny Ainge

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Danny Ainge was an All-Star with the Boston Celtics, and later would become an award-winning executive for them after he hung up the uniform. But before he started his professional basketball career, the BYU grad had a short career with the Blue Jays. Go below the jump to see his major league and minor league stats:

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Baseball players celebrating their birthday today

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Just for those of you sick of the 50th birthday of Michael Jordan, I now present to you a list of five baseball players who were born on February 17:

Wally Pipp

Josh Willingham

Ed Brandt

Rod Dedeaux (who would later be one of the greatest college coaches in baseball history)

Cody Ransom

…

So there you go. Oh, and Red Barber was born on 2-17 as well.

The grand World Baseball Classic Question and Answer (Part 4: Miscellaneous)

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If you haven’t seen the previous Q&A installments, you can find them here, here and here.

Today’s WBC Q&A covers basically everything else that is left on the World Baseball Classic that I haven’t covered elsewhere. Go below the jump for it.

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15 things guaranteed to happen in Spring Training

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The following things are guaranteed to happen during spring training:

1. At least one player per team will be declared to be in the best shape of his life.

2. On at least one day, basically every Grapefruit League game will be cancelled due to rain.

3. You will check the box score of every exhibition game against a college team, just to see if any MLB players were struck out by a college pitcher or a college pitcher got a hit off a MLB pitcher.

4. At least one game will be delayed due to a weird reason, like a tornado warning or a large swarm of bees.

5. At least one person will write an article questioning whether Michael Bourn‘s continued free agency is a sign of collusion, as opposed to the reality, which is that the Minnesota Twins basically removed Washington and Philadelphia- two of the most likely destinations for Bourn- when they traded Denard Span and Ben Revere, unintentionally destroying the demand for Bourn in the process.

6. Somebody will try to liken something going on in Spring Training to the going-ons in Vatican City, and it won’t make for a good metaphor.

7. A MLB player will tweet out a picture of what his NCAA bracket looks like.

8. There will be confusion when a player on a World Baseball Classic team plays an exhibition against his usual team.

9. While watching stock footage of players doing routine workouts, you will inexplicably get the theme from The Rookie stuck in your head.

10. Somebody will have an embarrassing injury that will have more to do with their own stupidity or bad luck then some sort of baseball activity.

11. After the Astros lose a Cactus League game, somebody on Twitter will declare that they have been mathematically eliminated from playoff contention.

12. We will hear about some humorous clubhouse prank.

13. At least one notable veteran will announce their retirement.

14. The Yankees will be declared doomed, the World Series favorites and a Wild Card contender… possibly all on the same day.

15. Everyone in Tampa, at Yankees’ camp, will be on 24/7 Alex Rodriguez watch.

Picture of the day: Walter Johnson gets a car

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Another image from the Library of Congress Flickr stream, this one is of Walter Johnson receiving a car.

But why is he receiving a car? Well, from 1911 to 1914, the MVP was awarded a car  from Chalmers Automobile. The winner of the AL MVP in 1913? Walter Johnson. This is him receiving that car.

One week until pitchers and catchers!

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As we near pitchers and catchers, we now have a countdown to 8:00 AM of February 11 over on the side of the page. The 8:00 AM time is just some random time, since just putting it at midnight wouldn’t be be quite true.

So, yeah, we are in the home stretch, everyone!