Tag Archives: Random Ideas

Random Thought: Have more MLB-Service Academy games

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Sorry that the remaining predictions aren’t up yet- it will be tomorrow during my preview spectacular. Instead, a random thought:

As I mentioned earlier today, the Yankees were playing Army at West Point.I watched some of the game, and it was, far as I could tell, pure class, with the respect between the two teams evident throughout.

So, what I’m wondering is: why can’t this be something done regularly? There are three service academies in Division I, would it not be a good idea to have MLB games at those academies every spring so long as the schedule of the academy team and MLB team allowed? Couldn’t the Orioles play Navy at Annapolis, or the Rockies play Air Force in chilly Colorado Springs? Or maybe have the Nationals rotate with the Orioles at Annapolis? Or maybe have the Mets go to West Point?

Actually, scratch that last one. The men and women of our armed services deserve better than the Mets these days.

Just a random thought.

Baseball needs a better trophy

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On Monday, the Stanley Cup was handed out. It is a a nearly 120-year-old trophy that is more revered than the actual event that is played for the right to have it. People have drunk out of it, had their kids baptized in it, it’s been thrown in rivers and pools and knocked off tables. There are names on it that are misspelled or put on as gags. Wherever it goes, it has at least one concierge with it. Every year, it produces a instant image that would become etched in the mind of that team’s fans: the captain hoisting it above his head, parading it around the ice.

In October, the winner of the World Series will receive the Commissioner’s Trophy (did you even know it had a name?), a rather uniconic statuette that has a new copy made every year for the champion, unlike the Cup, which goes from team to team. It only dates back to 1967. There are no iconic images of the Commissioner’s Trophy: no hoistings by the team leader, no images of a unflappable star weeping as they hold it and certainly no thrustings into the air as confetti falls. Why, the default pose with the Commissioner’s Trophy is just kind of holding it, like Lance Berkman did. Although Pedro used it as a hat, which is kind of cool.

(more after jump)

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