Astros Boyfriend Hits Girlfriend With a Foul Ball – Thumbs Down
Baseball is America’s pastime. Our childhood memories bring us back to playing catch with our dads, our first little league baseball game, and our first Major League Baseball game. Pretty much every American has a check mark next to those three events. One event that lingers is catching a foul ball in an MLB game. It’s a dream. People go crazy and will do anything for a foul ball (I can’t seem to find the video of a Rangers fan-I think- who knocked over a child to get to a foul ball and proceeded to get hit by the cane of an old lady…if you find this video, bonus points for you!). Catching a foul ball is one of the greatest highlights of a person’s career. The feeling of getting your hands on that little baseball while 10 other fans are fighting for it is so exhilarating. The only logical thing to do when you catch one is to hold the ball up high in the air for everyone to see that YOU came out of the scrum successful.
Well, as you’ll see in the video below, it seems that one Astros fan must have a different idea of how to act when a foul ball comes your way. Not only does the Astros fan cry foul by wearing his hat half-backwards/half-sideways, not only did he also miss a spot under his lip while shaving earlier that day before picking up his date, but he also broke the first rule of taking a date to a baseball game.
Rule #1: Don’t let your date get hit by a foul ball.
Not only does he let her get hit by the ball, but he is the sole reason she got hit: He ducked out of the way! When every other baseball fan would keep his or her hands high to catch the ball coming to them, this fan takes a lesson from Peter LaFleur and dodges.
Hope this guy bought plenty of gifts, flowers and a cold ice pack for that bruise on the girl’s elbow.
Bonus Video: Here’s Dave Chappelle’s take on the status of chivalry in America.
Thumbs Down – Nielsen Co. Baseball Algorithm Hates the Cleveland Indians
The Sports section of the Wall Street Journal today (you read that right, the Sports section….again, the SPORTS SECTION!) ran an article titled “Are the Yankees Truly the Most-Despised Ballclub?” The quick, easy answer to this is Yes. The other option would be the Red Sox (Red Sox Nation=annoying). However, the article reported some unexpected and startling news.
In an Internet algorithm designed by the Nielsen Co., the most-despised ballclub in all of baseball, get this…is the Cleveland Indians!! Now, I might be writing out of emotion because I’m from Cleveland and I love the Indians more than any other team. But, rationally, this result just does not make sense to me or, really, anyone else.
The algorithm was based on the team’s Internet presence and the reactions people have towards a team based on certain keywords. ”I love the Yankees” would be a positive point while “I hate the Yankees” would yield a negative point. The scale was based from -5 to 5. Not one team registered a negative result. The Yankees, finishing in fifth-to-last place, registered a score of 1.8. The Red Sox, a 1.1. And, the most “hated” and “despicable” Indians came in at a 0.9.
The Cleveland Indians don’t deserve this score at all. Here’s a list of reasons why:
- They haven’t done anything to anyone. The Indians last won a title in 1948 and came close in ’95 and ’97 (Be taller Charles Nagy!!). Other than that, they have been mediocre at best, having flashes of potential World Series contenders a year here and a year there.
- Who thinks to themself: “Man, I hate those Cleveland Indians! Bunch of low-lifes…they make me sick!”
- I don’t know how Indians’ fans are on the road, but I doubt that they are as obnoxious and arrogant as some other road team fans (again, I’m picking on you Yankees and Red Sox fans, but it’s true).
- Major League I and Major League II are two of the finest baseball films ever, both telling the heart-warming tale of the Cleveland Indians.
- I wonder how accurate the algorithm and Internet browsing were. What if people hated actual Indians (I don’t know why they would). Would the algorithm take that as not liking the Cleveland Indians? Was it based strictly on the nickname given, or did it consider other monikers like the Tribe?
- Not one team registered a negative score, so nobody really hates or despises anyone here.
Again, it maybe out of pure emotion and love for my home team, but how did the Cleveland Indians be determined as the most-despised team? They are second all-time for most consecutive sell-out crowds with 455 (only behind the Red Sox who also have a significantly smaller baseball stadium) and have given teams some of their key all-star players who have helped them make playoff runs and even win World Series (Manny Ramirez-Red Sox, Bartolo Colon-Angels/Expos, C.C. Sabathia-Milwaukee/NewYork, Cliff Lee-Phillies/Mariners, Victor Martinez-Red Sox, Brian Giles-Padres come to the top of my mind).
If anything, opposing fans shouldn’t hate the Indians, they should thank them ten-fold for being able to produce all-star caliber players, build them up to their all-star status, and then trade them away to your desperate teams, helping you and your team advance further in the playoffs than the Indians.
Denard Span, You’re Grounded! – Thumbs Down
Spring Training is a time to get back into baseball shape, get one’s timing down, and relax in sunny locations such as Florida or Arizona. However, it might be a little harder to focus all your time on baseball when you’re busy focusing your attention on your mother…who is now injured…because your foul ball entered the stands and struck her. Denard Span has a lot of explaining to do at the dinner table, and he maybe grounded until further notice (further notice being until Span buys his mother more things with his recently signed 5 year, $16.5 million contract). Here’s the video:
International Baseball Series – Thumbs Up
One thing that annoys me a bit is the labeling of all American sports champions (no matter what sport) as “World Champions”. The NFL doesn’t even include a team from neighboring countries in its league. The NBA and MLB only feature one team from outside the United States (Toronto Raptors in the NBA; Toronto Blue Jays in the MLB). The NHL boosts even more Canadian teams in its league. The MLS is starting to grow into Canadian territory as it recently added a Toronto team and will be adding a Vancouver team in a few years. However, just adding a team or two from Canada shouldn’t allow American sport leagues to crown their champions as “World Champions”. I understand that the leagues draw players from all across the globe, but it still doesn’t mean that they can be called “World Champions”.
But, this all may change soon. Bud Selig, commissioner of Major League Baseball, recently met with Japanese baseball commissioner Ryozo Kato in Milwaukee and they discussed a possible International Baseball Series which would pin the MLB champions against the Nippon Professional Baseball league champions from Japan. This is a little bit like the Little League World Series on a grown-up scale, and I think it would be a great step for baseball. As Americans, we always strive to be the best and sometimes we have a sense of being all-powerful. If this proposition follows through, we will finally have the opportunity and the right to call ourselves “World Champions”. Maybe other sports’ commissioners should take a page out of Selig’s playbook, but they should also be sure to skip this page.
Thumbs Up – Flip Flop Fly Ball
I like baseball. I also like interesting graphs(I can’t believe I just admited that). Finally I have some way to combine these two love besides FanGraphs, which is awesome in its own right. I’m talking about Flip Flop Fly Ball, where artist Craig Robinson has created a number of infographics describing various statistics about baseball. They range from how much money the MLB would spend if players actually stole the bases to a very cool timeline about when teams broke the color barrier. There’s plenty of other interesting stuff on his main site, Flip Flop Flyin’, but you can explore that on your own. All in all, his graphs are interesting and beautifully done, and I look forward to him creating more. I leave you with two images from the site: the first is a height comparison of the green monster, the second is the artist’s example of ”really fantasy baseball”.
