things I learned about in baseball this week/how i learned to stop worrying and love baseball

Man oh man. Casas drew a walk in the first inning, then had clutched at his side and was subbed out after the inning.

Me: 🙃

To recap, the starting infield for this team:

SS: Trevor Story - season ending injury
2B - Vaughn Grissom - groin strain in spring training, working through a rehab assignment
3B - Rafael Devers - sore shoulder, bone bruise on knee
1B - Triston Casas - “left field with left rib discomfort”

Fucking brutal. Hopefully he doesn’t miss too much time, but at least I got to see him hit a home run yesterday.

Saw Yoshida go 3-4 with a home run today and he was great. Kutter Crawford got into a jam in the sixth inning, Cora left him in and he got out of it. Joely Rodriguez came in to pitch the seventh and I was looking on my phone for Casas and when I heard Joely was coming in, I went, FUCK! I was right though.

Kenley came in for a save and was actually fine. Pirates manager got tossed for arguing an automatic strike call. Please don’t miss too much time, Casas!

gyac please stop killing my hometown baseball team

my man Mitch Keller might have injured the least healthy infielder

btw I cheered for Cutch when he came on to pinch hit

Also I talked to lots of Pirates fans

<3

Surprise win today with a patchwork lineup. Have I mentioned that on all three days that we were sitting in seats that we ended up realising were the wrong ones on two separate occasions and having to move? I have not.

Today Wilyer Abreu went 3-5 and drove in two runs; as someone who’s a nl Abreu truther based on his eye and his arm (both great), this was incredible for me. Ceddanne playing shortstop was great too; it remains to be seen if he’ll be as good there as at CF but I definitely felt good about him fielding the position and he made some plays.

Connor Wong was catching today and he was fine. He played well too.

Reese McGuire pinch hit and drove in two runs; did this prevent us from making fun of him? Reader, it did not.

Oh yeah, Aroldis Chapman came on to pitch and I booed him. I could not have told you I had that in me.

Various pictures that are mainly zoomed the fuck in or moving closer to the field when the game ended/before it started, so sorry for the mostly poor quality. I regret not being able to get a video of Bello dancing in the dugout:

https://i.postimg.cc/KcD5q11z/IMG-9511.jpg
Bello! I love him so much and I was glad I was there to see him pitch well. Today he was in the dugout wearing his hoodie up and dancing to music played between innings. He’s adorable.

https://i.postimg.cc/HsS9mF41/IMG-9518.jpg
The man himself on the right.

https://i.postimg.cc/5y48dmXt/IMG-9665.jpg
Our view before we realised we were sitting in the wrong section (!) and had to move.

https://i.postimg.cc/3JrFP3GZ/IMG-9679.jpg
Kutter Crawford after his first win of the year (his ERA over five starts is like 0.77).

https://i.postimg.cc/26FnKt8J/IMG-9704.jpg
Alex Cora today. He was out throwing batting practice earlier and will sometimes join in with the infielders as well.

https://i.postimg.cc/BnXcnNML/IMG-9711.jpg
Andrew Bailey and Jason Varitek going to the bullpen before the game.

https://i.postimg.cc/tg63hJ09/IMG-9727.jpg
Connor Wong.

https://i.postimg.cc/GmVP8Y5M/IMG-9734.jpg
Chris Martin, ???, Kenley Jansen. Possibly the middle guy is Bailey, I know all the relievers on this roster and I can see Joely Rodriguez and Bernie in the background. Everyone else was used.

Fun photos. Always love being able to see the bridge in the outfield.

Trip to Clemente museum

Went to the Clemente museum a few days back, felt like a necessary visit. Had a great time. It’s basically set across two floors with exhibits laid out across the floors and you can just walk around and explore within your time slot. They limit the number of people in there in every given hour so there’s a chance for everyone to see everything.

One of the first things we saw was this very morbid exhibit: a wing from the small plane that Clemente died in.

https://i.postimg.cc/J4Ym9mHQ/IMG-9613.jpg
https://i.postimg.cc/XNQ0C3L0/IMG-9614.jpg

They had shirts and bats and other expected memorabilia:

https://i.postimg.cc/bvcXhvy1/IMG-9621.jpg
https://i.postimg.cc/c4rPt36Q/IMG-9632.jpg
https://i.postimg.cc/RVyy70n2/IMG-9635.jpg
https://i.postimg.cc/tRmMbgD7/IMG-9636.jpg
https://i.postimg.cc/ZqcwMYCb/IMG-9654.jpg

But also some less expected stuff, like his custom golf clubs, his fashion suit(!) and my favourite of all, a pot he made for his wife after he got into throwing pottery while suffering from insomnia:

https://i.postimg.cc/nz2NBYv1/IMG-9628.jpg
https://i.postimg.cc/0QPLzHJQ/IMG-9630.jpg
https://i.postimg.cc/SKqZdYQ1/IMG-9639.jpg


I didn’t get a picture of it, but he messed up the side of the pot and drew a little heart with his name on it there instead.

There were guides who were very helpful; they were mainly people who’d seen him play and one man told us that he and his brother overheard Clemente give his number to a reporter and they’d ring him after games. He said Clemente always answered and was kind to them.

One of the guides told us that Clemente would rent buses in his earliest days for the black and Latin players because often they couldn’t go to the same places as their white counterparts and he tried to help them out whenever he could. I’d seen a RETIRE 21 sign at PNC so I asked about it; his number is obviously retired by the Pirates but they are pushing for league wide recognition to have the number retired like Jackie Robinson’s.



Some signed shirts belonging to visiting players; the Giants one is Posey.

There’s a picture of Javy Baez wearing the Clemente suit jacket in the museum which you can see in my photo, more on this here: https://www.mlb.com/cut4/javy-baez-wore-a-jacket-from-the-roberto-clemente-museum-at-the-home-run-derby-c

I love Javy Baez. I asked my hometown Cubs friend the other day his favorite player from the 2016 Cubs team and we agreed it's Javy Baez. That suit looks perfect on him, so styling ~~

Yes! His bat is terrible now but I don’t think that man will ever need to pay for a drink in Chicago for the rest of his life. Truly a blessed team

My last few pictures didn’t load, think I messed up bb code. Player shirts:

https://i.postimg.cc/XvcP6cD0/IMG-9647.jpg
https://i.postimg.cc/5yjKvc9x/IMG-9648.jpg

Other pics:
https://i.postimg.cc/PJc3Q6N1/IMG-9646.jpg
https://i.postimg.cc/LsMWW0DT/IMG-9644.jpg
https://i.postimg.cc/sgW8wRYx/IMG-9633.jpg
https://i.postimg.cc/d3SXSsNk/IMG-9626.jpg
https://i.postimg.cc/brCccHrv/IMG-9625.jpg

xp Folks in Detroit keep hoping he'll get his groove back. He's still a great fielder and base runner. He did have an RBI yesterday.

He is! I’ve been following him.

Things my parents learned about baseball this week (from coming in when I was watching a game and insisting I left it on):

- “Yeah it was the one in the Handmaids Tale” (Fenway)
- “Yeah it’s called the Green Monster it’s like 40 feet high”
- “Yeah they’ll hit home runs over that, that big fella there smashed someone’s windscreen there last week”
- “i do support them but it’s complicated”
- “So they had this disgusting sausage that they’ve been throwing around in the dugout for home runs because they’re on a really long winning streak”
“He’s really good but he’s injured”
“92 isn’t that fast to throw”

“i do support them but it’s complicated”

loll

My collector friend was appalled that I didn't recognize Fenway in The Handmaid's Tale; I was appalled that, same episode, he didn't know "Oh Bondage! Up Yours!"

Lol

Just like the real conversation all the actual points came back to me late

- “Do foreign players play baseball? Are they any good?”
I talk about Dominicans and Venezuelans and point to Ceddanne Rafaela and say, he’s from Curaçao but I don’t know if that counts as part of the Netherlands or not. Literally ten minutes later OH YEAH SHOHEI OHTANI
- yeah so his assistant who was his best friend stole $16m from him and it was a HUGE thing and now I guess he’s going to jail
- yeah he deferred $680m presumably until he’s living in a different tax jurisdiction but it’s all on NPV so it’s not actually $680m in 2024 money I think?
- yeah they do get injured all the time throwing like that

“Do foreign players play baseball? Are they any good?”

You have no doubt posted about this and I missed it, but I literally learned yesterday time that the Red Sox have one of only two Portuguese-born players in MLB history on their roster, Isaiah Campbell; the other was Frank Thomspon, who played 12 games for Washington and Brooklyn in 1875. How did I find out? Well, as you might expect, it all started with an upcoming book on Canadian glam rock.

time

I didn’t post that but I did know that. My Sox friend says there’s a Portuguese community there that’s very excited about him. He’s currently rehabbing an injury (along with 90% of the roster)

Earlier this week I was on hold for a phone call forever and while I was waiting I was drawing, as I often do. I found myself drawing something unusual: a gameday box. Gradually I knew which at bat I wanted to draw: the described AB from Casey At The Bat. I’d never heard of this poem before a few weeks ago when a podcast I listen to did a bit mocking Casey and wondering what his baseball savant page would look like. But the way the batter came out from my pen (grim-looking, not dynamic, he doesn’t believe in choking up on the bat or a two strike approach or any of that modern NONSENSE), made me think of that discussion and so I went with it.

To my mind, the unnamed other team’s pitcher was probably pitching a complete game because the poem is gloomy about the quality of the Mudville lineup. Casey pitches no higher than fifth in this lineup and he’s fucking awful; there’s no way that Mudville ever wins unless the pitching is lights out.

Mudville as a team clearly has some clutch qualities; two of their bad hitters manage to get on base in the bottom of the ninth with two outs (a single and a double) and Casey only needs a bloop into the outfield to tie the game.

Casey seems like a fan favourite who’s fallen on hard times. But the fans are tired of losing and they’re wishing that kid hitting .400 would get a shot and Casey can’t come up with the old magic one last time…can he? Can he?

Anyway this is far too many words for something that took me five minutes to draw (and effort seems like rather less) tbh
https://i.postimg.cc/L5493J9H/IMG-1083.jpg
https://i.postimg.cc/rsYkGgZJ/IMG-1082.jpg

If you want to know how ingrained baseball was (is?) in USA culture, this is the first poem I can remember reading in English class (3rd grade, 5th Grade maybe?).

Great drawing, too. Though he needs baggier pantaloons.

I wondered about this but by the time I thought about that it was drawn

I'm interested to know how you cam up with the pitch sequence

camE

Do you really think the hoodoo and the cake are batting 4-5? I'd always thought of them as the bottom of the order - like the last guys you'd expect to come up big. i suppose it is true that Casey is "mighty" - maybe not your archetypal leadoff hitter

If they’re batting at the bottom of the order making Casey the nine hole hitter then why would there be a stir in the crowd at the thought of Casey getting a chance to hit? Mudville clearly aren’t a good team, they can only muster a crowd of 5000 odd in the days before tv

I thought they were 8-9

But why would you put a guy who strikes out on three pitches as your leadoff guy? Casey has to be bad enough to do that but also relatively good enough that the crowd want to see him at the plate

The entire poem is about how even the greatest can strike out on three pitches!!!

“That’s baseball”

He’s the mighty Casey! Judge and Ohtani and Ruth rolled into one!

The entire poem is about how even the greatest can strike out on three pitches!!!

Cause they’re the bottom of the order? Cause their good guys have been on the IL for two weeks? Who knows

It was the first pitch! Guys like Wade Boggs pretty much never swung at the first pitch

I haven't read the poem in 35+ years, but isn't Casey the cleanup hitter?

I understand the logic of looking at the first pitch but bro’s like “I’m so good I can watch two strikes and then I’ll lock in”. Except he isn’t!

If Casey is batting cleanup, then that shifts everyone on my lineup up one place and then you’re looking back at the same problem (why is he batting behind these losers)

The outlook wasn't brilliant for the Mudville nine that day:
The score stood four to two, with but one inning more to play,
And then when Cooney died at first, and Barrows did the same,
A pall-like silence fell upon the patrons of the game.

4-2 in the 9th isn’t a brilliant outlook no matter who’s on deck

Anyway why do you think those are their two best hitters?

at that point you’ve got nobody on, down 2, 2 out, and a hoodoo (I always remember this as “a lulu”) and a cake before it even gets to mighty Casey. A pall-like silence sounds about right

But shouldn’t the guys hitting in front of cleanup be good enough to get on base? The crowd should be cheering for them, but they don’t, cos they know they’re bad!

Maybe Casey has Tyler O’Neill disease, where it ain’t his style to drive in runners on base. Solo homers only!

Lol. Yeah that’s the part that doesn’t quite click into place - “mighty” Casey feels like an archetypal cleanup guy.

^^^
though, yeah, it doesn't make much sense that the two weak hitters are ahead of Casey

maybe 1888 analytics said bat your worst hitters early so they can rest and don't get rubella or something

Hahahaomg surely "Mudville nine" means the team. Baseball used to be a game played with 9 players!!

xp PBKR 💀💀💀

Yeah felicity that’s what I think I means as well - but they aren’t the best up for the team in that inning, like they aren’t meant to be guys that would give a good shot at getting on base. But it turns out they’re clutch and Casey isn’t!

I admit, haven't done my podcast homework assignment yet.

in my mind there are two possibilities - casey is leadoff or casey is cleanup. i like tracer's interpretation for casey as leadoff but casey as cleanup is how i remember it too.

i agree with gyac that mudville probably had the lead first. i do think that they lost the lead relatively late in the game, which is why the crowd is so volatile and calling for the umpire to be killed.

CASEY AS LEADOFF
-cooney and barrows are the sixth and seventh batters. not great but not spectacular. can be thought to reliably put the ball in play at least, maybe get some singles. and they both did put the ball in play. but they both 'died at first'.
-flynn the hodooo and jimmy the cake are eight and ninth. understandably there's a pall when they're due up. jimmy is also the pitcher and is despisèd for not only being a terrible hitter but also allowing 4 runs in the seventh and eighth, turning a surefire win into a probable loss. however, the fact that he "tore the cover off the ball" and legged out a double was totally unexpected. it adds to the crowd's excitement after "the dust had lifted" and the "men saw what had occurred" - the crowd needed a second to process - who would have thought the 8 and 9 guys would get on base, much less both be in scoring position?
-casey in this scenario is a nineteenth century kyle schwarber. guy who starts the game off with a solo home run. maybe both runs in the game are due to casey solo shots. mighty casey! but also bats under 200 and is on the verge of setting the single season strikeout record, so the end of the poem is VMIC.

CASEY AS CLEANUP
-cooney the pitcher bats ninth and barrows is leadoff. the poem isn't negative towards cooney because when he bats there are no outs, anything can happen, even if he gets out that's only one out, still plenty of life in the inning.
-but when barrows the leadoff hitter can't get on base - that's bad. two outs!
-biggest question here as has been pointed out is why flynn and jimmy are so bad and hated but still batting two and three. i think it's because they're both 0-4 in the game, four strikeouts each, 10 RISP left on between them (bottom of the order has been hitting well), and not only that but have been slumping in their previous games - and the manager won't shuffle the lineup yet because he doesn't want to mess with their heads (the other reason the manager won't change the lineup is because the manager also either flynn or jimmy). jimmy is also probably in year 2 of a 10 year/$3000 contract that he's drastically underperforming. so he's much depisèd. that said, he can still smack the ball occasionally - this is supported by blake "[tearing] the cover off the ball" and legging out a double.
-casey bats cleanup as most people assume and you know what happens next.

i don't like casey as cleanup because even if the two and three hitters are underperforming, they're still good and the crowd should still have some hope. i think casey as schwarber is the better read, even if it goes against how most people remember the poem.

Jesus Christ this is an absolutely superb analysis. I’m in awe here.

I prefer your favourite interpretation too! Plus it’s funnier.

Cooney and Barrows both grounded out and not just grounded out but died. Suggests they are both ultra slow and baserunning liabilities. Also I really like the idea of Jimmy Blake being the pitcher. I know he includes the first name to make it scan better but I like the idea of there being several Blakes on the team hence the need to specify.

“Blake, as in our best hitter?”
“No Blake as in the pitcher who gave up a grand slam to the nine hole hitter last series.”