Breaking Hair Alert: Cole Hamels's Goatee, Part II

From my personal Cole Hamels archive:

If you want to read or contribute to a message board about this goatee, you can do so here.

Breaking Hair Alert: Cole Hamels's Goatee, Part 1

Last night, Cole Hamels shut down the Padres. He also got two hits! Why don't these count towards my Fantasy stats? I have a few players who have only had one hit this week (Jeter) and could use the boost in batting average. Here he is caught in a run down between first and second base:

But the important news is Cole Hamels's new facial hair. What's going on, here?? More photos to follow.

Brooklyn Throwback

The newly orphaned Dodgers wore Brooklyn throwback uniforms yesterday in their extra-inning victory over the Atlanta Braves. Our old friend Casey Blake hit a home run!

Emerging ace Clayton Kershaw struck out seven batters and wore very large pants. Matt Kemp hit a walk-off home run in the 12th inning. I think he has the right idea with the high socks. Is this shade of powder blue the universal signifier of PAJAMAS? I remember the Blue Jays doing something like this once, to pretty much the same effect.

In case you've forgotten, this is what the Dodgers usually look like:

And what they did look like when they were in Brooklyn (courtesy of this cool fan blog):

Now, I too must brush my teeth and leave Brooklyn.

Look Now, Look Again

Here are some things I noticed while scrolling through the Yahoo! Sports MLB Photo Gallery:

Successfully pitching his first complete game of the season did not change Roy Halladay's perpetually dour expression. The above photo made me think of this, for some reason:


It's Saint Sebastian! The patron saint of "soldiers, plagues, arrows, athletes/athletics/sports." I googled "patron saint of baseball" and this is what happened:

Thanks dude. Since we're on the subject of religion:

...
...
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I love thinking about what the Connecticut basketball player to A-Rod's right is texting in this photo. Doesn't A-Rod look like he's made out of plastic?


And finally, I swear that Derek Jeter is wearing bigger pants than normal:

See?

I did a few image searches for "Derek Jeter big pants" and "Derek Jeter tight pants" and "Is Derek Jeter wearing bigger pants than usual?" Which lead to this:

The internet...who knows why anything is the way it is. More Derek Jeter pants updates to follow.

Baseball as Experienced Through my iPhone

Here are some iPhone photos of my recent baseball activities:

Yankee Stadium, Hat Night

A page from my baseball card binder

Watching the Dodgers on my computer

Earlier today, an appropriately dreamy photo of Cole Hamels

Cole Hamels was great this afternoon. Here are two notable excerpts from his 2009 Sports Illustrated profile:

In early January 2009 Cole and Heidi drove their Jeep, with a U-Haul attached, from their house in suburban Philadelphia to Clearwater so Cole could start his off-season workouts at the Phillies' spring training facility. On the way they stopped in Orlando. There Heidi, a dedicated runner who has a master's degree in exercise physiology, ran a half-marathon and attended a convention on behalf of a company she has started with her sister Dawn called sistasshirts.com, which produces and sells inspirational T-shirts for female runners. (Cole manned the credit-card swiper.)

Hamels is also humble and quick to laugh at himself. He casts himself as the rube in many of the personal stories he tells. There was the time that shortstop Jimmy Rollins and a few other teammates invited him to play cards on the team plane. ("I was like, Sure, I know how to play poker, but it wasn't poker, and the next thing I know, all my meal money's gone.") And the misunderstanding over the 2010 Chevy Camaro he won as the World Series MVP and promised in a postgame interview to give to Heidi. ("I kept waiting for them to deliver it, so I finally called and they said you have to order it online, and it'll take eight months. I was like, I thought I just got the one that was on the field!")

I'm now listening to the Yankees-Red Sox game on the radio. No photos will be taken.

Evan Longoria's Hair

I don't want to talk about Evan Longoria's strained left oblique. I want to talk about his hair.

This mullet of free spirited curls isn't that bad when he keeps his hat on, especially considering this look:

Or this one:

Or this one:

APRIL FOOL'S! That's Johnny Damon. Did you see him fall down in left field the other day?

Opening Day 2011

The forecast promises snow and freezing rain tomorrow, but the long, dark season of "I-guess-I'll-get-interested-in-football-but-I-still-don't-like-basketball" is finally over. I've been watching baseball on my computer, on my phone and on a muted television at the Greenpoint YMCA for nine hours and counting, now. Here are my favorite photos of things I may have seen at one point during the day:

TIGERS v. YANKEES

AMERICA: giant flag, fireworks, Statue of Liberty, advertisements,
Yankees, baseball, hot dogs (probably somewhere).

Curtis Granderson's diving catch. Later, he hit a home run.

Welcome to New York, Miggy.

Mark Teixeira hit a 3-run home run. Derek Jeter said "Congratulations!"

BRAVES v. NATIONALS

AMERICA: shooting columns of fire into the air,
men charging through clouds of smoke

Bahhhh. You again.

BREWERS v. REDS

Prince Fielder with beard and earflaps.

PADRES v. CARDINALS

I have this guy Chase Headley on my Fantasy team. Here he
is scoring a run. What does his face look like?

ANGELS v. ROYALS

Bobby Abreu chewing gum.

GIANTS v. DODGERS

I typically cheer for the Dodgers, but with Joe Torre gone, Casey Blake injured, Andre Ethier wearing a ponytail and MLB.tv not allowing me to listen to the Vin Scully audio over the ESPN video feed, I wasn't sure how I'd feel during the game. The ESPN announcers sucked. I mean, you can't just say that Pablo Sandoval lost 40 lbs. on the "chicken salad diet" and not describe what was in the chicken salad. I don't know what he was eating before, but mainlining mayonnaise doesn't sound like the fastest route to good health.

The California Baseball Giants

But he looks a lot thinner here.

Matt Kemp had a good night. I forget how attractive he is and then
see him and think he should be a movie star.

Anyway, despite the aforementioned factors, I really enjoyed this game. You'd have to have a heart made out of wormy garbage to not feel closer to the Giants after their World Series victory last year. I hope Buster Posey becomes a baseball megastar and that Panda enjoys continued success with that chicken salad. Do you put apples in it? Golden raisins?

THE YANKEES WON!
THE DODGERS WON!
ROY HALLADAY IS PITCHING TOMORROW.
I LOVE BASEBALL!!!!!

BAAAAASEBALLLLLL

I promise to provide some non-ESPN-produced baseball thoughts and pictures later in the day, but I just woke up and.........
Is this a mistake or a joke?
Four point eight percent of people went with it, regardless. Sometimes you just have to go with it. Anything could happen. aNYYthing.

This Team

I drafted some excellent mugshots in my Grinnell College Fantasy Baseball League. This team resembles my Marauders of Time Auction Dynasty Keeper Team, although I did not have to pay a combined total of $61.00 for Derek Jeter and Cole Hamels. No one freak out. I would have gone up to $93.00 each and spent $47.00 on Robbie Cano and filled the rest of my team with dollar scrubs in a heartbeat.

Yes, Cole is the "ace" of my pitching staff. I'm putting that in quotes because of this New York Times article:

Identifying an ace is largely subjective, but baseball people tend to give no more than 13 active pitchers the title, with about the same number falling just a shade below and three others (Johan Santana, Stephen Strasburg and Adam Wainwright) probably out for the season with injuries.

The members of the vaunted, if unofficial, class: Chris Carpenter, Zack Greinke, Roy Halladay, Felix Hernandez, Ubaldo Jimenez, Josh Johnson, Cliff Lee, Jon Lester, Lincecum, Price, Roy Oswalt, C. C. Sabathia and Justin Verlander.

That's three Phillies starting pitches not named Cole Hamels! We'll see.

We're All Probably Moving in a Direction, Somewhere, Somehow

I read on Twitter that Grady Sizemore is running again:

As someone who also suffered a knee injury and who starts "running again" once every few weeks after intermittent binges on internet television and fried Chinese food, I can't say that I'm so impressed that Mr. Pro Athlete / Former #1 Fantasy Baseball Draft Pick is running again. But since I haven't completely forgotten my early infatuation with Grady, here's a picture of him running away from a cone.

RUN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Cleveland.com suggests that Grady may even be running the bases soon. "He's probably moving in that direction," said manager Manny Acta. Grady Sizemore is probably moving in the direction of running the bases. That's a lot of potential motion for one sentence. Should I draft him again this year? So far, my strategy has consisted of drawing angry X's through Jayson Werth's name and nervously wondering if I'd spend all $260 of my budget on Derek Jeter.

Loser.

Of course I would. The way I see it, $260 in imaginary money is a small price to pay for my future career as Derek Jeter's art advisor/Yankees radio co-host.

Happy weekend everyone! If the weather improves and you start running again, make sure to tweet it!