Thome 600

Jim Thome hit his 599th and 600th home run last night. Of the eight players that have hit 600 home runs in their MLB careers, only Thome and A-Rod are still actively playing and only Thome is currently playing with a Major League team. Congratulations, Jim! I hear you're very nice.


This is a Jim Thome Upper Deck Rookie card with a "BUST" trophy on it. I wish I could say that it's related to Third Base or Bust, but alas, we have yet to publish our own series of baseball cards.
I don't get it-- how can a STAR ROOKIE also be BUST? Also, will Manny Ramirez emerge from his hideout on the moon to comment?

Catch It!

It's been a few days since I scrolled through the Yahoo! Sports MLB Photo gallery. I was going to post a gross-looking photo of Brian Wilson licking his gross-looking beard, but then I thought "Jenni, don't hate." Here, instead, are some photos of center fielders jumping to catch balls. They are Franklin Gutierrez, Ichiro Suzuki, Brett Gardner, Grady Sizemore (back when he could play baseball without injuring himself), and Ken Griffey Jr.

Don't hate...elevate!

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!

Memorial Madness

I'm going to adopt a loose definition of "Memorial Day Weekend," and rewind the blog back to Thursday night when I waited through a windy two-hour rain delay to see Cole Hamels pitch at CitiField. He lost. He wasn't that great, but the Phillies scoring ZERO runs over 27 innings didn't help much either.

C-Hamels looks kind of like the male "dating model" from the Amazing Race.

That same night, Kei's favorite baseball player hit three home runs and my favorite player hit a grand slam. Baseball Twins SPORTS FEELINGS!!!

Top: Lord Miggy collecting a low-five from Brennan Boesch;
Bottom: BEST SMILE IN BASEBALL

On Saturday afternoon, A-Rod almost killed Indians starting pitcher David Huff. Then, the Yankees/Joba Chamberlain blew a six-run lead to lose 11-13.

I'm exaggerating. David Huff is fine, not almost dead. Also, A-Rod said he felt bad.

Also on Saturday, Angel Kendry Morales hit a walk-off grand slam against the Mariners, then immediately broke his leg in the on-field celebration. The next night, Angel Howie Kendrick hit a walk-off home run against the Mariners. No injuries resulted.

Get better soon, Kendry!

As I mentioned, Derek Jeter celebrated his 15-year anniversary this weekend. Rookie Jeter looks like a baby ostrich. Present-day Jeter hit a double. I already told you about what Roy Halladay did on Saturday night. I spent three hours drawing nine pictures of Doc Halls this afternoon. They're all pretty weird.

Never treat your life like a used t-shirt and never, never, never give up.

I don't remember what happened on Sunday, other than that the Yankees won. Apparently, I also don't remember what happened on Friday.

On Monday, everyone wore white hats to pay tribute to American soldiers. All of the teams that wear white uniforms looked like milk men. Handsome Tiger Justin Verlander lost his game. Conversely, crazy Colorado Rockie Ubaldo Jiminez pitched a complete game shut-out against the Giants. His ERA is something inhuman like 0.970 right now.

Top: Okay, maybe more like an ice cream man?
Bottom: If I saw those eyes staring directly into mine, I'd strike out, too.

I'm currently watching the D-bag v. Dodger game and have a few pieces of trivia to report:

1. Casey Blake's beard is back and it's GRAY.
2. Manny Ramirez has never homered on his birthday. He has homered 8 times (counting tonight) on the day after his birthday. Happy 800th Birthday, Man Ram!
3. The Diamondbacks' first baseman owns a ranch and brands his cattle with the phrase "E3." ERROR ON THE FIRST BASEMAN. Does this scare anyone else?
4. Man, Vin Scully knows everything...college GPAs, player hobbies and nicknames, the body counts of every major war since the American Revolution...if you haven't watched him call a game, I highly recommend it.
   

That's all! Happy Memorial Day! Goodnight!

Brothers in Sport and Song

The thing I like most about football is star quarterback Peyton Manning of the Indianapolis Colts, and one of the things I like most about Peyton Manning is that he has a younger brother who is also a star* quarterback on a team that wears most of the same colors as the Indianapolis Colts.
(*By "star" I mean "appeared in a series of Toyota commercials that may or may not have aired outside of the Tri-state area.")

While I like all configurations of sports families (Griffey and Griffey Jr. and Griffey, C., for example), I REALLY LIKE sports brothers. In fact, the ONLY thing I like about B.J. Upton is his brother Justin. So, when baseball commentators began talking about Detroit Tigers prospect Scott Sizemore this spring, I automatically wanted to believe that he was the younger brother of Cleveland outfielder Grady Sizemore.

Shared trait: Crooked grins

Although I can't find any proof on the internet that Sizemore and Sizemore are brothers, I also can't find any websites that specifically say that they aren't.

Shared Trait: Bad running faces

If Scott Sizemore were exceptionally ugly, it would be easier for me to accept that the two Sizemores aren't genetically linked. Does it follow, then, that Scott Sizemore's serviceably standard looks can be used as further evidence that he and Grady are related?

God, obviously not. Didn't you take logic in high school?

Cleveland, Honestly...

It's a long-haired magenta carpet monster with yellow splotches standing next to a lady hot dog in a ruffled tube top and an apron. Nevermind your questionably offensive team logo, WTF are your mascots? Cleveland...Grady....Cleveland...anyone?

First Look

Spring training has begun! Let's look at some aesthetically unsettling formal portraits of my favorite players:

The two sides of Ichiro are equally frightening.

Grady's in baseball jail on the moon. REDEEM YOURSELF, SIZEMORE.

Derek Jeter is so good. His head is exploding with goodness.

My first thought upon seeing this picture of Robbie Cano was,
"God, I bet he smokes a lot of pot." Do you think it's true?

For some reason, Mark Teixeira's portraits were published sideways. He doesn't need help looking strange, so I'm not posting them, here. I will, however, share this photo of Teix jogging in sports flip flops. Gah. I can't look at him without grimacing in a baffled and horrified, yet somehow loving way. He's not normal. He's not, not, not, not, not, not, not, not at all normal.

And finally, no one cares about taking artful photographs of Casey Blake. Aw. What happened to your beard, Casey? Do you want to play on my fantasy team again?

Sam, what happened to his beard?!

This is My Town

I've never been to Los Angeles, but thanks to their website, DODGERTOWN IS MY TOWN. Yeah! Matt Kemp's wearing a Casey Blake jersey with my name on it and high-fiving Andre Ethier. COOL!

The McCourts are getting divorced, Vincente Padilla got shot by his friend, and Manny Ramirez has just announced that 2010 will be his last year with the Dodgers, but I still feel optimistic about the team's chances. They're going to play the Yankees this year, which will be exciting. I'll bring my Dodgers hat so that I can wear it when Casey Blake bats. CASEY, IT'S YOUR YEAR!!! BREAK OUT!!!!! FANTASY ALL-STAR!!!!!!

Speaking of people who tanked my fantasy team last year, one or two weeks ago, Sam got drunk and warned me that he was going to address Grady Sizemore's nude photographs on our much neglected blog. "I'm going to make a post and it's going to be a post razzing [is this a word?] you for not being into those Grady Sizemore photos," is mostly what he said, "Come on, here's someone you spent a year toiling over and then this happens and you're not into it?!"

Listen Sam, when Grady Sizemore was just some handsome abstraction that I could daydream about meeting in the Continental Philosophy section of the Cleveland Barnes & Noble, life was great. Now that he's demonstrated himself to be a real person with an exhibitionist streak, a scary looking girlfriend and generally poor fashion sense (not to mention the fact that I've always known about his passion for The Doors), I can't help but feel slightly wounded. Unconditional love predicated on the knowledge of who a person is, as opposed to who I want them to be, is a feeling that I've reserved for only one professional athlete.

Now, here's some pictures I made that will make that last sentence seem completely disingenuous.

This blog just gets weirder and weirder.

Anyway, none of this means that I no longer like Grady Sizemore. I like him and I'll like him more once baseball starts again. I'll definitely go see the Indians when they're in New York. Maybe Sam can come with me. What do you say, Swebs?

#24 on Your Scorecard, #1 in Our Hearts

"You can't forget about him.  I believe that even in this winter, in my sleep, he will appear in my dreams. To play together with that hero of mine, in the same uniform -- and on top of that, in Seattle -- that time we got, even now, seems like a dream. I believe that time with him will continue."

-Ichiro Suzuki, on the possibility of Ken Griffey Jr. returning to the Mariners next year (quote via ESPN) 

Everyone loves #24! Please see the below post for proof of Kei's steadfast devotion to her favorite baseball player,  #24 Miguel Cabrera of the Detroit Tigers.

Coincidentally, my number one is also a #24.

Robbie's looking a little rough there.  My second favorite #24, Grady Sizemore of the Cleveland Indians, has also seen better days.

Grady, what's going on with your life, right now? I'd like to blame it on the post-surgery pharmaceuticals, but just to be safe, I'll never look at photos of you in street clothes again.  Love may be blind, but sometimes you have to help it along by deliberately closing your eyes to the truth.

Don't forget to cheer for the Tigers tomorrow, everyone!

Seven Pounds of Vomit

I realize that it's more than slightly gross to follow yesterday's "All-You-Can-Eat Farm Game" post with something titled, "Seven Pounds of Vomit," but my devotion to Grady Sizemore compels me to share this information, no matter how tasteless. From Yahoo! Sports:

Update: Sizemore (illness) missed his second consecutive game on Tuesday, the Cleveland Plain Dealer reports.

Recommendation: Sizemore has lost seven pounds due to the illness but though he might be available for late-inning duties on Tuesday. “I got on the plane and spent the whole flight throwing up,” said Sizemore. “I still feel weak.” Consider him day-to-day for now.

Wipe that...grin off your face.

Grady was back in the lineup last night, going 0 for 4 and further precipitating my Fantasy team's plunge into the void of irreversible awfulness. Aw, was that mean? I'm sorry, Grady. I love you and your seven pounds of vomit. Get well soon!

In Which Our Errant Men Hobble Homewards

Spending last week on life's DL has brought me slightly closer to recently wounded Indian and eternal dreamboat Grady Sizemore. The frustration of not being able to perform one's favorite activities is something we now share. Thankfully, both of us rallied back to action last night: Grady, by going 2/5 with a 2RBI triple, and me, by limping all the way to Greenpoint without falling over in exhausted exasperation. While no members of the media were present to capture the miracle of Jenni walking, some mean-spirited ass masquerading as a professional photographer snapped this image of Grady before his game-changing triple.

Apparently, Grady and I also share a love of pouting under pressure.

I swear to God that Getty Images hates Grady Sizemore. They never posted photos of him before his injury and, upon his fairly triumphant return, this is what they give us? Please. Somebody get me their address because I'm ready to file a formal complaint.

In other news, Manny Ramirez played his first minor league game last night, going 0/2 in four innings with the Albuquerque Isotopes. According to Peter Pascarelli of ESPN's Baseball Today podcast, Manny is "jacked like Arnold Schwarzenegger in Terminator." When I shared this news with Paul, who co-manages both Grady and Manny on our Yahoo! Sports Fantasy Baseball Team, he said, "What, so he's on MORE drugs?" Haha. Not that I'd be surprised....

Anyway, here's Manny stretching and failing to hit a minor league pitch. He looks pretty good, no?

"I'm baaaaaaack!"

And finally, while we're on the topic of men trying finding their ways home, here's a photo of Derek Jeter bending beneath the burden of the Yankees' awful hitting drought.

"...Lead us not into Red Sox nation and deliver us from A-Rod..."

Derek! I believe in you! Lest you've forgotten, let me end by directly quoting the last paragraph of your autobiography:

Believe me, I'm thankful every day that my dreams have unfolded. I think about what I have to do to improve, about how long my career might last, about where I've been, and about where I should be going. I keep myself motivated that way. Now, grab a hold of your life and take it seriously. Face the challenges and work hard to do everything you want to do. That's what I did and what I'm still doing. You can't treat your life like a soiled T-shirt, not for one day.

Amen. So, readers, remember, even if you're physically broken like Grady, spiritually corrupt like Manny, or floundering miserably in a sea of woes like the Yankees, never treat your life like a soiled T-shirt. Not even for one day.

Welcome Back, Grady?

"Tonight's the night. / To-night's the niiiiiiight." Or, at least it could be. Breath bated, fingers crossed.

15 Days of Grady-less Baseball

Major League Baseball and its television affiliates will experience a sharp drop in female viewership this week, as Grady Sizemore has gone on the 15-day DL* with a sore elbow. Here's a photo of Grady from Men's Vogue to help weather the drought (via):

Wow, he's cute. He should be on REAL television. Feel better, Grady! And please, upon your healthy return, see what you can do about a girl's Fantasy stats, eh? People make fun of me for having squandered my #1 draft pick on you, but I HAVE FAITH.

*That means Disabled List, Phil.