Pie in the Face

March 3rd, 2010 comments 1

1. The inevitable headline of the Chicago Sun-Times‘ sporting section were former Cub prospect and current Baltimore Oriole Felix Pie (pronounced PEE-ay) to record the game-winning hit in a contest against his former club.

2.  A blanket term to denote the unwavering tendency of American dailies to shoehorn a pun into a headline if at all possible. Alternatives include either (a) Jeters Never Prosper, were Derek Jeter ever to be caught using steroids, or (b) Mo Better Blues, were historically great closer Mariano Rivera ever to sign with the Kansas City Royals.

As American as Felix Pie.

The Baseball Annual in the RBI Database

Career Mode

February 26th, 2010 comments 0

All of today’s best baseball video games include a Career Mode. In these Career Modes, you create a highly accurate video game version of yourself–forgoing your beer belly for let’s say the “Buff” body-type–and advance through the trials and tribulations of a pro baseball career. Start in the low minors and slowly inch your way to the big leagues: it’s all of the man hours of the baseball life without any of the chicks or the cash.

In Career Mode, your creepily accurate avatar–born in 1991–can toil in Double-A obscurity as a crowd of hundreds ignores its singles power. And rather than virtually inhabiting the body of an already amazing athlete, you can experience the joy of slowly accruing enough Drag Bunting and Plate Vision skill points to earn the starting job in Altoona.

Notable examples include:

Note: The virtual advancement of a Career Mode player is inversely related to the gamer’s real-life career advancement.

Roguish minor leaguer thaMADHitta232 works on his swing in the cage.

Visit Career Mode in the RBI Wiki

The Baseball Annual

February 24th, 2010 comments 0

The Baseball Annual represents the height not only of baseballing analysis, but all known literature. The Odyssey? Never heard of it. Madame Bovary? More like Madame Boringry. Just as winter shows the first signs of breaking, The Baseball Annual appears — on the shelves of local bookstores, in our mailboxes — with hundreds of pages of analysis written almost exclusively by pale, bespectacled men. In its pages, we’re invited to celebrate Player X’s breakout potential, but cautioned against Player Y’s “old man skills.” We’re introduced to a glistening future, even as we’re asked to temper our expectations about its excellence. Like American poet Walt Whitman, The Baseball Annual asks, “Do I contradict myself?” And answers without shame: “Very well then, I contradict myself. I am large and most certainly contain multitudes.”

Nostradamus: One of the founding editors of Baseball Prospectus.

Pie in the Face in the RBI Wiki

The Shadow Legend

February 22nd, 2010 comments 7

The Shadow Legend is a ballplayer whose early on-field exploits are so heroic that they become unsustainable. He has the capacity to draw out superlatives from the broadcast booth and expletives from the opposing dugout. With a twirl of his bat, a kick of his front leg, a knowing grin, he wraps the collective imagination around his fingertip. Then real life gets in the way.

When transcendence is expected, mere excellence becomes unsatisfying. He gets hurt. He slumps. He drinks too much. The Shadow Legend is one hell of a ballplayer. But he is never able to hit that 800th home run, strike out that 6,000th batter. He is never able to escape the shadow of his own mythology.

“One of the best ever,” fans might say about the shadow legend, “but imagine if he managed to stay…”

The Shadow Legend is Tony Conigliaro, Ken Griffey Jr., Juan Gonzalez, Herb Score, Dick Allen,  Rocky Colavito.

Dick Allen passes the Raines Delay with a cigarette.

Check out The Shadow Legend in the RBI Database

The Pitchers and Catchers Report Report

February 19th, 2010 comments 0

For baseball-starved fans in early spring, no news is still news, especially on the day that players actually arrive at their spring training site. Therefore, sports reporters nationwide, from the big-time beatniks to the local scribes, head to Florida and Arizona to file their annual reports about pitchers and catchers reporting.

In this day and age, most newsworthy stories have already been beaten to death in the off-season sandblasting, so The Pitchers and Catchers Report Reports amount to sun-drenched rehashes of stale trade news and mundane injury updates.

These reports include thrilling footage of such momentous events as:

  • Baseball players sitting on the ground stretching their legs
  • People walking into buildings
  • Chicken-legged coaches standing in circles and talking to one another

"...and Mota rode it all the way from Tuscon. Next up, we watch as Steve Garvey asks the equipment manager for a whiter pair of socks."

Visit The Pitchers and Catchers Report Report in the RBI wiki

Trusting the Process

February 17th, 2010 comments 2

Trusting the Process is to baseball what jumping the shark is to television — which is to say, the point at which one’s suspension of disbelief is challenged to such a degree as to reveal the absurdity of life and cruel randomness of the universe. The term is most famously attributed to Kansas City Royals General Manager Dayton Moore, who, after a series of mystifying acquisitions, spoke to the Royals faithful, saying, “Let’s just trust the process. If other people don’t want to trust the process, that’s fine. If other people want to abandon the process, then abandon it. I’m not abandoning the process. I believe in the process.”

Let not to the marriage of true minds admit impediments.

Visit Trusting the Process at the RBI wiki

Custer’s Last Transaction

February 15th, 2010 comments 2

The final, desperate maneuver of a baseball executive whose miscalculations and bad assumptions have left his franchise surrounded by ruthless warriors bent on its destruction. This inevitable blockbuster trade or free agent signing has no positive impact and only serves to momentarily delay said General Manager’s dismissal while further etching his legacy of ineptitude into the minds of future generations.

Examples:

  • Billy Bavasi trades The Tacoma Rainiers for Erik Bedard

Send us your own Custer transactions!

"I wonder if Joe Carter is still available..."

Visit Custer’s Last Transaction at the RBI wiki

The Perfect Name

February 12th, 2010 comments 0

A pitcher throwing a perfect game is the pinnacle of efficiency and effectiveness. So, too, is The Perfect Name, which is the culmination of that mythical journey into and out of the psychic abyss, in which the hero returns clutching that vaunted trophy: the perfect name for this year’s fantasy baseball team.

Your fantasy baseball team’s Perfect Name should have some but hopefully all of the following characteristics:

a) Autobiography. This could mean, for example, employing the name of the street you grew up on, the gentrifying neighborhood you just moved into, or your favorite strain of marijuana.
b) Timeliness. Refer to the latest news, and for more impact go with blights on the game. If Mark McGwire just admitted to using steroids, then your team name needs to refer to the size of his balls.
c) Pun. A relief pitcher’s name tweaked to sound like an STD will suffice.
d) Lyricism. The team name should roll off of the tongue with the ease and grace of a grandmother swearing at Yankees Stadium. At least consider iambic pentameter.
e) Anything that shits on Bud Selig.

For numerous examples, please see the Annual Fake Teams Best Fantasy Baseball Names Contest. Past winning names include When You Lose Your Haren You Find Ubaldo, Itchy Buchholz, Schoenweiss and the Seven Dwarves, and I’m Bill James, Bitch!

"I got it!" exclaimed Buerhle. "Guillen Some You Lose Some!"

Visit The Perfect Name in the RBI Wiki

Look Alive

February 10th, 2010 comments 4

Like Elbow Up, Look Alive (or the variant Look Alive Out There) is a phrase that is almost always shouted — and then, almost always in the direction of unsuspecting youths. The term actually works on two levels: first, and most immediately, as a plea from parents and coaches that the aforementioned youths might fortheloveofgod at least pretend like they’re playing a baseball game; and second, as a tacit recognition of a dark but obvious truth — namely, that children bear a greater resemblance to the undead than we’d sometimes care to admit.

The Son of Man tells Lazarus to look alive.

Look Alive in the RBI Database

Rogue’s Archives: The One Stat to Rule Them All

February 9th, 2010 comments 0

In baseball analysis, as in many rational pursuits, there is the search for a single formula that distills and explains the nature of the whole enterprise in one compact form. The One Stat to Rule Them All would, with a single figure, describe who was the best and the worst baseball player, taking every iteration of the game into account, and leaving no room for debate, no logical calculation unturned. With the discovery of this fabled statistic, the sabermetric baseball conversation on the Internet would fall dormant, and everyone would go back to talking about Vin Scully.

When Vin discovered batting average, he thought it would be good enough for everybody.

The One Stat to Rule Them All in the Wiki

« Older Entries

Newer Entries »