Hey, what's that? A baseball player, with a sense of humor? I've never heard of such a thing!
The sound quality isn't the best, but here's Brewers pitcher Tim Dillard delivering the starting lineups using the Will Ferrell Harry Caray voice. He's the dude playin' the dude, impersonating another dude!
I wouldn't call myself a big Corey Hart fan. In my personal rankings of "Brewers I like to make fun of whenever possible" he ranks right below Ryan Braun. This isn't to say that I don't like Corey Hart as a baseball player, I just think he's, well, mostly pointless. He's valuable when he's good and I like him, but when he's not good I have no use for him. (Unlike Rickie Weeks who struggles and I make ten thousand excuses for.) If Corey Hart falls off the cliff I'll be the first one calling for his head, but if he breaks out as a star I'll be clamoring for the Brewers to keep him. My feelings on Corey are 100% performance based. I don't really care about Corey Hart either way and I refuse to watch The Blind Side no matter how badly he wants me to.
Now, Corey Hart has struggled mightily this spring (something like 1 for 27) and the Brewers spring training invitee Jim Edmonds has been doing pretty well for himself. So well that the Brewers are considering making right field into a platoon with Edmonds taking most of the at-bats against right handed pitching. This makes pretty good sense. A quick look at his splits show that throughout his career Jim Edmonds has killed right handed pitching (career .954 OPS (!)) and that Corey Hart has fared better against left handers (career OPS .854). Beyond that, as a career center fielder Edmonds should be better, possibly a lot better defensively in right. This is the kind of move you like to see your team making. A smart decision based in performance and giving the team the best chance to win. I really want to get behind this move except there is one minor detail that the team seems to be completely ignoring and that's the fact that.. Continue reading
Ryan Braun loves him some offseason projects. He doesn't want to be a baseball player. He wants to be Coke, he wants to be Pepsi, he wants to be Chevy, Ford and BMW. Ryan Braun isn't just an All-Star, he's a brand. The name Ryan Braun equals quality and it reaches far beyond the baseball field. Whether it's Ryan Braun's Tavern and Grille, RB8 or Remetee, he sets out to do good things. I like Ryan Braun, he impresses me.
Why should he stop here? He needs to just keep getting bigger and bigger. Obviously the next logical step is movies and boy oh boy, do I have the perfect movie pitch for you Ryan Braun. You want to be a movie star? You want to extend your brand? You want to get laid about 15,000 times more than you do now? Well, I've written you a screenplay that will BLOW YOUR MIND and surely become one of the top box office hits of 2010 (that's right, we're fast tracking this baby!) I have the story that's going to take Ryan Braun from "Major League Baseball Star" to "Bigger than Jesus, Babe Ruth, Leonardo DiCaprio and 80's Michael Jackson combined". I have the idea that is going to make Shaq and his movies like, well, Shaq movies. Are you ready for this? Are you ready for....
When a group of Neo-Nazi's seek to re-animate Hitler and kill all the famous Jewish people in the world, there's only one man who can stop them and his name is Ryan Braun.
It's time for this Jewish All-Star to deliver some suffering of his own - with a baseball bat!
Call me.
The slow news days have begun and due to MLB rules there is only a playoff game once every six days. What do we do? Inspired by our favorite site The Dugout, we've decided to follow our favorite JSOnline writer Anthony Witrado on a quest. A quest to find love, adulation and respect in a cruel world that doesn't understand him or particularly like him. Will he find what he's been seeking? Or will he fail at it, like he's failed at life so many times before? Find out in Witrado's Quest: A Miller Park Drunk Event. Continue reading
Parra: Man, Nashville sucks. I wish I was back in Milwaukee.
/goes to Grand Ole Opry
Parra: I mean, it's not like I WANT to pitch bad. I don't know how those batters get to the bases. I throw and they don't swing, what am I supposed to do? Why won't Doug Melvin understand?
/goes to Country Music Hall of Fame
Parra: I wonder who won the sausage race today. I bet it was the Polish, he's due.
/runs out of things to do in Nashville
Parra: God, what am I doing? I'm so lost. Maybe I should join twitter. Then people will notice me. Then I can get back to Milwaukee. That will be my thing, the baseball player who tweets during his starts. That's the ticket.
/joins twitters, nobody follows him
Parra: Crap. I should just sit in this clubhouse until I get called up.
/puts hands in face, slowly starts to weep
Voice: Hello.
Parra: Oh, hi. Ummmm, I just had something in my eye. It's really dusty down here. Hey, aren't you...
Billy Ray Cyrus: Billy Ray Cyrus? Well, yes I am.
Parra: Well, I was going to say Hannah Montana's dad Robbie Stewart but if you want me to call you that, that's cool. What are you doing here?
Billy Ray Cyrus: The owner said he'd give me thirty bucks and a free hot dog with mustard on it if I came and sang the national anthem before tonight's game.
Parra: Woah sweet deal.
/high five
Billy Ray Cyrus: Hey partner, I can't help but notice that someone seems to have broken your achy-breaky heart. Is there something I can help you with?
Parra: I don't know Billy Ray. I'm a pitcher and my general manager said I throw too many "balls" and not enough "strikes", but I told him that if I didn't throw balls how would I pitch? I can't just hold the ball you know?
Billy Ray Cyrus: I'm sorry to hear that Manny, but I've got some good news for you. In addition to being a successful country singer, actor and media personality I am also an excellent pitcher. I think I can help you.
Parra: How?
Billy Ray Cyrus: Like this.
/Billy Ray Cyrus throws a perfect strike
Parra: Woah, how did you do that? That was amazing.
Billy Ray Cyrus: You see there's this thing called the strike zone.
Parra: The what?
Billy Ray Cyrus: The strike zone. The strike zone is a conceptual three dimensional right angle pentagonal prism over home plate which defines the boundaries through which a pitch must pass in order to count as a strike when the batter does not swing.
Parra: WOAH. Why didn't anyone tell me about this? Where is it? Is it really hard to find like the g-spot? Is it hidden in lines and lines of code like the Matrix? Will I need to travel to Narnia?
Billy Ray Cyrus: No, it's right there in front of you. The top of the strike zone is a horizontal line at the midpoint between the top of the batter's shoulders and the top of the uniform pants. The bottom of the strike zone is a line at the hollow beneath the kneecap. The right and left boundaries of the strike zone correspond to the edges of home plate. A pitch that touches the outer boundary of the zone is as much a strike as a pitch that is thrown right down the center. A pitch at which the batter does not swing and which does not pass through the strike zone is called a ball. Unofficially, the de facto enforced strike zone may be different at any different level.
Parra: Hang on a second, you're pulling my leg aren't you? Is this how you get your kicks Billy Ray?
Billy Ray Cyrus: Hand to God Manny, it's the truth. Billy Ray gets his kicks banging extras on the set of Hannah Montana when Miley has no clue. There was this one time on Best of Both Worlds with these Vietnamese twins and a tennis racket that I --
Parra: Billy!
Billy Ray Cyrus: Sorry. Okay, about the strike zone. It works like this.
Billy Ray Cyrus shows Manny Parra a series of graphs and illustrations defining the strike zone. This process goes on for many hours and Manny has a hard time with the concept until Billy Ray shows him this picture.
Parra: Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, I get it.