Ok, I know I'm getting old. I just read a news story about the Carolina Panthers - they came to Charlotte about when I was leaving and so I've never actually been to one of their games. The news story was about one of their players, who also happens to be one of my favorite football players - he is still playing, and has been with the Panthers every year of their existence [16 years now]. Can you name that player?
Speaking of playing sports when old, one of my favorite baseball players was Julio Franco. Never spectacular [okay, I lie. That home run into the pool was amazing]; but man was he in shape and always hustling! He's got nearly all of the age-related records - oldest player to hit a home run (which he then topped a few times), etc, but nearly as impressive is that he's one of only 3 players to top 4200 hits in their career (major, minor, international play) - the others are Pete Rose and Ty Cobb [I suspect Ichiro may get there, maybe?]. Other amusing trivia: he went 20 years between starts at 3rd base. He was the 6th batter Roger Clemens faced in his career, and when they faced off in 2007 they were the oldest batter/pitcher pair [combined ages] since 1933. [So, when did he first face Clemens? That would likely be 1984, when Clemens debuted in the major leagues for the Red Sox. Franco first played in the majors in 1982.] While it's likely just a myth, there's reports that his registered birth year of 1958 may be incorrect - it could be as early as 1954!
Showing posts with label baseball. Show all posts
Showing posts with label baseball. Show all posts
Monday, September 13, 2010
Thursday, September 2, 2010
A disgrace
Nyjer Morgan is a disgrace to the game of baseball and should be tossed. In the past week I've seen at least three plays where he appeared to intentionally try to hurt someone, and he succeeded at least once (separated shoulder).
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Baseball
So the the angels angels of Anaheim have a new center fielder. I just saw some of his highlights and man he's fun to watch: (Man he can dive) and (That's some speed!)
Also he was in a nice suicide squeeze play, but that's one of my favorite plays in baseball when it's executed. Here's the one he was in: (Bourjos squeeze). Here's one by the Braves earlier this year, that won the game for them: (Conrad squeeze play woot)
Also he was in a nice suicide squeeze play, but that's one of my favorite plays in baseball when it's executed. Here's the one he was in: (Bourjos squeeze). Here's one by the Braves earlier this year, that won the game for them: (Conrad squeeze play woot)
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
Today on: "I'll believe it when I see it."
So, playing my new baseball game, I naturally have started up a franchise mode, playing the Braves. We're now 7 games into the season and won the opening series against the Phillies, gave up a game to the Nats but won the other two, and started off the first series against the Marlins with a come from behind 4-3 win (with Chipper hitting 3 solo HR's and McCann entering for a pinch hit RBI walk that tied it). Ok, so it's already stretching the likely happenings in the season, but at least the injuries appear to be consistent with the Braves' luck: Josh Anderson twisted something badly during the first game and is out for 98 days, and Javier Vasquez's second start got cut short to one inning when he threw a fastball so hard he broke a rib. Yeah, really. No, he didn't get hit with a ball or anything, so it must have been that crazy arm of his.
Anyways, aside from those oddities... I decided to take a look at what the standings were like, to see if it might be a decent predictor (ha ha). AL East: NYY 1st (6-2), Red Sox 2nd (5-4), Blue Jays 2nd (5-4), then the Rays (4-4) and Orioles (1-7). So far so good.
AL Central: Royals 1st (7-2) ... what? ... CWS 2nd (6-3), Twins (4-5), Indians (3-6), Tigers (3-7).
Ok, at that point I went yeah, not predictive. :)
The rest, for those curious:
AL West: Rangers 1st (5-3), Mariners 2nd (4-4, including a surprise 8-7 win against the Angels in 18 innings!), Athletics (5-5) and Angels (3-5).
NL West: D-backs 1st (8-1), Padres 2nd (4-4) Dodgers 2nd (4-4), Giants (3-4), Rockies (2-6).
NL Central: Cubs 1st (5-3), Cardinals 2nd (6-4), Astros (4-3), Pirates (4-4), Brewers (2-6), Reds (1-7)
NL East: Braves 1st (6-1), Mets (4-3), Phillies (3-4), Nats (3-4), Marlins (3-4)
For the Dodgers, Manny is 10-30, with two doubles, no HR and 5 walks.
There's a few weirdnesses. The first is that the AI bats very aggressively, even in simulated games, so pitch counts are a decent bit lower than expected. There's also a VERY annoying bug when trying to make a catch of a flyout in the outfield - sometimes it misses inexplicably when the animation looks perfect. It doesn't credit as an error. Of the three runs the Marlins had in the last game, two were because of this error causing H. Ramirez to get a pair of triples that should have been outs. It's not actually that common, but it's very annoying when it does show up. (Both of these are said to be fixed in the upcoming patch that's in testing, whew.) I'm also a very impatient hitter, so the Braves have a lot fewer walks than would be expected, but I'm working on that!
Anyways, aside from those oddities... I decided to take a look at what the standings were like, to see if it might be a decent predictor (ha ha). AL East: NYY 1st (6-2), Red Sox 2nd (5-4), Blue Jays 2nd (5-4), then the Rays (4-4) and Orioles (1-7). So far so good.
AL Central: Royals 1st (7-2) ... what? ... CWS 2nd (6-3), Twins (4-5), Indians (3-6), Tigers (3-7).
Ok, at that point I went yeah, not predictive. :)
The rest, for those curious:
AL West: Rangers 1st (5-3), Mariners 2nd (4-4, including a surprise 8-7 win against the Angels in 18 innings!), Athletics (5-5) and Angels (3-5).
NL West: D-backs 1st (8-1), Padres 2nd (4-4) Dodgers 2nd (4-4), Giants (3-4), Rockies (2-6).
NL Central: Cubs 1st (5-3), Cardinals 2nd (6-4), Astros (4-3), Pirates (4-4), Brewers (2-6), Reds (1-7)
NL East: Braves 1st (6-1), Mets (4-3), Phillies (3-4), Nats (3-4), Marlins (3-4)
For the Dodgers, Manny is 10-30, with two doubles, no HR and 5 walks.
There's a few weirdnesses. The first is that the AI bats very aggressively, even in simulated games, so pitch counts are a decent bit lower than expected. There's also a VERY annoying bug when trying to make a catch of a flyout in the outfield - sometimes it misses inexplicably when the animation looks perfect. It doesn't credit as an error. Of the three runs the Marlins had in the last game, two were because of this error causing H. Ramirez to get a pair of triples that should have been outs. It's not actually that common, but it's very annoying when it does show up. (Both of these are said to be fixed in the upcoming patch that's in testing, whew.) I'm also a very impatient hitter, so the Braves have a lot fewer walks than would be expected, but I'm working on that!
Friday, April 18, 2008
Baseball Marathon
This is the companion post to the other one today. As the Angels game was finishing, I was watching scores from the other games. The Braves had won 8-0 (yay!), and most of the games were completed, except one: Colorado vs San Diego, which was tied 0-0 in the eighth inning. Jake Peavy was starting for the Padres, and Jeff Francis for the Rockies, so I figured it had been a pitcher's duel.
Cut to arriving back in Pasadena, chatted with M^2 some, and then headed home. I got on the computer to catch the highlights from the Braves game. Whoa, the Rockies game is still going!
It was (I think) the 16th inning at that point, and tied 1-1, the only runs coming in the 14th. Wow. I put the game on and watched the rest of it. 17th inning. 18th inning. Lots of baserunners, no scoring. To cut a long story short, the game went to 22 innings, the Rockies managed to score a run in the top of the inning, and it looked like the Padres had a chance to score one in the bottom until their running was erased by a double play.
The game set all kinds of records for both teams, and stuff like longest game since 2003, etc. The write-up of the game is here on ESPN, and has a more comprehensive list. Among the funny stuff that happened (after midnight) were the mentions for the postgame show, and cuts to the two guys who were going to do the postgame show, sleeping on their desk, playing table football, reading blogs, etc. On the slightly less funny side, the workers who had to clean up the ballpark were sleeping in the upper deck, waiting for the game to finish so they could finish up and go home. Guess they weren't counting on such a long game, I really hope they get paid overtime/hourly rather than per-game.
Cut to arriving back in Pasadena, chatted with M^2 some, and then headed home. I got on the computer to catch the highlights from the Braves game. Whoa, the Rockies game is still going!
It was (I think) the 16th inning at that point, and tied 1-1, the only runs coming in the 14th. Wow. I put the game on and watched the rest of it. 17th inning. 18th inning. Lots of baserunners, no scoring. To cut a long story short, the game went to 22 innings, the Rockies managed to score a run in the top of the inning, and it looked like the Padres had a chance to score one in the bottom until their running was erased by a double play.
The game set all kinds of records for both teams, and stuff like longest game since 2003, etc. The write-up of the game is here on ESPN, and has a more comprehensive list. Among the funny stuff that happened (after midnight) were the mentions for the postgame show, and cuts to the two guys who were going to do the postgame show, sleeping on their desk, playing table football, reading blogs, etc. On the slightly less funny side, the workers who had to clean up the ballpark were sleeping in the upper deck, waiting for the game to finish so they could finish up and go home. Guess they weren't counting on such a long game, I really hope they get paid overtime/hourly rather than per-game.
Baseball Yesterday
I got to go see a game yesterday with Lem, Christina, and her father, who is a big fan of the Angels. The game was the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim (the the angels angels of anaheim) against the Kansas City Royals, who have been playing pretty well this season, and had won six of their last eight games against the Royals.
Highlights from the game: Watching Torii Hunter play center field. Man, he's fast and has a lightning arm. I saw at least two plays where the ball was hit well into center field, easily a double and possibly a triple, and he was on it with a laser throw to second base that would easily catch anyone trying for third or even just rounding off the base too far.
The pitching was good, but our seats were by the left field foul pole (and were quite good), so I couldn't actually tell a lot of the small details about it, like pitch selection and so on. However, we did get to see Francisco Rodriguez come up for a save situation, which was pretty awesome. He did let a run score, but in my opinion the Royals were pretty lucky to have that chance: he gave up an initial single, struck out the next batter, and then the next play was a hard hit ball at the third baseman Chone Figgins (who has a cool name. They pronounced the first name sort of like Shaun or Sean). He nearly had it for an easy out, but ended up only knocking it down. A single scored the run and then the last two were retired on a foul out and a strikeout.
Negatives: Only one to mention here, and while it may sound like the player, it's more the fan reaction that got to me. The left fielder, Garret Anderson, felt really slow when trying to field balls. Several plays would happen where the ball would drop in front of him while he was jogging there, or similar stuff. Maybe he's not fast, but it really felt like he wasn't even trying, either. However, he did have a good game hitting, driving a really deep double that scored three runs. And while that double would probably have been a triple for someone who ran more, it was still a clutch hit. The annoying part was actually the (drunk-ish) fans a few rows ahead of us who kept ragging on him every time he was fielding. I don't see anything wrong with booing when it looks like the fielder isn't making an effort and a single gets through, but that's a single event. Booing him whenever he's on the field, especially after he was the one who hit in 3 of the 5 runs, just seems wrong. Sure, his fielding may have led to one more run for the Royals, but he did make up for it. And that sort of ragging could easily be distracting and make his play that much worse. The fans ahead of us were a bit drunk and not really receptive to other opinions on how to treat players, so even though it was greatly annoying the people near us, not much changed.
The ballpark: Very very pretty. The center field fountains are really pretty, and they had some fireworks launched from that area that were pretty cool. The layout behind center field was really interesting, behind the rock garden/fountain area was a patio eating area and some of the restaurants. It's hard to compare the actual view with Dodgers Stadium, as I've never sat in a similar location there, but objectively it was very good.
Parking: Easiest parking I have ever seen. The only delays were in the traffic leaving Pasadena. We left after the game finished and it took maybe five minutes to leave the ballpark and get on the freeway, and most of that was just navigation time, not waiting in lines of cars.
The food: Mixed reviews: The tri-tip sliders were excellent, their only problem was that there weren't enough of them. The pretzel, on the other hand, was a shame on ballpark pretzels everywhere. Though the dough was pretty well cooked, it had zero salt. That's just weird, they didn't ask or anything about whether I wanted with or without salt, just I got one with no salt. On the whole though, it looked like the food choices were good: the hot dog seemed tasty (judging by T+C's reactions of scarfing it up), and the garlic fries were similarly received. I didn't see a place to get a decent hot sausage, but presumably that's because I didn't search hard enough.
Anyways, I highly recommend seeing a game at Angels Stadium some time: the field and park are good, and it's always good to see a ball game, even if they play by the silly designated hitter rules. :)
Highlights from the game: Watching Torii Hunter play center field. Man, he's fast and has a lightning arm. I saw at least two plays where the ball was hit well into center field, easily a double and possibly a triple, and he was on it with a laser throw to second base that would easily catch anyone trying for third or even just rounding off the base too far.
The pitching was good, but our seats were by the left field foul pole (and were quite good), so I couldn't actually tell a lot of the small details about it, like pitch selection and so on. However, we did get to see Francisco Rodriguez come up for a save situation, which was pretty awesome. He did let a run score, but in my opinion the Royals were pretty lucky to have that chance: he gave up an initial single, struck out the next batter, and then the next play was a hard hit ball at the third baseman Chone Figgins (who has a cool name. They pronounced the first name sort of like Shaun or Sean). He nearly had it for an easy out, but ended up only knocking it down. A single scored the run and then the last two were retired on a foul out and a strikeout.
Negatives: Only one to mention here, and while it may sound like the player, it's more the fan reaction that got to me. The left fielder, Garret Anderson, felt really slow when trying to field balls. Several plays would happen where the ball would drop in front of him while he was jogging there, or similar stuff. Maybe he's not fast, but it really felt like he wasn't even trying, either. However, he did have a good game hitting, driving a really deep double that scored three runs. And while that double would probably have been a triple for someone who ran more, it was still a clutch hit. The annoying part was actually the (drunk-ish) fans a few rows ahead of us who kept ragging on him every time he was fielding. I don't see anything wrong with booing when it looks like the fielder isn't making an effort and a single gets through, but that's a single event. Booing him whenever he's on the field, especially after he was the one who hit in 3 of the 5 runs, just seems wrong. Sure, his fielding may have led to one more run for the Royals, but he did make up for it. And that sort of ragging could easily be distracting and make his play that much worse. The fans ahead of us were a bit drunk and not really receptive to other opinions on how to treat players, so even though it was greatly annoying the people near us, not much changed.
The ballpark: Very very pretty. The center field fountains are really pretty, and they had some fireworks launched from that area that were pretty cool. The layout behind center field was really interesting, behind the rock garden/fountain area was a patio eating area and some of the restaurants. It's hard to compare the actual view with Dodgers Stadium, as I've never sat in a similar location there, but objectively it was very good.
Parking: Easiest parking I have ever seen. The only delays were in the traffic leaving Pasadena. We left after the game finished and it took maybe five minutes to leave the ballpark and get on the freeway, and most of that was just navigation time, not waiting in lines of cars.
The food: Mixed reviews: The tri-tip sliders were excellent, their only problem was that there weren't enough of them. The pretzel, on the other hand, was a shame on ballpark pretzels everywhere. Though the dough was pretty well cooked, it had zero salt. That's just weird, they didn't ask or anything about whether I wanted with or without salt, just I got one with no salt. On the whole though, it looked like the food choices were good: the hot dog seemed tasty (judging by T+C's reactions of scarfing it up), and the garlic fries were similarly received. I didn't see a place to get a decent hot sausage, but presumably that's because I didn't search hard enough.
Anyways, I highly recommend seeing a game at Angels Stadium some time: the field and park are good, and it's always good to see a ball game, even if they play by the silly designated hitter rules. :)
Saturday, October 13, 2007
Saturday! (Open Thread)
Oops, it's sunday now though. Oh well! Hope you all had a great saturday, mine was very good. :)
So... how about them divisional championship series things they have in baseball? I haven't been actually keeping track, having sorta lost interest when 1) the Braves didn't get into the postseason and 2) the Yankees got eliminated from the postseason (yay!). I saw a quick blurb today that the Rockies are one game away from their first world series, that's pretty cool. :)
Oh yeah, this is officially a post for an Open Thread! So... if there's something you want to talk about, post! :)
So... how about them divisional championship series things they have in baseball? I haven't been actually keeping track, having sorta lost interest when 1) the Braves didn't get into the postseason and 2) the Yankees got eliminated from the postseason (yay!). I saw a quick blurb today that the Rockies are one game away from their first world series, that's pretty cool. :)
Oh yeah, this is officially a post for an Open Thread! So... if there's something you want to talk about, post! :)
Friday, August 10, 2007
Whoa, nice catch
Just checked the box scores for thursday's games and saw the Braves won 7-6. Then I read the recap and watched the video of Willie Harris taking away a game tying home run in the bottom of the 9th. That was a great catch, and very helpful in not letting the game go to extra innings. Check out the video here if it's still up and my link works, it's to the recap which has the video in a side box. That game brings us back to 3.5 games behind the Mets, and we won the series, though a sweep would have been nicer, I'll take what we got as it looks like that ending was pretty demoralizing, not to mention that we've won every series against the mets and are now 8-4 vs them.
Thursday, July 5, 2007
A Random Assortment
A quick collection of things today: Some of you (most of you?) probably know I am a big fan of the Atlanta Braves. I got to catch the last few innings of the game today after the usual frisbee game, and got to see Chipper Jones break an Atlanta record: all-time home runs while playing for the Braves, which was previously held by Dale Murphy. I wonder if mom or dad remember how much I liked Dale Murphy when I was a kid, I remember I had a bunch of his baseball cards and always cheered for him and the Braves. Though I maybe wasn't so good with statistics then, I have a very faint recollection of thinking he had a .200 or so batting average one season and thinking that was great. In any case, he had 371 homers while with Atlanta, and I got to see Chipper Jones hit homers number 371 and 372 today. Another interesting thing about the home runs today was that they were hit while batting with different handedness: the first was while batting right-handed, and the second left-handed. And for a final interesting note about this, apparently Hank Aaron only hit 335 of his 755 homers while with Atlanta, and had 22 with the Milwaukee Brewers in his final two seasons. The interesting part is that the rest were with the Milwaukee Braves, and he holds the Braves franchise record with 733 homers. This was very confusing when I was looking up all the various statistics here, but I think it works out if you think of the franchise records and the Atlanta records as being seperate.
Ok, now, I know I was going to post about something else. Oh yeah! So, based on the interesting edge-detect photo editing a few days back, I was experimenting with some other similar things - I want to use the edge detection to create a layer which has a rough approximation of a rat's outline, and use that layer to make it look like there's a fuzzy brightness/halo around the rat. Some preliminary experiments sort of worked - they brighten up the area at the edge of Cao Cao's fur, but since he is already pretty bright, it doesn't show up too well. I found a decent solution by using the layer on the "only brighten" mode with some opacity, but it still doesn't quite achieve what I wanted. So going to mess with this some more, if anyone has suggestions, or other interesting effects to try, let me know.
Finally, I started writing a short story, because I had a decent opening line which led to the rest of the idea. But I have only gotten to write a line or two beyond that as I've been busy tonight. So maybe that will be posted later.
Ok, now, I know I was going to post about something else. Oh yeah! So, based on the interesting edge-detect photo editing a few days back, I was experimenting with some other similar things - I want to use the edge detection to create a layer which has a rough approximation of a rat's outline, and use that layer to make it look like there's a fuzzy brightness/halo around the rat. Some preliminary experiments sort of worked - they brighten up the area at the edge of Cao Cao's fur, but since he is already pretty bright, it doesn't show up too well. I found a decent solution by using the layer on the "only brighten" mode with some opacity, but it still doesn't quite achieve what I wanted. So going to mess with this some more, if anyone has suggestions, or other interesting effects to try, let me know.
Finally, I started writing a short story, because I had a decent opening line which led to the rest of the idea. But I have only gotten to write a line or two beyond that as I've been busy tonight. So maybe that will be posted later.
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