Baseball Page 1420 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights
Baseball's Facial Hair Spectrum
This is it. The very least amount of hair a man can be covered in and still considered to have a mustache and the very most amount of hair a man can be covered in and still be counted among those walking upright and having moved on from dwelling in caves....
Journeyman Baseball Player Gets Hurt While "Trying To Be A Gentleman" To A Pitching Machine
On Friday, Casey Kotchman signed a free-agent deal with the Marlins, his seventh team in 10 MLB seasons. He was brought on, at least in part, because Logan Morrison is coming off knee surgery. Only now Kotchman will be out for at least a few days, too. During a drill yesterday, he accidentally ran i...
Dale Murphy Once Got A Lame Autograph From Richard Nixon
Yesterday, former Atlanta Braves star and beloved-by-the-internet old dude Dale Murphy decided to celebrate President's Day by showing his Twitter followers a picture of one of his prized pieces of memorabilia: a baseball with Richard Nixon's autograph on it. The autograph reads, "To Dale Murphy, f...
Luke Scott Hath Slain The Hellboar
Everyone's favorite gun-humping birther, Luke Scott, arrived at the Tampa Bay Rays' spring training facility with a special guest: the stuffed head of a slain hellboar. How did Scott come to claim this bloody prize? By sticking the beast with a spear, of course! Scott told Rays Report that the boar...
Poor Son Of A Bitch Mat Gamel Tore His ACL For The Second Time In Two Years
It super sucks to be Mat Gamel right now. The Milwaukee Brewers' corner infielder, who was at one time a fairly promising prospect, will miss the entire 2013 season after tearing his ACL. Gamel's injury is all the more depressing due to the fact that he just finished a rehab stint after tearing the...
Josh Hamilton Says Dallas Isn't A Baseball Town, "True Baseball Fans" Won't Boo Him When He Returns
Josh Hamilton's in Anaheim now, after five up-and-down seasons in Texas. It was mostly down at the end, as the Rangers choked away the division and bowed out in a one-game playoff, with Hamilton hearing boos down the stretch for his declining numbers. (He blamed it in part on quitting tobacco.)...
Is Chipper Jones Getting Fat Again?
Chipper Jones joined the Braves on Saturday to spend a few days hanging around the team's spring training complex as a "special instructor," which is baseball-speak for "old guy who stands around leaning on a fungo bat and spitting seeds." So how's retirement been going for Chipper? Aside from the o...
Time To Retire The Verducci Effect: What <em>Really</em> Predicts Pitcher Injuries?
Originally published in Baseball Prospectus....
Tim Lincecum Had A Very Zen Offseason
Now that spring training has officially kicked off, it's time for baseball writers to spend the next two months filling column space while absolutely nothing of consequence happens. Fox Sports' Ken Rosenthal got started today, asking various members of the San Francisco Giants to share their favori...
Alfredo Aceves Is In Mid-Season Form
Alfredo Aceves began tossing batting practice this morning, pretty standard procedure for this time of year. Alfredo Aceves does not know the meaning of pretty standard. So, instead of using it as a slow and steady way to ease into spring training and build arm strength, he used it as another opport...
Carl Pavano's Freak Spleen Injury Nearly Killed Him
Live by the freak injury, nearly die by the freak injury: On January 12, Carl Pavano slipped on some ice outside his Vermont home, fell onto the handle of his snow shovel, and after taking a moment to recover, went about his business until he couldn't anymore:...
Jeffrey Loria Told Jose Reyes To "Get A Nice House In Miami" Four Days Before Trading Him And Decimating The Marlins' Roster
We knew that the Marlins had given Jose Reyes “verbal assurances” that they wouldn’t trade him, but yesterday brought a new report about the exact content of those promises and when the Marlins were making them. In particular, walking pair of conspicuously expensive sunglasses Jeffrey Loria told Jos...
Mike Piazza's Book Tour Produced An Excellent Illustration Of The Absurdity Of Steroid Handwringing
Mike Piazza wrote a memoir, and if early releases are any indication, it's mostly about how weird a human being he is. Perhaps because of his eccentric streak, many apparently hoped that the book would be a tell-all about the steroid era, like Jose Canseco's Juiced from someone who isn't (as much of...
It's College Baseball's Opening Day, And The Umpires Are Already Falling Over Their Own Feet
Believe it or not, there are a few of us who really do get excited for college baseball's opening day. (This may be a Florida thing. Being able to see live baseball in mid-February in gorgeous weather is tough to turn down.) While the players may be fully-trained and ready for the field, the umpir...
Biogenesis PED Records Just Being Given Out In Boxes Of Cereal Now
First, the Miami New Times obtained some records of South Florida "anti-aging" clinic Biogenesis, which appears to tie MLB players to banned performance enhancing drugs. Then Yahoo obtained additional Biogenesis records, naming additional players....
Mike Piazza Once Hired A "Karate Guy" To Teach Him How To Beat Up Roger Clemens
After Roger Clemens threw a large part of a shattered bat at Mike Piazza in Game 2 of the 2000 World Series, the Mets catcher's first instinct was to beat him up. Piazza thought better of it, though, for plenty of reasons: It was the first inning of a game in the World Series; Clemens was half-apolo...
Another Weird Baseball Injury: Francisco Liriano Broke His Arm While Trying To Scare His Children
A few days before Christmas, the Pirates were reportedly close to inking a free-agent contract with lefthander Francisco Liriano. The deal appeared to be on the verge of falling through, however, when the team announced that Liriano had mysteriously injured his non-throwing arm sometime over the hol...
Felix Hernandez's Contract Extension May Fall Through Because Of An "Elbow Issue"
On Thursday it was reported that the Mariners and staff ace Felix Hernandez had agreed to seven-year, $175 million contract, the signing of which was a mere formality to be completed by spring training. Apparently the source speaking on condition of anonymity because the contract is not official has...
This Is The Line For Single-Game Marlins Tickets Minutes Before They Went On Sale
So, the Marlins are not exactly popular in Miami ever at the moment. Whether it is the $1.2 billion dollars Jeffrey And The Amazing Technicolor Stadium the county's on the hook for, the unwillingness to spend money on a major league roster or the appurtenant fire sales, the Marlins are really not p...
Economists Disagree Over How Influential Jose Canseco Was In Spreading Steroids, Start Getting Personal
With advance apologies for giving any more press to Jose Canseco, you might want to check out a little contretemps happening over at Econ Journal Watch about Canseco's role as the Johnny Appleseed of baseball steroids. There's been a debate for a few years now about Canseco's claims to have spread t...