Link-O-Rama
I'm still searching for a definitive study on this, but until then I'm going to go out on a limb and say that no one has ever looked better pulling a parking ticket off their car than Jessica Alba. You know the old saying -- I like to use it about Vin Scully -- "I would listen to him read the phone book"? Well, I'm thinking about using the "I would watch her pull parking tickets off her car" line for beautiful women now. It goes well with "Waffle Crapper."
I'm not sure why, but I was very amused to find Scott Podsednik and Lisa Dergan's wedding registry online. I'd make some sort of anti-White Sox joke here, but it's tough to make fun of a guy who won a World Series and married a former Playmate in six-month period. Plus, I once heard Dergan as a guest on Loveline and thought she had a great personality (and that was on radio, so I wasn't just woozy from looking at her).
Here's a boxscore line from earlier this month that will bring back some memories for Gophers basketball fans:
MIN FGM-A 3PM-A FTM-A AST TO PTS
Kevin Burleson 36 0-6 0-4 0-0 2 2 0
The only thing that doesn't belong is the fact that those numbers are from an NBA game.
Shortly after the end of his senior year at the University of Minnesota I wrote that "Kevin Burleson was so bad this season that it is almost beyond words." A few months ago, after hearing that he made an NBA team, I compared Burleson to Adolph Hitler in a roundabout way. That was a poor choice on my part, because I certainly didn't mean to make light of what Hitler did. Plus, I'm pretty sure Hitler would shoot better than 21.3 percent if some NBA team was silly enough to give him a roster spot.
One interesting part of The Mind of Bill James that I left out of my review is Bill James' extreme stance on copy editing. Matt Welch quoted the whole passage on his blog earlier this week, but it essentially boils down to this:
1. I have very good reasons for doing things the way I do them.
2. My name is on the book; the copy editor's name isn't.
3. I know vastly more about the effective use of the English language than the copy editor does.
So ... I don't want any bleeping policies.
I can say from personal experience -- having edited and published James' work multiple times on The Hardball Times website and in The Hardball Times Baseball Annual 2006 -- that it's true. I suppose it's sort of like being a record producer and wanting to fix a track where The Beatles sounded less than perfect. In normal circumstances it would be a good idea, but are you really in any position to say what The Beatles should sound like?
I spent far too much of my formative years at various malls and convention centers, selling sports cards with my dad (it was fun, but sort of an odd way to spend weekends). One day I'll probably write about the experience, which was a lot more interesting than it probably sounds, but until then I'll just enjoy The Baseball Card Blog that launched recently.
The Hardball Times Baseball Annual 2006 has been reviewed by a lot of different people a lot of different ways, but as far as I know this review is the first time the book has been compared to Nomar Garciaparra circa 1997.
I'm not one of those people who say Bill Simmons has lost a step, but his column on attending NBA All-Star Weekend is definitely Simmons at his very best.
It's nice to see that Minnesota is so well-represented in Dead Spin's "Why Your Hometown Columnist Sucks" series. First Jim Souhan, then Sid Hartman, and now Bob Sansevere. Despite being a relative small market with only two major newspapers, I believe Minnesota is the first state to be honored three times. The people running the sports sections here should be really proud, and by "really proud" I mean "ashamed of themselves."
If this were, say, 1997 and I still watched Baseball Tonight, I would be really intrigued by the idea of Tino Martinez joining the cast. Of course, like Baseball Tonight, Martinez was actually good back then.
Two depressing articles that go hand in hand: A blow-by-blow look at Kevin McHale's shaky run at the helm of the Wolves and the news that Troy Hudson's ankle may ruin his second season in the past three years. The long-term deal that McHale handed out to Hudson a while back is perhaps the best example of how the Wolves have fallen so quickly. It was misguided on so many levels at the time, and may have turned out even worse than expected.
This just in: Playing the lottery isn't a smart investment. Plus, as this extremely odd story shows, there are far better ways to spend a dollar.
As a fat person who is in the process of losing weight (I'm down 30 pounds now), I always find it maddening when people say that genetics don't play a large role in the way you look. Sure, eating right and exercising are extremely important, but when someone can look this good while simultaneously eating fast food and smoking a cigarette you've got to wonder if maybe they have a leg up in the genes department.
My two favorite Unsubstantiated Rumors of the Week: Star Jones might get canned from The View (which is a bit like a baseball player being cut by the Royals) and Arrested Development might find a new home on Showtime. I can't quite decide which one coming true would make me happier.
The headline accompanying this link is the leader in the clubhouse for "Understatement of the Year." And the picture ain't bad, either.
Finally, a roundtable discussion about the American League Central featuring myself, The Cheat from Southside Sox, Rich Lederer, and Bryan Smith has been posted over at The Baseball Analysts. Click here to check it out.
