July 20, 2006

Link-O-Rama

  • For the second straight year I find myself incredibly jealous of friend of AG.com Pauly McGuire, who is at the World Series of Poker blogging and writing articles for FoxSports.com. Not only is he covering the events live and even playing in one tournament himself, Pauly's getting double-kissed by the lovely Isabelle Mercier and "taking leaks" next to less-lovely-but-still-noteworthy pros like Daniel Negreanu and Phil Ivey.

    I'm thinking I jumped on the wrong blogging bandwagon by choosing baseball. Not only are poker players infinitely more accessible and interesting to talk to, you won't find many baseball players who look like Liz Lieu. Plus, Pauly after midnight at the WSOP looks an awful lot like me at the SABR convention in Seattle, except the late-night poker tournaments are just slightly more difficult to win.

    One of these years I'd love to head to Las Vegas for a month to blog from the WSOP, but sadly I haven't tricked anyone into paying me to write about poker on a regular basis yet. Until then, I'll be living vicariously through Pauly, Brad "Otis" Willis, Wil Wheaton, and Phil Gordon.

  • Try as she might, Jessica Alba can't turn me off.
  • It's always good to see that my favorite basketball player from my pre-teen years is doing well. Actually, perhaps the only shocking thing in the article is that he's 35 years old. Thirty-five. I've never felt so elderly.
  • Friend of AG.com Paul Katcher had a good article on ESPN.com's Page 2 last week about what the baseball jersey you wear says about you. Here's a Twins-related excerpt:

    Stake in the Heart jerseys: Wanna see how quickly you can make a Twins fan cry? Sport one of these Twins No. 27 ORTIZ throwbacks that has got to grant Minnesotans impunity of all but the most violent crimes. Somewhat along those lines, I heard some New Yorkers wore Red Sox No. 6 BUCKNER shirts at Fenway for the recent Mets series in Boston. Not sure if they're out of the hospital yet. Anyway, it's easy to figure out what these duds say about you, but most of it can't be printed here.

    As surprising as it may be, I've never actually owned a Twins jersey. I do have retro jerseys of Joe Morgan (for obvious comedic reasons), Bo Jackson (as pictured in Sports Illustrated), and Tony Gwynn (simply because it's the ugliest jersey I've ever seen). Due to my weight loss those jerseys no longer come anywhere close to fitting, which means losing 65 pounds can be a bad thing. If you know any (really) fat guys looking to upgrade their baseball wardrobe, let me know.

  • While being less fat leads to some of my favorite clothing no longer fitting, the good news is that I can now buy (and actually fit into) shirts like this.
  • I'm either the last person to find out about this or it's not getting nearly enough attention, but Kevin Garnett is now blogging at NBA.com.
  • Here's one of my must-follow rules of blogging: When someone says this many nice things about me on their site, they get a link.
  • I had a feeling that WCCO's choice in guests was pretty iffy back when they asked me to appear on the Twins pregame show (I chickened out, as I always do with phone-in appearances), but never did I expect this.
  • I'd like to go on record saying that letting Marcus Banks leave via free agency was a huge mistake by the Wolves. Banks' potential is underrated and he'll be a perfect fit with the up-tempo Suns. Plus, losing him for nothing means that the Wolves essentially gave up Wally Szczerbiak, a future first-round pick, and a bunch of salary cap room for Ricky Davis, Justin Reed, and the albatross that is Mark Blount's contract. The deal was bad then and it's even worse now.
  • At some point I'm sure people will stop creating new Twins blogs every week, but until then here's the latest one. I've pretty much given up remembering all the different names of Twins blogs and their bloggers, but more people writing about the Twins is always a good thing.
  • I was quoted in both the Minneapolis Star Tribune and Dayton Daily News this week, but I wasn't the only Gleeman mentioned in a newspaper. Here's a note about my cousin that I stumbled across in the Grand Forks Herald:

    Julia Gleeman joins JLG Architects as a summer intern while working on her master's degree in architecture at the University of Minnesota.

    Gleeman earned her bachelor's degree at Gustavus Adolphus College in St. Peter, Minn.

    She is a teaching associate at the University of Minnesota.

    Before joining JLG, she was the communications intern at Mind on the Media.

    My immediate family is filled with lawyers, professors, accountants, teachers, and soon-to-be architects. I have one cousin working on her master's degree at the University of Minnesota and another cousin doing his undergrad work at the University of Chicago. And me? Well, I write about sports from my bedroom. Funny how that works.

  • Speaking of my writing (sort of), The Hardball Times Annual 2007 is now available for pre-order from ACTA Sports. Last year's version turned out very well, and because of better-than-expected sales and overwhelmingly positive reviews, we have a wider distribution this time around.

    The book comes out in November, and over the past couple months Dave Studeman and I have worked hard to put together what is a great lineup of writers. In addition to the regular assortment of THT staffers, we have ESPN.com's Rob Neyer and Eric Neel, Deadspin's Will Leitch, and SI.com's Jon Weisman.

  • On a somewhat related note, I wrote an article for Maple Street Press' upcoming Here Comes the Irish, which is a high-end Notre Dame football annual that comes out next month. I'm certainly far from an expert on or even a fan of Notre Dame, but I enjoyed the challenge and research involved in writing my piece, which the good people at MSP have described as follows:

    An examination of the relationship between Notre Dame and the NFL draft, and how Charlie Weis has re-opened the ND pipeline to the professional ranks.

    Earlier this year I wrote the American League preview for MSP's 2006 Red Sox Annual, which also included articles by Hidden Game of Baseball co-author Pete Palmer, Paths to Glory co-author Mark Armour, Boston Sports Media Watch's Bruce Allen, and Chad Finn of the Boston Globe. Palmer and Finn are back for Here Come the Irish, along with an impressive assortment of other contributors, and if you're any kind of football fan it promises to be an excellent read.


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