Imagine my excitement when this invitation showed up in my e-mailbox a few days ago:
We hope you can cover/attend this Captain Morgan All-Star event on Sunday night, hosted by Maria Menounos. We are confirming additional talent as we speak and will keep you updated. Media RSVP for this event is required to attend.
Who: Maria Menounos (Access Hollywood) will be joined by MLB All-Stars including Manny Ramirez, Chase Utley, Hanley Ramirez, Geovany Soto, Francisco Rodriguez, Aramis Ramirez, Ryan Braun and Kosuke Fukudome. Also attending are NFL player Keith Bulluck and NHL All-Star Martin Havlat. Music will be provided by DJ Cassidy.
What: Captain Morgan gets the All-Star festivities rolling with a star-studded bash.
When: Sunday, July 13th. Red Carpet Arrivals: 9:00 p.m.-11:00 p.m.
How exciting! What boy doesn't grow up dreaming of hanging with "NFL player Keith Bulluck"? Plus, Maria Menounoslooks like this. Tragically, my dreams were destroyed with the invitation's final line:
Where: STK 26 Little West 12th Street @ 9th Avenue and Washington Street New York, NY 10014
You can track the progress of my spectacular beard and see me discuss the Brewers' trade for C.C. Sabathia by watching this week's "Fantasy Fix" show on NBCSports.com:
My initial plan was obviously to shave the beard already, but the reviews have been so encouraging that it made me reconsider. For instance, when she saw me last month Will Young's lovely wife reportedly said afterward: "It looks horrible!"
Speaking of Sabathia, with traditional weight-loss plans proving difficult, he's apparently decided to try a new approach. Every little bit counts.
Each year my recap of the Society for American Baseball Research (SABR) convention focuses on my experience consuming tremendous amounts of alcohol, playing poker, sexually harassing lamps, playing wiffle ball in the street, and basically just being an all-around doofus. And each year it amuses me way too much when the official SABR website links to my silly write-up along with the many serious, non-doofus recaps.
Those of you who read my annual SABR convention recap will recall Chris Dial's starring role and those of you who frequent Rotoworld are no doubt familiar with managing editor/NFL guru/Fred Savage impersonator Gregg Rosenthal. Two of my absolute favorite people, yet a fairly odd couple, which is why stumbling across this picture of them sitting together at a game years ago (along with Jonah Keri of ESPN.com and Baseball Prospectus fame) made my week:
You should click on the picture to see the full-sized version. Trust me. Dial is wearing a Mets hat, has a beer in his hand, and appears to be intoxicated, which is a slightly less shocking combination than, say, Keeley Hazellbeing photographed sans clothing. Rosenthal looks to be approximately 40 inches tall and has sun glasses hanging from his shirt, like he's posing for some department store's summer catalog. Keri apparently can't bear to watch. And the guy in the Durham Bulls hat ... well, who knows.
Obviously motivated by her shocking last-place finish in the recent Official Fantasy Girl of AG.com voting, Elisha Cuthbert may finally have busted out of her multi-year slump. Apparently nothing gets a Canadian girl to doll herself up quite like attending the NHL awards.
Meanwhile, OFGoAG.com runner-up Marisa Millerhasn't slowed downone bit following her narrow loss to Hazell.
According to Google, Rotoworld has had more visitors than the St. Paul Pioneer Press' websiteevery month for the past year. Google also shows that the Minneapolis Star Tribune's website has topped Rotoworld in readership each month during that same time frame, but the gap in visitors is a whole lot smaller than you'd probably imagine. And that's with counting the newspapers' total readership across all sections. Count only the sports section and Rotoworld almost surely blows them both away.
I'm not quite sure exactly what my point is, but it seemed pretty interesting to me.
On a somewhat related note, I've long complained about the Pioneer Press' website being so poorly designed that it makes simply linking to articles difficult, so it was encouraging to hear from several of the newspaper's employees this week that a significant re-design is in the works. Armed with a decent website that doesn't make his articles disappear, Phil Miller may be capable of presenting a serious challenge to LaVelle E. Neal III for Official Twins Beat Writer of AG.com status.
On another somewhat related note, following my appearance on KFAN earlier this week I stumbled upon LEN3, Dan Barreiro, Doogie Wolfson, and Phil Mackey all sitting together at desks outside the studio (it was cute, almost like a real office). Wolfson and Mackey were their usual chatty selves, LEN3 was mostly preoccupied with being on the phone (no doubt reporting!), and my thrilling, first-time-ever interaction with Barreiro went as follows:
Wolfson (to me): If Gomez gets moved out of the leadoff spot, what would you do with the rest of the lineup?
Me (to Wolfson): I'd probably just slide everyone else up a spot. Put Casilla at leadoff. Make Mauer the No. 2 hitter. I know Dan would love that.
Barreiro (several yards away, without looking up): It'd be a perfect spot for him!
That was it, but as a longtime Barreiro fan whose enjoyment of his show gets put to the test whenever he talks about Mauer or Kevin Garnett, it seemed like a fitting introduction.
After publicly feuding with ESPN for the past several months, it looks like Bill Simmons has decided to take his ball and go home. As a huge Simmons fan his taking 10 weeks off makes me sad, but if it eventually leads to him breaking free from ESPN and finding a new home where he can be completely unfiltered, that would probably make up for it. Until then, his highly amusing send-off of Will Leitch over at Deadspin will have to suffice.
That might be the internet version of "hey look, someone wrote gullible on the ceiling!"
For Jessica Alba's hopes of reclaiming the OFGoAG.com title that was stripped from her way back in 2004, this is too little, too late. Well, maybe not too little.
Perhaps if she wasn't so incredibly shy out in public, fourth-place finisher Kate Beckinsale would've had a better chance of claiming the OFGoAG.com throne.
Formerly totally against the move, I've become lukewarm on Kevin McHale's decision to swap O.J. Mayo for Kevin Love in part because of this fantastic video of the Timberwolves' newest player goofing on ESPN douche nozzle Stephen A. Smith. "I need some Cheez Doodles, man!"
ESPN has made Rick Reilly extremely rich, but is he really just a poor man'sJim Souhan?
On the heels of this exciting bit of synergistic news, I'm now one step closer to my life-long dream of writing a daily column about the weather. Imagine: "While temperatures on the East Coast dip below 50, here are some other notes from around the atmosphere ... " (Sorry, that was my lame attempt at an inside joke for Daily Dose readers. Won't happen again.)
Imagine this blogger's reaction if it was a college newspaper that turned him down. Nine times.
You should click on the picture to see the full-sized version. Trust me. Dial is wearing a Mets hat, has a beer in his hand, and appears to be intoxicated, which is a slightly less shocking combination than, say, Keeley Hazell being photographed sans clothing. Rosenthal looks to be approximately 40 inches tall and has sun glasses hanging from his shirt, like he's posing for some department store's summer catalog. Keri apparently can't bear to watch. And the guy in the Durham Bulls hat ... well, who knows.
