June 4, 2009

Link-O-Rama

  • For posterity's sake and because looking at the numbers makes me smile, the first four hitters in the Twins' lineup have the following season totals after collectively going 10-for-15 with four homers, two doubles, four walks, 10 RBIs, and 11 runs scored in yesterday's blowout win against the Indians:
    1. Denard Span        .307 AVG     .395 OBP     .410 SLG
    2. Joe Mauer .436 AVG .519 OBP .845 SLG
    3. Justin Morneau .348 AVG .426 OBP .657 SLG
    4. Jason Kubel .322 AVG .374 OBP .532 SLG

    Here's hoping that Ron Gardenhire can resist the urge to fix what isn't broken by jamming Alexi Casilla or Matt Tolbert in there.

  • According to Sports Business Journal, the Twins have baseball's eighth-largest television audience with an average of 108,000 "households" per game, which is pretty amazing when New York, Boston, Los Angeles, Chicago, Philadelphia, and Detroit are the only markets ahead of Minnesota. Meanwhile, the Washington Post notes that the Nationals have seen their TV audience increase by 56 percent this season ... and are still drawing only 12,000 households per game.
  • The poor Gatorade machine that Carlos Zambrano went berserk on last week has been designated for assignment by the Cubs.
  • Apparently they don't have pitch counts in Seth Stohs' hometown.
  • Barry Bonds may have stumbled upon a new career.
  • "Amazing" by Kanye West has basically been running on an endless loop during the NBA playoffs, so this remix honors the subset of guys who rarely make any "Where Amazing Happens" commercials:


    "No matter what they'll never pass it to me, my range is as far as my arms can reach. I'm Caucasian."
  • People magazine calls Alex Rodriguez's relationship with Kate Hudson "somewhat serious," noting that "Hudson followed Rodriguez on the road late last month to Dallas" and the couple "worked out together in the fitness center" of the team hotel. If by some miracle Hudson ever makes a decent movie again--seriously, check out her resume since Almost Famous--the Hollywood media will no doubt start buzzing with talk of performance-enhancing drugs. Does human growth hormone help you act?
  • Apparently the "good-looking girl playing football in a bikini" craze is taking over the world of staged photo shoots: Kim Kardashian last week and Kristin Cavallari this week.
  • Kimbo Slice is a cast member for the next season of The Ultimate Fighter, which gives him another opportunity to be exposed as all hype and no substance against unknown fighters.
  • Trevor Born wrote one of the best Twins blogs around before falling off the face of the blogosphere in mid-2007, but it turns out that he's been kind of busy since then:

    University of Minnesota student journalist Trevor Born has been named this year's recipient of the Big Ten Conference William R. Reed Memorial Award. ... The conference annually honors the former commissioner by presenting this award to a student journalist ... who ... best exemplifies the spirit, ideals and dedication to the Big Ten and intercollegiate athletics.

    A sophomore journalism major, Born is the beat writer for football and men's basketball at the Minnesota Daily, a post he has held since the second semester of his freshman year. Born was named the 2008 Sports Reporter of the Year by the campus daily publication and has spent time freelancing for the Associated Press. In addition to his excellence as a reporter, Born has excelled in the classroom, maintaining a 3.8 GPA in the University Honors Program.

    That's all, huh? Nearly three years ago one of these Link-O-Rama entries included my plan for "landing a newspaper gig" that involved "waiting a couple decades until Born is the editor-in-chief somewhere and hoping he remembers me." At this rate the "couple decades" timetable is going to look kind of silly.

  • Official Fantasy Girl of AG.com fourth runner-up Mila Kunis, looking good as usual.
  • In his latest first-round projection, Jonathan Mayo of MLB.com has the Twins picking a high-school pitcher, Matt Hobgood, at No. 22 overall. While that may indeed happen, it's worth noting that the Twins have selected either a high-school hitter or college pitcher with their first pick in every draft since 1997.
  • Last week's Link-O-Rama included the latest amusing installment of Between Two Ferns With Zach Galifianakis, so here's a 5,000-word New York Times article about the man himself.
  • Brad Pitt has begun "pre-production work" on the Moneyball film, which apparently involves wearing hats and boarding private jets.
  • On a related note, Moneyball isn't the only Michael Lewis book being made into a movie.
  • I'm on the fence about the "fire pit" at the Twins' new ballpark, but the Brewers using their parking lot for drive-in movies is a brilliant idea. Even their initial movie selections are good: Anchorman and Jaws the first night, The Sandlot and Major League the second night.
  • Friend of AG.com, Dodgers blogger, and Variety editor Jon Weisman put together a survey about the decade's best television and the results look surprisingly good to me.
  • David Dorsey of the Fort Myers News-Press wrote a nice article about the tallest pitcher in baseball, Twins right-hander Loek Van Mil.
  • Here are some of the highlights from my NBCSports.com blogging this week:

    - Craziness in the NCAA baseball tournament
    - RAR has Longoria, Ibanez as MVPs through May
    - Daily Dose: Busy day in Atlanta
    - Quote of the Day: White Sox are 'in trouble'
    - No one is watching the Nationals ... still
    - Zambrano is having a bad week
    - Quote of the Day: Holliday 'wants a chance to win'
    - The Strasburg Watch: Amazing year ends with loss
    - Nats fire pitching coach with Strasburg on horizon
    - Good news, bad news for first-place teams

  • Finally, since I'm no longer the lone human to not see the film, this week's AG.com-approved music video is Bruce Springsteen singing "The Wrestler":


  • Once you're done here, check out my "Circling The Bases" blog over at NBCSports.com.

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