February 11, 2011

Link-O-Rama

• Leave it to The Black Eyed Peas to get the entire country to agree on something.

• This seems sort of unfair. I mean, the poor guy "said thank you and hung up."

• I've never actually appeared in court, whereas Lindsay Lohan is a veteran defendant at this point, but this seems like a bit much.

Little Jerry Seinfeld finally got his revenge.

• I remain highly skeptical, but Michael Rand of the Minneapolis Star Tribune attempted to solve the mystery of Anthony LaPanta's hair.

• I used to have a similar system for finding inserts in certain baseball card packs.

• Rotoworld's annual fantasy baseball draft guide is now available online. I'm "editor-in-chief" and it's a big part of my job, so I'd be grateful if AG.com readers checked it out. You get 1,000 player profiles and projections, a couple dozen strategy articles, customizable cheat sheets, and a whole bunch of other good stuff that adds up to 150,000-plus words of content updated all spring. Buy it, so I don't have to move back to the proverbial parents' basement.

• Speaking of Rotoworld, the entire site underwent a dramatic re-design this week.

• It turns out I know exactly what it feels like to be an award-winning movie star.

• On a related note, being a non-movie star actor doesn't sound like much fun.

Ozzie Guillen watched the Super Bowl while eating a massive bowl of Jell-O. Obviously.

• AG.com reader Andy Ulseth is a local musician who just released his first album and I'm very confident in saying it's legitimately good (as opposed to just "good for someone who reads my blog"). Acoustic singer-songwriter stuff is always right up my alley and Ulseth fits somewhere in the indie-folk or folk-pop realm with a bunch of really enjoyable songs. Check it out.

• I live this cartoon every day on Twitter.

• Along with being a stand-up comedian, podcaster, occasional actor, and the UFC's television analyst Joe Rogan is also enough of a mixed martial artist himself to teach Georges St. Pierre a turning side kick:

That would be sort of like if Bert Blyleven taught Roy Halladay a curveball, except if Blyleven was a really good announcer and had double sleeves of tattoos.

• Speaking of actors teaching kicks to UFC champions, Vitor Belfort can blame Steven Seagal for being on the wrong end of one of the most memorable knockouts in MMA history. Seriously.

Howard Stern's recent appearance on Late Show with David Letterman was fantastic and it produced this picture, which is currently the background on my laptop.

• "Never Not Funny" with Jimmy Pardo and Matt Belknap is such an outstanding podcast that I happily pay for it, but their latest episode featuring Conan O'Brien is available for free.

• Few men could get mocked relentlessly for attending the Super Bowl while sitting in a luxury box and being hand-fed popcorn by their movie star girlfriend, but Alex Rodriguez managed.

• Remember that one-punch goalie fight from last week's Link-O-Rama? I'm not sure whether it increases or decreases the hilarity, but the one punch broke the losing goalie's face.

• This is not a great look for Tim Lincecum. Or anyone, really.

• Without knowing it Ken Rosenthal and Kelly Oxford had an amusing Twitter conversation in my TweetDeck feed.

Peter Gammons quoting me in one of his MLB.com columns made my day/week/month/year.

• I'm a big Norm MacDonald fan and a big High Stakes Poker fan, but I'm skeptical about how good they'll be together. Of course, the biggest issue with the upcoming HSP season probably isn't MacDonald replacing Gabe Kaplan, but rather that all the big-name players sponsored by Full Tilt Poker are no longer allowed on the show.

Jerry Sloan stepped down as Jazz coach after 23 seasons and his replacement is one of the original Timberwolves.

Ricky Rubio continues to struggle in Europe.

• My fellow Party Down fans will love this.

• Here are some highlights from my NBCSports.com blogging this week:

- Dirty little secret: Michael Young simply isn’t all that great
- Phillies' right field job is "a three-man race" that Domonic Brown should win
- Phil Hughes blames inconsistent changeup for second-half fade, but do numbers agree?
- Giants top prospect Brandon Belt likely headed for Triple-A
- Mike Lowell is definitely retired and "hip replacement is most likely inevitable"
- Josh Hamilton and Rangers agree to two-year, $24 million deal
- Mariners sign Vladimir Guerrero's nephew for $400,000
- Yankees sign reliever Luis Ayala to a minor league deal
- Diamondbacks decide against using a humidor at Chase Field

• I've started re-watching The Wire, so in honor of becoming totally obsessed with the show all over again this week's AG.com-approved music video is The Blind Boys of Alabama doing their cover version of "Way Down in the Hole" by Tom Waits: