Because Daily may be setting expectations too high in the final flickering days of the postseason.   Be grateful for whatever Dumps may come your way. 

29 of the 60 newspapers that covered at least some games in the regular season do not have a reporter at the World Series, including of course the San Francisco Chronicle, the San Jose Mercury News, the Oakland Tribune, and the Contra Costa Times (the latter three functioning as one paper for this purpose).   I don't think this is the end of the world....I'm sure SuSlu would have given us an interesting Swisher anecdote or two if she were there, but if your team isn't in the playoffs, I don't think your beat reporter has to be there either.   Selig disagrees:

“It’s a manifestation of what’s happening in America,” Bud Selig, the baseball commissioner, said Sunday before Game 4 of the World Series. “I’m saddened by it. I think newspaper coverage over the years has enabled us to succeed much more than a lot of people understand so for me this is a very, very unhappy development.”

You might think with all that extra space in the press box, there would be extra tickets for Yankee fans who spent days camping out before the first two games, but no.  I was drawn to this AP video by the guy in the furry trooper hat who really looks like something out of the Onion News Network, but then when I watched it I was struck by the guy at :19 in wearing a camo jacket and.... an A's cap.  Who wears an A's cap to camp out for Yankees tickets?  Is he a mole?  A ticket scalper?  Was he planning to leap from his seat onto the field and strip down to his green-and-gold underpants and taunt Bud Selig?  Sadly, we'll never know since he did not get tickets. 

And I'm sorry, but centaurs are way lamer than unicorns and Mark Ellis would never in a million billion years do that. Plus if the ladies' principal impression is the art on your wall, you're doing something wrong. 

The lede to this story will bring a tear to your eye: 

Sitting in rocking chairs on the back porch, sipping beers, the three friends would talk about it: What if we could all play in the World Series someday?

Here is a shocking story of possible cheating at a high-profile tournament.....a high-profile Sudoku tournament that may have been scammed by a mysterious guy in a hoodie. 

And the latest speculation (no new facts that I can see) on the territorial rights to San Jose. 

And thus a new Daily Link Dump.....however, I commend yesterday's DLD to your attention because of the many excellent links and comments including Poppy's highly-recommended suggestion. 

Speaking of the new A's ballpark, some interesting recent posts from the always-interesting Marine Layer include the news of potential Sharks-A's conflicts on Comcast Sports Net California -- not this year, but in the spring. 

Speaking of where the new A's ballpark isn't but should be, the Oakland Tribune has an upbeat assessment of downtown Oakland including the un-shrinkwrapping of City Walk. 

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Yes, we have BART service today, and more importantly, tonight for those who can make it to the Coliseum to watch Brett Tomko take on the Yankees.  Tomko tonight, Mazzarro tomorrow, Duchscherer....sometime maybe....he has a non-baseball issue.  But let's not dwell on the future when we have the past to gloat about!

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Or the one that isn't in production right now.  The New York Times has a story headlined In Skittish Hollywood, Stars Can't Save "Moneyball"  and the LA Times counters with its more insiderish Sony's Amy Pascal speaks out about "Moneyball".   Both identify the problem with the original script: people who are still alive being portrayed by actors, saying and doing things that did not actually happen exactly the way the script depicts them.   This is a problem that many other filmmakers have conquered successfully, but it does help to have the cooperation of the people who are going to be portrayed as characters....and the NYTimes indicates that it was at least in part Major League Baseball that objected to the historical liberties.  The second draft -- the one we haven't seen, the one that caused Sony to put the movie on ice -- was apparently much more of a documentary/reenactment.   The LAT story says one of the bits in the first script that director Steven Soderbergh wanted cut was the part where the 4-year-old daughter of Scott and Bitsy Hatteberg fields a ball that her dad missed and the "Ron Washington" character suggests signing her up. 

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It's the 42nd anniversary of the first major-league game I ever attended, Minnesota Twins vs. Washington Senators.  Unfortunately, the game was called on account of a tremendous thunderstorm before it became official; here's the box score for the next day.  Look at that lineup.....Tovar, Versailles, Killebrew, Oliva, Allison, Rollins, Zimmermann, Quilici, and the promising rookie Rod Carew was brought in to pinch-hit for Kitty Kaat. 

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Shooting was supposed to start today on Moneyball: The Movie, but it isn't gonna.   It may be a temporary snag, or the film may be dead....it's day-to-day.

The advisory vote on whether to encourage an A's stadium was supposed to be on the ballot in San Jose in November, but it isn't gonna either.  Maybe in 2010.   It's day-to-day.

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I hope I'm not stepping on anyone who intended a special DLD for today, but when I saw this story I knew I had to post it.

Four lemurs of endangered species born at San Jose's Happy Hollow zoo

via extras.mnginteractive.com

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Bruce Jenkins: on the Yankees' new ballpark:

The real Yankee fans, the ones who perfected the art of sophisticated (or downright rude) heckling, have been priced out of the yard.

The Wall Street Journal: rocks the high socks....with stirrups; taking us to Twin City, South Carolina, home of "the last mass-production baseball-stirrup mill in America".

Futsal? In Hayward?

And the most awesome news after the jump.

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does not mean that we don't need a DLD as well.   Because we don't like to clutter up the game threads with Ignacio de la Fuente saying I told you so:

"I predicted a long time ago that Fremont wouldn't work out" for the A's, De La Fuente said.  "The A's belong in Oakland," he said.

Just call him Nostradanus.  However, at least Oakland city officials are now pretending they want the team to stay.  In a further quote from that Bay City News Service* story:

*just because NBC11 is comfortable putting unattributed wire copy on their website does not mean I am

Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums' spokesman, Paul Rose, said, "The mayor is willing to do whatever it takes, within reason, to stay in Oakland."

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