SB Nation User Blog: The Dogfather

AN Community Service Day 1

The Dogfather — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 01:47:16 -0000

The photos below are from AN Community Service Day 1, by the contingent who assisted setting up Newman Center's monthly meal. A much larger group helped out at a Rebuilding Together Oakland work site -- they can send me their pics for inclusion or develop another fanpost. We all then met at the Coliseum and sat together in seats donated by the A's. Thanks A's!

Many thanks as well to Nico, LongTimeFan and Pam5981 for setting this event in motion.

Father Nico blesses the coffee...

... and works on his four-seam wrapped-brownie grip.

The DogMa and EnglishMajor hatch a plot.

EnglishMajor cuts the mustard.

She's got a bit o' The Captain in her ...

... as does The Dogfather.

Shots from the game ... We know what 67Marquez didn't give up for Lent.

The A's won, the ice plant's in bloom, spring is in the air and Spring Training is Finally Over -- it was a good day.

Come, MondA's!

The Dogfather — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 18:52:20 -0000

With apologies to Parrotheads everywhere, and fond memories evoked by this vid:

I offer this small ode to the impending bA'seball season.

Headin' out to San Francisco,
For the Op’ning Day warm-up show.
I'll have my green parka on,
You know I’m not meant to freeze my ass-off, by the Cove.
Old ballyard -- I didn't know,
That I'd be missin' you so!

Chorus:
Come Monday, it'll be all right,
Come Monday, starts a new pennant fight.
You’ll spend four lousy days in a brown slegnA haze,
And be back here for Opening Night!

Yes, it's been a long winter,
Rent-a-stars and shoulder strains.
Another new Beaneball creation,
Sometimes, they’re hard to explain.
But bA’seball, since i love you so,
That's the reason I just hafta go --

Chorus:
Come Monday, it'll be all right
Come Monday, starts a new pennant fight
There’ll be Sunday’s workout, and then four days without
Fin’lly Friday is Opening Night!

I can't help it -- Stomper
Is that much a part of me now.
Despite all that tarp monkey business,
And even when there’s no free kraut!

Our pitchers may start on the DL,
I know Chavvy may end up there.
But then there’s this new guy Holliday,
J’ombi, OCab, and kids – how’ll they fare?
It’s the last verse -- you’re glad, I can tell,
One more chorus; no more dog-ger-ell...

Chorus:
Come Monday, bA’seball makes it all right,
Come Monday, starts a new pennant fight.
Six long months in a daze, and now I’m nearly crazed,
And I just want to start the wild ride!

Six months wasting away, finally Opening Day
And we soon get to start the wild ri-i-i-de!

AN (girls, stat-heads and 'ball)

The Dogfather — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 23:16:52 -0000

With apologies to Becker, Fagen and Cream (Ice, baby), here's a bit more Stolen Dan.

Original lyrics are here.

Steely Dan FM [no static at all] on ROWE AMI R-85 (via ishredu)

Tune-out the battle, mama, just stat-heads' whine

WHIPs, LOOGYs and PECOTAs, big waste of time.

The girls don’t seem to care, who's on,

As long as their pants aren't long.

Nothin’ but rockin' high socks

And Jason Giambi's favorite thong.

Give her some Latin candy, she’ll salivate.

Show her some Sweeney dandy, her eyes dilate.

The girls love derrieres, all right

As long as their pants are tight

AN – not just stat-heads at all

Offer Buck in Jen's basement, they’ll celebrate.

Show ‘em some Ample Crotchby, they’ll be home late.

The girls all take delight, tonight

As long as they’re tailored right

AN – girls, fat-heads and 'ball....

Dog Day, The Photos

The Dogfather — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 00:45:35 -0000

At the behest of Leopold and others, this fanpost includes a few shots of the A's cAnine fAnitude. We got there too late for most of the pup rally festivities.

Here are three Ellises from the rally:

Rescue in Lights (no idea whose idea that was...)

Okay, Patterson -- left ear up = STEAL!

Coming soon: The Mutt Who Ate the Collieseum!

There are A's on dAlmAtion!

Inning 1: Genghis drowns his sorrows

I kan haz baykon??>

A full moon, walk-off howl

It was a Three Dog Night

Please add your own shots!

An interlude for the Poets: Don't Poop on Our Parade

The Dogfather — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 22:19:11 -0000

With apologies to Styne, Merrill and Monkey

(I can't account for the occasional random line breaks. And yes, I do happen to be a heterosexual)

Don’t tell us not to cheer—

Just mope and compute,
Life’s winning and the goal’s
A chance to crapshoot.
Don’t bring around some stat
To poop on our parade!

Don’t tell us “no sac bunts”
We think they count, too.
If we can steal a base,
We really ought to.
No dreary acronyms

To poop on our parade!

We’ll march our rooks out,
Bet on the come.
And if we’re hooked-out,
Your turn at bat, Rats.
At least we didn’t flake it,
Drat, Rats, maybe Oh-9 is when we’ll make it …

But if we’re 20 wins,
Of rare perfection.
Or painful losing streaks
Meaned by regression
The Lasik or some blurry sunscreen in the eye,
We gotta play ‘em,
We’re gonna flay ‘em,
Hardly even pay ‘em, this year
Baseball is heaven,
Six months or seven --
We get to cheer the A’s, dear.

Get ready for us, League,
The A’s are comers,
Marching to the beat
Of left-field drummers.
Don’t bore us with some stat
To poop on our parade!

We’re gonna win, and win Now!
Play off your charts--we know how,
Play-off for the whole jackpot,
Pitch, catch and hit where they’re not,
Eye outside sliders, and take--
Wait for the fastball, and rake--
Hey, Mister Selig, kiss our bum!

Repeat: We’ll march our rooks etc.

Repeat: Get ready for us etc.

Original lyrics here.

Youtube version here.

Poll

So, are you:

A stat-head?

5 votes

A Poet?

3 votes

A puppet, a pauper, a pirate, a pawn and a king?

4 votes

12 votes | Poll has closed

Bay Area commerce and the move to Fremont

The Dogfather — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 21:07:03 -0000

Well, the Bay Area's Bestest Newspapers [retch] came out with their regular 50 Biggest Companies reports on Sunday link , toting revenues and profits for both the 50 largest businesses in the East Bay (generously defined) and the Bay Area at-large. Of course, they misspelled a word in the headline ("trial" meaning "trail"), but hey, they don't call themselves the Bay Area's bestest proofreaders, and I think I know where they made their most recent cuts. But I digress, hoping I haven't made similar blunders in this here fanpost.

I was surprised at the results, and thought I'd share 'em on which for folks to chew. Now, I'm perfectly well aware that this is only one measure of economic activity, but if we concede that the A's are organized and intended to be a profit-making entity, then these kinds of numbers are not insignificant.

For the Bay Area at-large, I would divide the geography as follows:

SF= SF, SSF and North Bay

Silicon Valley = peninsula, San Jose, Fremont, Hayward, Union City

East Bay = everything else east of most of the bridges

The Top 50 settle into those areas as follows:

SF = 14

SV = 30

EB = 6

So it's really no mystery why the Giaunts are so proud and jealous of "their" territory to the south.

Looking at the East Bay Region specifically, I would resolve the geography as follows:

Oakland = Oakland, Emeryville, Alameda, Berkeley, Hercules

San Ramon/Tri-Valleys = everything east of the Caldecott Tunnel, and Dublin and Sunol grades

Fremont = Fremont, Hayward, Union City

Defined so, the numbers are as follows:

Oak = 12

SRV/TriV = 20

Fremont = 18

By this logic, the new ballyard might better be in Walnut Creek or Pleasanton than Oakland. And if we just look at companies HQ'd within the city limits of Oakland and Fremont, per se, Oakland loses 3 to 15.

Now, I've heard Fremont disparaged around here as a parking lot with a City Council, but it's pretty clearly more than that. And one could take away from the above data that the tech industries centered in the Silicon Valley, of which Fremont is best considered a part, are the economic engine of the Bay Area. It also seems clear that Oakland in particular, and to a lesser extent SF, just aren't the commercial centers they were when the teams moved here 40 and 50 years ago. At those times, the peninsula was fruit orchards, and there really were walnut groves in Walnut Creek. Or so I'm told.

Viewed using this metric, the move south makes a lot of sense. Yes, companies aren't people, but to an increasing degree they are ticket-buyers, and they do represent sponsorship sources. Oakland, for all its natural beauty, infrastructure advantages and head start, just hasn't kept pace.

Resolving the Dot Race Colors (or not, we'll see)

The Dogfather — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 01:14:01 -0000

Regular readers of these electron arrangements will recall that there are several of us, 67Marquez and YT among us, who detest the blue-white-and-red dot racer color scheme. To us, it characterizes a slapdash approach to the stadium experience. As such, it's an affront to an outfit that does all those little things on the baseball operations side -- maybe better than anyone. It's something that troubleth the soul of the team we love. Please note that this is quite apart from actually cheering for the stupid little orbs -- to me it ranks only inches above The Wave in proving PTBarnum's theorem. But I digress.

So. Last evening I corralled one of the comely, young marketing assistants, who gave me the name of one David D, who, she assured me, could address this matter of deep and lasting ennui. I emailed him today, as follows:

To: David D
Subject: Please change the Dot colors!

At the pregame event last night, one of the hostesses gave me your name as
someone who might be able to help.

Why, oh WHY, are the dots red white and blue (Red Sox colors, no less -- at
least you arranged for the red dot not to win, but cripes)?

Why, in a day when you can get custom-made M&Ms in A's team colors, can't
you-all customize the dots to be team colors -- then we'd always win!

Plus the crowd, which goes nuts for that silliness anyway, would REALLY go
nuts for this.

Howsabout it?

Thanks,

And, scoring big points for timeliness and politesse, if still blind to the eye-popping brilliance of the solution thus succinctly presented, he responded as follows:

Thank you for your interest in Dot Racing. Dot Racing has had Red White and Blue Dots since it's [sic] inception in 1987. The colors are based on the colors of our nations [sic] flag [Note: also France's ] It is part of the tradition of the unique ballpark experience. There has been some discussion internally about changing the colors but Red White and Blue won out. This feature is sponsored and therefore ultimate approval lies with our client. Thanks again and we thank you for your support of the Oakland Athletics as we celebrate our 40th Anniversary.

He's very welcome. And, of course, he's very wrong.

He did make the error of indicating that The Client has final authority on this issue. A little further digging revealed that said client has an executive VP in charge of just these matters:

... Vice President of Marketing, has over 10 years of marketing and sales experience[!]. Mr. K is responsible for FusionStorm’s corporate marketing, branding and communications strategies. He joined the company in 1998 and under his direction FusionStorm has grown to be one of the most recognized and respected... [yadayada]

Still with me? Okay, then it seems to me that a diaristo might be deputized to convey the results of a poll to this Mr. K, on behalf of the citizenry of AN, hopefully to the effect that he could single-handedly rejuvenate the tired marketing, branding and communication strategery , by changing that stoopid-from-the-inception dot color scheme. Not that I'm trying to drum-up support.

Now, it may be that nobody 'cept 67Marquez and YT actually gives an Angels fan's patoot about this issue. If so, nobody will vote and Marquez and YT will retire to our respective corners, muttering and shaking an occasional angry fist at an indifferent deity. Or, I might argue passionately that such a show of indifference is prima feces PROOF that the strategery is old-n-busted. So what if I'd lose.

On the assumption that this screed has now gone on long enough that I can avoid getting Nico's goat, as it were, 'tis time for a thoroughly biased and unscientific poll of the AN cognoscenti (note that indifference is not an option -- express it, if you must, by not letting your voice be heard on this important topic):

Poll

Resolved: that we denizens of A's Nation are endowed with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of a different color scheme for the Coliseum racing dots. We respectfully request your urgent attention to this matter

Yes -- change them to team colors: green, gold and white.

164 votes

No -- keep the dreary old Red Sox color scheme: blue, red and white.

29 votes

193 votes | Poll has closed

2H3A3N and the elephant ear, 030408

The Dogfather — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 01:43:56 -0000

2H3A3N and the elephant ear, 030408

Fiorentino on base, 030408

The Dogfather — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 01:42:44 -0000

Fiorentino on base, 030408

Cupcakes and a Pink Taco, 030408

The Dogfather — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 01:41:32 -0000