Because this worked so well last year, here's my second annual assessment of the gentlemen of the Braves. It's just six this year, mainly because I had too many for a "top five" and didn't feel like putting in the extra effort to carry the list out to ten. Besides, it's either this or another post about moving McCann to shortstop. You'll thank me later.

Continue reading this post »

On Thanksgiving Day, November 22, 1956, Today host Dave Garroway recited a list of things for which he was thankful. The list, he said, was made up of "little things." White paint, because it makes things look fresh and new. Opposable thumbs, because without them we couldn't grasp anything.

Garroway made a fair point: It's not always the big things that make a difference.

Continue reading this post »

This was written by request of a Braves fan who liked my previous short stories, but wanted to see one about Chipper Jones. It took me a little while to think of an appropriate setting and theme. Once it hit me, I sat down and wrote for a few days, then tinkered and fixed for a few more.

The result is a story called "Beautiful Ride." Retirement is in the back of Larry's mind. During a rain delay, his memory drifts back to three seminal moments in his career.

I hope you enjoy it.

Continue reading this post »

It started with a man and a dream. But enough about how Robert Goddard invented the first liquid-fueled rocket. This is a post about the fine, upstanding men of the 2011 Atlanta Braves. And how they look in their uniforms. I promise, there will be some small measure of analysis -- and statistics!

So sit back and make yourself comfortable. Live, laugh and learn.

Continue reading this post »

Okay, so it's not really front pages from all over the country, but "The Bay Area's Newspapers" didn't have the same pop.

The barricades are gone, the crowds are dispersed, and pieces of orange-and-black confetti littering Market Street are probably the only tangible signs of Wednesday's parade. And that was that. The parade and speeches capped off this weird, wild season not just for the Giants but for major league baseball. The 2010 season goes into history, and we get a brief breather for the winter before the crescendo of spring training begins.

We've shared some laughs, some tears and more than a few exclamations of "FUCK!" along the way, but you know, I couldn't pick a better group of people with which I'd rather suffer through the torture than the McCoven. Let's take a last look back at this cast of characters called the 2010 San Francisco Giants and that wonderful symbiotic relationship between team and fans.

/picks up guitar

Another turning point, a fork stuck in the road
Time grabs you by the wrist, directs you where to go

Everybody!

It's something unpredictable, but in the end is right
I hope you had the time of your life

YOU'VE BEEN GREAT! THANK YOU, SAN FRANCISCO! GOOD NIGHT!

/throws pick to walkoff baltimore chop, walks off stage

Continue reading this post »

Bart Giamatti once wrote that baseball is designed to break your heart, leaving you to face the cold days of winter alone. And for 55 seasons, fall indeed broke the hearts of many a Giants fan. To this day, there are people who refer to 1962, 1989 or 2002 in the same tone of voice one might use to describe a sex offender.

I think this winter will be just a little warmer for the Giants nation, because of the otherworldly, seemingly impossible sight we witnessed last night. In last night's post-game coverage, I kept hearing various beer-and-champagne soaked Giants utter variations on the phrase, "This is for the fans," and I've no doubt every one of them said so sincerely.

Yes, the victory is for Mays and Marichal, for Clark and Cepeda and all those who came before. But it's also for all those who shivered in Candlestick and floated in the Cove, those too many to name, those that don't get statues outside the park. It's for the fans. It's for all of us. Our hearts go into this winter intact.

Here now, courtesy the Newseum in Washington, D.C., is the story of that night as told through the eyes, ears and words of the nation's newspapers. From San Francisco to Billings to Pensacola to Tuscaloosa, here is how the United States of America is looking at your 2010 World Champion San Francisco Giants. Print-quality PDFs available for download until midnight EDT.

 

 

 

Continue reading this post »

(OPEN ON SHOT OF POSEY SITTING BEHIND DESK, TIE SLIGHTLY LOOSENED, SLEEVES ROLLED UP)

"Hi. I'm Buster Posey. My opponents have been giving you reasons not to vote for me all summer. They say I'm inexperienced. They say I I'm weak on defense. They say I'm going to be soft on baserunners.

"Well, I ain't havin' it. I've worked hard to get where I am today. From my blue-collar roots in Georgia, my parents worked to put me through Florida State University so I could have a chance at a better life. And now I want to do the same for you.

"When you vote for me, you're voting for something America needs deperately: strength and poise behind the dish, and an effective bat in the lineup.

"When you go to the polls tomorrow, think about what this election means to you. If you don't want a Black-and-Orange Party triumph, don't vote for me. But if you want to help send me and my colleagues to victory and send a message to those inside-the-beltway Texas fatcats, make the right choice.

"And just what is Bengie Molina trying to hide, anyway?

"I'm Buster Posey, and I'm the candidate for you. Vote November 2."

(FADE TO BLACK)

 

 

Continue reading this post »

It starts innocently enough. A strapping, wide-eyed country boy from the Wiregrass region of Alabama signs with a big-city team out West. The minors are fun, and mostly the guys you hang out with are like you: simple, focused on baseball, just happy to be there instead of working on a farm or in a factory somewhere.

Then, you get called up to the bigs. It's a bit confusing at first, this sprawling mass of people and buildings crammed onto the tip of a tiny peninsula. You meet some interesting characters in the clubhouse, like that guy from the A's who's always talking about Zen or something. You really hit it off with that laid-back stringy-haired fellow from Seattle. You used to beat up kids like that in junior high. You politely turn down his offer to share a blunt, though when you get home you don't know why. Nothing wrong with a little toke now and then, you think. Whoa. Where did that come from?

You're not sure what to think. These people didn't exist back home. But y'know, they're pretty nice guys, so they can't be all that bad. And the people here are kinda friendly, not like you expected from Californians. When it comes time to pick a place to settle down, you don't go up to Marin. You get a nice place in Noe Valley, which is great because there's that fantastic little sandwich place in the Castro.

In the Castro? You leave that part out when you call your parents that evening.

And then, before you realize it, you wake up one morning and you're telling people how to get to Portero from Pacfica and laughing at all the rubes who still say "Frisco." Your hair is longer than it's ever been. You know that Buena Vista is way overpriced and that Fisherman's Wharf is too touristy and if you see a big, hairy guy in pink leather walking down Folsom Street leading a midget dressed as a blood-spattered Benjamin Franklin around on a heavy chain, you automatically think, "Is it time for the Fair already?"

And then the night you blank the Rangers in the World Series (the World Series!), the sound of 43,000 people singing "Lights" still ringing in your ears. You glance in the rearview mirror as you drive back home. It's the Bay Bridge, all lit up like a diamond necklace strung between the two cities it links and you get this little feeling in your chest, like you've just witnessed something magical.

You can't believe how far you've come in so little time. You love this city, and it loves you. And the next morning, you hope that guy on McCovey Chronicles is uploading the newspaper front pages from your victory so you can glance at them as you sip your coffee.

Today is your day, Matt Cain. Savor it.

 

 

 

Continue reading this post »

All right. Just got through watching my DVR'd copy of this week's Glee. What happened in the game last night?

Let's see...seventy-five words. Uh, I bought a couch yesterday, but I think I mighta paid too much for it. But it really goes with the color scheme in my living room. It all evens out.

I'm wearing this nifty navy-with-light-blue-pinstripes ensemble today. Everyone at work says I look pretty darn good.

That oughta do it.

Today's papers, courtesy the Newseum in Washington.

Continue reading this post »

On a warm, humid morning in September, 1962, John F. Kennedy addressed a crowd at Houston's Rice University to dedicate the facility that would be the nucleus of America's manned spaceflight program. It was another step forward in his goal to bring humans to the surface of another celestial body for the first time in history.

"We meet in an hour of change and challenge, in a decade of hope and fear, in an age of both knowledge and ignorance," Kennedy said. "The greater our knowledge increases, the greater our ignorance unfolds."

He continued: "We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard; because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win."

The young, brash chief executive could just as easily have been speaking of the 2010 Giants and the uncertain times in which we live. Just as the Apollo program dared us to reach for the stars, Buster Posey, Brian Wilson, Matt Cain, Tim Lincecum and many others on and off the field dare us to reach ever higher. They dare us to use the bat of imagination to hit the baseball of hope over the outfield wall of despair and into the gracious crowd of humanity.

All this is to say the World Series begins tonight in San Francisco. Here are your damn papers.

Continue reading this post »

"The world will little note nor long remember what we say here," Abraham Lincoln wrote in his Gettysburg Address. "But it can never forget what they did here."

His words might be applied to the event that took place in Philadelphia last night. The significance of such a milestone won't benefit from my words added to the avalanche of words that have erupted from sportswriters' notepads and computer keyboards in the hours since the final pitch was thrown. I'll let the event speak for itself, though the lenses of the photographers who captured it, the writers who witnessed it and the newspapers who covered it.

Now, I'm going to enjoy my own paper while watching Charles Osgood on CBS Sunday Morning.

Yes, I'm 89 years old.

You know the drill by now: All these front pages are available as print-quality PDFs (which one local reporter says are good enough to frame and place in his kitchen) from Washington's Newseum until about midnight EDT tonight. Today's papers under the jump.

 

Continue reading this post »

EXTRA! EXTRA! READ ALL ABOUT IT!

NEWSPAPER FRONT PAGE POSTS SWEEP NATION!

OVERWORKED REPORTER FORCED TO ENTERTAIN MASSES WITH NEWSPAPER JPEGS!

As always, PDFs are available from the Newseum until about midnight EDT.

Continue reading this post »

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - Early returns indicate a landslide victory for the Cain/Ross ticket, a virtual deadlock until Tuesday. Cain successfully quelled rumors that threatened to de-rail his campaign, including lack of experience and deeply partisan hair. In his concession speech earlier this evening, defeated incumbent Cole Hamels thanked supporters for a hard-fought campaign. Philadelphia's hopes now turn to dark-horse candidate Joe Blanton, who will face off against Madison Bumgarner. The 21-year-old candidate is seeking to capitalize on voter mistrust of the Phillies and promises to "bring an outsider's perspective" to the Bay Area. Tonight's televised debate begins at 4:57 PDT.

Today's newspapers, under the jump. JPGs only this time, but print-quality PDFs of each are available from the Newseum until about midnight EDT.

Continue reading this post »

You know the drill. Let's find out what's on the front page of your morning newspaper, courtesy the Newseum in Washington. Print-quality PDFs are available from the Newseum until about midnight EDT.

Continue reading this post »

Good morning, all. Using my powers of East Coast bias for good, here is an early-morning snapshot of newspaper front pages from the win. Links are included for downloading print-quality PDFs of each file. The PDFs, courtesy the good folks at the Newseum in Washington, should be available until about midnight EDT.

Continue reading this post »

It started, as one might expect, with a rain delay. Actually, it started when I was kid, when I first discovered the amazing things a pencil can do when combined with an imagination. But that's another fanpost. Back to the rain delay. I had done an intentionally bad Moylan 'K' graphic in MS Paint, a sort of parody of NCChopper's great work. And it gave me an idea: Why not try to draw a player I liked, just for fun? I already had Paint open, and looked forward to the challenge. I didn't know it at the time, but it was the origin of what became a season-long project to depict the 2010 Braves as I see them.

All pictures link to a full-size version.

 

 

 

Continue reading this post »

They said it couldn't be done. But that's what they said about putting a man on the Moon. And then Neil Armstrong sank the Titanic. Be careful what you wish for.

I got the idea in my head last week: Create a calendar featuring various major league jersey numbers representing the days of the month. It took me a short while this afternoon, and frankly it's one of the most productive Saturdays I've had in a while. Click on the calendar for a full-size version.

via img.photobucket.com

Cross-posted to Talking Chop