Around The League Narratives

Premium Ice Cream Price Wars

2012/05/01 – 1:27 pm

Bryce Harper this, Bryce Harper that. I’ve got other things on my mind.

As I reflect on an already fascinating season in MLB, I think of the stories that have brought me to closer to you, the home viewer:

Philip Humber, who recovered from Tommy John surgery to throw MLB’s 21st perfect game. Never you mind the check-swing end to the story. Check swings are and always have been highly arbitrary. (The sci-fi part of my brain is wondering if we will one day live in a world where pitchers have Tommy John surgery without first injuring themselves. It’d be like a toddler with a tiara going to Argentina for an eyelash extension!)

Eddie Murphy on “The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson.” Has nothing to do with baseball, but watch it anyway.

Matt Kemp has morphed into baseball’s Michael Jordan. What will a Kemp slump do to Dodgerland? He’s all those fans have to hope for at the moment. Yes, I understand that we just saw a sweep of the first-place Nationals, but James Loney has to do better than .230, or this club will not maintain relevance past the All-Star break. I hang it all on Loney and I always have. Andre Ethier too.

Tom Hanks, as Jimmy Dugan (who was modeled after Hack Wilson), reminded us that “there’s no crying in baseball.” I’m trying to remember the last time I cried about baseball. It was probably the day I was cut from the high school team.

The Red Sox will be fine. Too much talent. Teams have played well with managers they don’t like, all throughout history. You think those hard men in the early days loved John McGraw, man for man? I doubt it.

Those of you who know my play-by-play work know that I am given to flights of fancy, as the inimitable Bob Uecker displays here in giving us some revisionist history about Western Metal Supply Co.

I’m watching Jay Leno’s first stand-up performance on “Carson” in 1977, the year my parents met. Judge for yourself.

The day after we watched Barry Bonds tie Hank Aaron’s home-run mark in San Diego, we took in a 14-inning game at Sam Lynn Ballpark. Sergio Romo tossed 2 2/3 scoreless relief innings in the 9th, 10th, and 11th; Pablo Sandoval went 2-for-7.

More tomorrow! Maybe we’ll even do a podcast.

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Narratives

On Facing Anxiety

2012/04/30 – 4:26 pm

Aubrey HuffAubrey Huff is on the DL with anxiety.

Anxiety is a difficult thing to grapple with. At times, fighting anxiety can feel like trying to handcuff smoke. You can’t directly lay your hands on it and “fix” it. You can’t slice it out of your body like a tumor.

And in a sport as dependent on confidence as baseball is, anxiety can be crippling.

Huff was brave enough to talk about what he was dealing with in his statement to the fans and the team:

Thank you to the fans, media and Giants organization for the outpouring of support during this very difficult week. I’m especially grateful for the texts and calls from my teammates, who are like my brothers and have let me know they’re here for me.

My goal is to get back on the field as soon as possible. To do that, I have to focus completely on getting well. I know I’m in a public job, and I’ve been one of the more open guys. But sometimes you have to pull back and work on things in private. This is one of those times.

I appreciate your understanding and patience.

And in writing about Huff’s fight, as he broke the news in SFGate’s The Splash blog, San Francisco Chronicle SFG beat writer Henry Schulman revealed that he also struggles with anxiety and depression.

Before I continue this story, I need to disclose something. I have struggled with whether to say this publicly, and how to do it, but this gives me a good opening. Since 2009 I have been treated for depression, in therapy and medicinally, and continue to be treated. Many awful things happened to me and people around me in a very short time, and my mental health was affected. Anxiety and panic attacks were part of it.

I say this, then, from experience. Everybody will have an opinion about what set this off, but you can’t know, and it’s possible Huff doesn’t know. Sometimes a panic attack just happens.

Oh Henry!

Pictured: Hank Schulman's perennial Twitter icon.

Schulman is brave and gritty in his own disclosure. Writing is also deeply rooted in confidence, and when a writer can’t write, it is a difficult, claustrophobic feeling.

I speak from experience as well: This past year has felt like a running battle for me with anxiety and with my own perfectionism. It has slowed down my output and it made everything much more wearying, including writing for and coding for TenAndFive. I sought help with how I was being unkind to myself, made adjustments to what I was doing, and make headway each day. This article is proof of that.

My way of facing it is to write about it and to laud these two men who face similar difficulty in their everyday lives. And also to pass along the information of how to get help if you or someone you know is having a problem with anxiety.

If you feel anxiety and need to get help, here are some contact numbers:

National Institute of Mental Health Information Center
1-866-615-6464
8:00 AM to 8:00 ET, Monday through Friday
http://www.nimh.nih.gov/index.shtml

National Mental Health Association Hotline
1-800-273-TALK (8255)
Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week
http://www.nmha.org

National Suicide Hotline
1-800-SUICIDE (784-2433)
Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week
http://www.hopeline.com

If you’d like to send a letter of support to Huff, you should. Here’s the address:

Aubrey Huff
c/o San Francisco Giants
AT&T Park
24 Willie Mays Plaza
San Francisco, CA 94107

If you’d like to send a note of support to Schulman, that would also be nice of you. His Twitter account is @HankSchulman.

What else can help against anxiety? Baseball helps. Writing helps. Everyone faces anxiety differently. There is no need to face it alone.

Thank you Aubrey, and thank you Henry.

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Narratives

Can I Borrow A Feeling?

2012/04/16 – 1:13 pm

Some of my favorite intro music for batters and pitchers – and ballpark music at large – is presented here without embellishment. Go download it at your leisure, for sadly I am not made of iTunes gift cards. You have to attend Fishbowl trivia night to have a crack at those.

Ryan Cavan – Citizen Cope, “Bullet and a Target”

Tim Lincecum – MGMT, “Electric Feel”

Paul O’Neill – The Who, “Baba O’Riley”

Joe Sanders – Aloe Blacc, “I Need A Dollar”

Randy Winn - Common, “Universal Mind Control”

Logan Wood - Nate Dogg, “Nobody Does It Better”

My favorite pre-game tune as a child at Candlestick: Roy Orbison, “You Got It”

My favorite pre-game tune as an adult at the Coliseum: The Rolling Stones, “Jumpin’ Jack Flash”

Honorable mention: Bob Marley, “Buffalo Soldier” – it should have been Barry Bonds’ music, like, all the time

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Narratives NL West

DM @BrianWilson38, Re: Mid-Season Form

2012/04/13 – 1:59 pm

To the detriment of blood pressure throughout The Bay Area, Brian Wilson‘s pitching stuff is in mid-season form.

Witness the play-by-play from yesterday’s stress-tastic final inning from Colorado against the Rockies where Wilson entered with a three run lead:

 

Bottom 9th: Colorado

- B. Wilson relieved J. Lopez
- T. Tulowitzki doubled to right center
- M. Cuddyer singled
- W. Rosario struck out swinging
- J. Giambi hit for R. Betancourt
- J. Giambi singled to shallow right, T. Tulowitzki to third, M. Cuddyer to second
- J. Herrera ran for J. Giambi
- T. Helton hit for C. Nelson
- T. Helton lined out to second
- T. Colvin walked, T. Tulowitzki scored, M. Cuddyer to third, J. Herrera to second
- M. Scutaro flied out to right

 

Yup, that’s a familiar pain.

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Podcast

Ten And Five Podcast 14: “Aberrations, Slow Starts, and The Importance Of Kicking The Phillies When They Are Down.”

2012/04/12 – 8:47 pm

Tim Lincecum is working on his release point this season.

We are several series into the 2012 MLB season now. Feels pretty good.

The outliers and aberrations natural to a season’s beginning are still happening, as they do.

Happily, you have TenAndFive’s Scott Armstrong, John Padua, and Chris Rogers to jovially analyze exactly how things are goin’ now that we’re underway. Podcast time, you guys.

Topics covered include:

* Tim Lincecum‘s difficult start to this season

* Barry Zito‘s extremely unlikely shutout

* The Rockies‘ struggles against the breaking ball

* Barry Bonds vs The Baseball Hall Of Fame?

* Jeff Francoeur

* The wild end of yesterday’s A’s game

We are underway, y’all. This Major League Baseball season is happening.

Listen now:  

Download now: TenAndFiveDotCom_Podcast_2012-04-11.mp3

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Narratives

Ozzie Ozzie Oxsen Free

2012/04/10 – 11:52 am

I’ll give the Miami Marlins credit: until I woke up this morning and saw that Ozzie Guillen had been suspended for five games, effective immediately, I hadn’t given one iota of thought to the Marlins skipper in the past week. So now everyone’s talking about the Marlins, but for the wrong reasons.

Folks, don’t haul the ol’ “they’re stepping on Ozzie’s First Amendment rights” argument out of hock. First Amendment rights, my foot. Ozzie works for a private company worth many millions, under the umbrella of another private company worth billions. Ozzie can say whatever he wants, but he shouldn’t expect amnesty from his employers. On the air, I can say that the director of the company I broadcast for is a pinhead. That’s protected speech, and I won’t face criminal charges. But I should probably expect to be suspended or fired.

Moreover, it might behoove the Oz not to take the bait when he’s asked about something, shall we say, outside his bailiwick. I don’t believe that the Marlins should fire him, at least not right away – this is the precise reason the team hired him. That Ozzie made his first big splash in Little Havana by praising his community’s most feared and hated political scourge is an unfortunate circumstance. I’m not defending Ozzie here, any more that I would defend John Rocker or Marge Schott.

But if you live by the sword, you die by the sword, Marlins.

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Narratives

If You Don’t Win Your First Two Games,

2012/04/08 – 2:29 pm

Sorry, Pablo.

If your baseball team doesn’t win its first game of the season, it’s no big deal.

It’s nice to be back out there and it’s too bad there wasn’t a good start and all but we’ll get ‘em next time.

If you don’t win your second game, alright, that didn’t feel good. Let’s think about the last two and come hard for the third game.

If you don’t win your third game, OK, let’s think about what happened and reduce the negative patterns. We want to compete.

If you don’t win your fourth game, the humor — already thin at this point — starts to bleed out of the situation. The size of the swing of the change needed to win that first game of the year gets exponentially bigger. The size of needing that first win gets bigger, almost to the point of not wanting to look at.

If you don’t win your fifth game of the season, changes get made.

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NL West Podcast

Ten And Five Podcast 13: “We Know We Can Podcast.”

2012/04/06 – 2:49 pm

Opening Day 2012Today is Opening Day 2012 for the San Francisco Giants.

We recorded a podcast last night to herald the coming of the new season.

Topics covered include:
* 10&5′s aim(s) for this season.
* Analyzing the Giants’ Opening Day starting lineup decisions.
* How will the SFG middle infield competition play out?
* Looking into the key players for this year for San Francisco.

We are here. This is meant to be fun. Listen with us.

Listen now:  

Download now: TenAndFiveDotCom_Podcast_2011-04-05.mp3

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Narratives

So You Think You Can Podcast

2012/04/05 – 9:22 am

So we recorded a podcast last night. That’s progress. That’s the wonder of technology. Now we must post it! We’re supposed to bring you another one tomorrow from AT&T Park.

While everyone coastside is abuzz over the Matt Cain extension, let’s consider Joey Votto’s new deal with Cincinnati. Votto’s $225 million contract runs until at least 2024, the year Joey’s fellow Canadian Justin Bieber will appear on an infomercial for a KTEL box set of “The Greatest Hits of the 2000′s.”

$100-million-or-more deals have turned into the norm in this sport, and that going rate for top players is likely to rise with the $2.15 billion sale of the Dodgers. However, UCLA and USC economists say that the sale doesn’t work if Magic and Friends can’t also turn the real estate surrounding Dodger Stadium into a net profit. Wasn’t the Dodgers’ previous ownership annihilated by a real-estate hack? Why yes, yes it was.

So how much of the Dodgers’ return to financial stability relies on the club’s on-field performance?

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Around The League Season Previews

Joe Shlabotnik

2012/04/04 – 12:24 am

Tomorrow, we get our first look at Marlins Park, whose opening puts to bed the goofy-old-timey ballpark phase of the game’s history. I’m personally partial to the whizbang home-run effects from the Astrodome. I liked those lights and noises a hell of a lot more than I liked the Astros’ rainbow uniforms.

Speaking of things I like, I’m revisiting the recurrence of baseball bum Joe Shlabotnik in the Peanuts comic strip. Shlabotnik is Charlie Brown’s diamond hero, and like Charlie Brown, Joe is a born loser. Pausing for self-analysis, I wonder if I’m reading up on such a tragic figure because we’ve reached the end of spring training, the time when a lot of ballplayers’ hearts are broken in managers’ offices.

 

Good reading for today: Sports Illustrated’s profile of former NBA star Antoine Walker, another hard-luck case; and Tom Verducci’s preview essay for the season.

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