Over Celebrate What?
I was trying to figure out a way to sum up the Goose Gossage thing and then Murph did it for me. Here is this perfect, short exchange on KNBR this morning:
Murph: “Hey, have you seen the Goose Gossage rant yet?”
Christian Arroyo: “No, I haven’t.”
M: “Do you know who Goose Gossage is?”
CA: “No.”
lqtm.
A Place To Talk About Giants Baseball 
He’s the guy that gave up Brett’s famous pine-tar HR. Maybe he’s still bitter about that. 🙂
I guess ol’ Goose was attending short attention span theater. I missed the Ryan Braun rant in the middle of the other 3 rants. “Get off my lawn!!!”
“Ryan Braun is a fucking steroid user. He gets a standing ovation on Opening Day in Milwaukee. How do you explain that to your kid after throwing people under the bus and lying through his fucking teeth? They don’t have anyone passing the fucking torch to these people.
“If I had acted like that, you don’t go in that fucking dugout. There are going to be 20 fucking guys waiting for you.”
Grey Goose Gossage indeed.
Grey Goose? Make that martini extra dry (just wave the vermouth bottle at the glass), please…
Great night of b-ball. Watched Seton Hall edge Creighton, OK beat Cyclones, Cal lick Beavers.
Utah has better big men tho and Brown needs to wake up. Glove Jr. (gary payton 2) cool player.
Also as Mac said great to see Duke lose. Coach K has 64-48 lead with 11 plus minutes to go when I turned it on and heimliched it away, scoring only 6 more points in regulation and losing in OT.
Is baseball really losing kids? For minorities I’d imagine it has to do with proliferation of expensive travel teams that go year round and start in middle school years. Dunno how parents afford it and baseball does require a lot of gear that only will last so long.
Other factor for good athletes would be opps and economics–there are over 300 D-1 b-ball schools with at least half dozen on average scholarships available. Do baseball programs have that? Cal almost ended their entire program couple years ago.
Plus, rode to ml baseball often involves years spent in small town minors. B-ball guys at top of food chain out of Pa 12 and other leagues can get in after a year or two of college, and rake in $$$ right away.
Cal definitely will get in the dance. If they can beat the Utes, they’ll get a better seed. I’ll be surprised if they can pull it off, though. If not, I’m sticking with the prediction of the usual 7 or 8 death seed somewhere back east at 11 am…
As I mentioned yesterday, I disagreed with Goose’s rant on Bautista, and really liked Bautista’s response. The rest of the rants were funny as hell, and yes, especially the one on Braun.
Flav – how about an update of the BBOTD? Come on…help some brothers out…
As for year round sports, in California at least, everyone does it, from baseball/softball v-ball to b-ball to soccer. By the time you get to HS pressure is on from school coaching staff to continue being on these teams with implied (or real) consequences. The club team coaches usually add in the factor of having influence and connections (plus visability of their program) when it comes to potentially playing in college…which of course only select few do.
Romo has pretty much been invisible this spring, hasn’t he? I looked at Baseball Reference, he’s not even on the reliever list as having appeared once. What’s up with that?…
still no Pence in the LU…..
An achilles is no joke. They have to make sure that puppy is not in danger of popping, else the season is gone. At his age, maybe Hunter needs to re-evaluate his training. Maybe he’s overdoing it, and this thing of not taking a day off is ridiculous. That’s why you have a bench. Hopefully this is all out of an abundance of caution. He probably only really needs two weeks of game time to get his stroke in shape anyway. BTW, the dugout shop at Scottsdale stadium was a beehive, the stadium was loaded, draft beers at $11.50, bottles at $9. The Giants must make major coin on Spring Training. Really enjoyed the vibe down there. At both Scottsdale and Peoria stadiums, it looks like the teams raided an AARP convention to populate the ticket taker and other supporting positions in the stadiums. I can think of a lot worse things to do in retirement than work at a Spring Training stadium for a month. Everybody’s in a good mood, great weather, you get to ogle chicks in shorts and tank tops 1/3 your age — what’s not to like?…
Tom – Yep – you mention all the things I love about ST…that and it is a handful of days to spend with my lovely daughter who is also a hard-core baseball/Giants fan.
I laughed at your AARP comment. I usually try to get box seats close to the field for games at Scottsdale Stadium. There is a dude my daughter and I have met on a number of occasions (not sure what their title is but he is one of the peeps who patrols the baselines, etc.) named Wally. He is from Wisconsin but winters over in Scottsdale and works the ST games. Yeah, I too can think of worse retirement gigs.
And yes…the Giants have to be making huge coin during ST.
Glad you had a good time my friend!
I caught the Krukow segment on the ride in this morning and they served this topic up on a platter for him. Its right in his wheel house so he of course got both cheeks into it talking about the unwritten rules, showing up your opponent, yadda yadda. He doesn’t seem to be very impressed with Harper but I give him credit for being able to acknowledge that Harper makes some good points about the sport appealing to the younger generation. That is something I respect about Krukow. For all of his old school nonsensical babbling he is open minded about a lot of things.
For what its worth,there is a very active little league in Campbell with a lot of community involvement. The diamonds near my daughter’s school were overflowing with activity yesterday.
I’ve come to think that it’s not as urgent for major league baseball to be worrying about getting a younger audience. People can transition into being baseball fans as they get older. And the sport has gotten MUCH better at marketing to women, which was a mostly untapped audience. With most households now having TVs with larger screens and high definition, people can see the games better. A lot of the players are physically fit, attractive men, and women can have their favorite matinee-idols. I’ve talked to several women who have their favorite Giants players. The sport has a daily soap-opera aspect to the season, the highs and lows, the daily stories. A lot of women like to watch the games for the PEOPLE on the team, which is actually kind of refreshing. They don’t care what Crawford’s OPS is, but they know his wife just had a baby boy a few months ago.
The sport is in good shape heading into the future. It doesn’t need to freak out.
I agree with all of this Zume, but I believe most of the banter here of late (and centered around Harper’s ESPN piece) was about how to attract younger players.
John Shea @JohnSheaHey 24m24 minutes ago
Bochy says Pence (Achilles) actually will play today but needs to show training staff he can break out of batters’ box without an issue.
Good news. I had heard earlier in the week that Pence was slated to start today. Glad to hear there have been no set-backs and that is still the case.
pulled this somewhere off the internet
“In short, baseball watchers are older than their counterparts. The median age of a baseball viewer is 53 years old, according to ESPN, compared to 47 in the National Football League. Separtately, the National Basketball Association’s median fan age is just 37”
I would just be curious how they determine what a “fan” is. My mom is 82 years old and she watches almost every single Giants game. And watches every inning. The Giants could be losing 11-0, and she watches to the end. That should count more than someone who identifies themself as an NBA fan, but only watches NBA games once in a while.
I guess the thing some people would say is that my mom is less likely to buy the products being advertised, because elderly people don’t buy much. Which is baloney. I take my mom shopping at Costco and other places, on a regular basis, and she packs her cart. She’s not going to buy a new car, because she doesn’t drive anymore, so yeah, the car and truck commercials are lost on her. But advertising can still make money off older folks. A lot of them do buy stuff.
There’s the rub zumiee…it is all about the 29-49 male audience. Higher those numbers are the higher rates the tv networks get…
Stupidest new rule, that isn’t even physically possible: the first visit by the manager or pitching coach to the mound to talk to a specific pitcher will be 30 seconds, with the clock starting from when the old guy first steps out of the dugout. Yeah, seriously? It’s going to take him a chunk of that time just to GET to the mound. One of the Spring Training broadcasts I watched showed that the umps were not enforcing that rule during that game. Were any of last year’s “speed up the game” rules enforced much? I doubt it. Maybe a few batters were stepping out of the box less. Maybe.
Yeah that 30sec rule is BS Zumie!
All managers and pitching coaches now better get 1st hand training on how to ride a “Segway” to the mound..
Keith Emerson, founding member of Emerson, Lake and Palmer, dead at 71. RIP.
Wow, Just another sad day for Rock&Roll. Wtf is going on lately?
Something in the water?
Are I guess,my “Rock Legends “are just getting to old and the years of partying caught up to them.(except of course Keith Richards who is embalmed and still plays)
RIP Keith Emerson 😦 Awesome on the keyboards!🎹🎼
It’s was great seeing ELP play in O town in the late 70’s “Welcome back my friends to the show that never ends!”
Another rock giant gone this year. Damn,
The Astros have a young third base prospect who is having a really nice spring and may play his way onto the roster.The guy looks and plays just like Matt Duffy. In fact, that’s his name; Matt Duffy.
You guys gotta see this guy. It’s amazing how similar they are and they even share the same name. The Astros Duffy is slightly more filled out but other than that you can’t tell them apart.
A UConn player did a Curry and then some — about a three-quarter-length 3-pointer to send game into 4th OT after Cincy made a 3 with .8 left. And now UConn just won.
Pence hit a 2-run HR today. More videos on the way, haha.
Flav,
You can chill down now some over Hunter and his Achilles/GF, he just smoked a long 2 run bomb to LF that left the yard. Easy on the achilles to jog home…
“All managers and pitching coaches now better get 1st hand training on how to ride a “Segway” to the mound..”
How awesome would that be, Kat? A whole lot of awesome. Although, lots of potential for spin-outs and wipe-outs.
I see Ryder Jones went yard today as well. My favorite part of ST is seeing what these young bucks can do.
Payback game for the Dubs tonight. Good start so far.
Matt Duffy (Astros) had to wear Matt Duffy’s Giants uniform on a flight last year IIRC.
Holy shit. Curry just got a steal a rebound and 3 3s in less than a minute,
Tough last few days for those hot-shot Dodger prospects. The pitchers Urias and DeLeon got shelled.
And this:
“Corey Seager was removed with a knee issue. He isn’t going to play tomorrow, as was planned. Dodgers will know more tomorrow.”
I just saw that Emmanuel Burriss is in Phillies’ camp.
In the category of “unforced errors,” here’s a political one: Hillary today praised Nancy Reagan for “starting a national conversation about HIV and AIDS.” Hillary has already retracted the statement. Someone must have pointed out to her the amazing wrongness of that “fact.” What the heck was she thinking? The Reagans were infamous in their silence about HIV and AIDS.
In fact, I don’t think any national conversation really started until Magic Johnson was diagnosed in the early ’90s. The Reagans completely and intentionally missed the boat on that. Hillary shouldn’t make a mistake like that. She’s brighter than that. Well, I thought she was brighter than that.
It may have gotten buried in the news cycle anyway by violence at a cancelled Trump rally.
Nothing gets lost in the news cycle anymore. That’s about as tone-deaf as you can get to a fairly big issue.
Protesters shut down the rally. Yay protesters.
Chuck: Do you care about the First Amendment? If you care to do some investigative research you will find that some of the organizations involved in the “protest”, which aimed at confrontation and violence, were financially supported by George Soros, uber-agent for the Rothschild crime family and in close league with Neocon Gauleiter of Chicago, Mayor Rahm Emmanuel. Personally, i think that Trump picked a very bad venue for his rally ~ the University of Illinois/Chicago.
Our revered “founding fathers” were rabble rousers and rebels in the eyes of George III…
wow wild end to WestVa-OK. Sooners were down 11, scored 12 straight to take lead then were down 2 with 1.8 seconds left. Hield lets one go from half court that banks in to win it…but it’s a hair too late and Huggy’s boys survive.
Haven’t watched any of it but Golden St has 101 pts with 3 minutes left…in 3rd Q.
Up 30 on Damon Lillard, getting a beat down in his hometown.
Portland’s making it a game, but they won’t come back all the way.
Going to my 1st ever Scottsdale stadium game tomorrow. Thewife and daughter too. YAY!!! Orange county to Scottsdale and back on Sunday..Can’t wait
Should be good…
Lucky Man by ELP and the vid reminded me of the movie Excalibur directed by John Boorman. Really liked that flick — thing was all as if in a dream. Boorman also did “Hope & Glory”, a movie about life in London and England in WWII. Great flick, lots of it from a kid’s viewpoint, and funny, which seems weird about the Blitz in London, but it was…
Loved Excaliber. Great movie.
Brain Salad Surgery as well. Best album name ever.
I watched that video very early this morning. Made me sad.
Cal with a signature well played game vs. Utes who can win the league. One defensive lapse allowing tying hoop with 4 seconds left cost them.
Led by senior G Tyrone Wallace and the freshman Ivan Rabb. These 2 plus Utes Poeltl look ready for NBA.
Brown looks like he’s ready for AAU ball, taking dumb shots and hogging the ball. Cal got more balance in scoring from Bird, but ball needs to move more and get more touches for Rabb. They’re rolling at right time tho.
Props to the Hall of Jersey too–their Gs Carrington and Whitehead are fantastic.
In other good news for the state, Rutgers dumped Eddie Jordan. Man, that team (7-25) got smoked in the Big Ten (1 W in league total), regularly giving up 90+ points in blow out losses.
I hope Cal did enough to get a 5 or 6 seed, which could allow them to get to the round of 32. 7 or 8 seed is a crapshoot. They seem not to be able to finish against a squad that is their equal in talent, or just better organized. Probably due to youth — what do you think willie?. It’s a shame Rabb is probably gone after one year. I really think this one and done is bad for NCAA ball, and not the greatest for the kids either, especially if they go second round. There should be some way for them to retract going pro right before the draft if things look dicey on where they’ll go. Or, even get re-instated amateur status if they don’t stick with an NBA team…
I have not seen any news on Timmy C. Anyone seen or heard anything? Mid way through March and no video of him pitching? Could be never playing again for Tim. Which would be sad,
Oops how aboutTimmy L
http://www.cbssports.com/mlb/eye-on-baseball/25510430/the-royals-were-escorted-out-of-tim-lincecums-secret-throwing-location
Peavy and Blach, two more starting pitchers getting tattooed today.
Still early, but Peavy has to be rising on the concern-o-meter…
Snarkk, Wallace (who had a great game) had a pretty good look at a 3 that would have put Cal in a late tie in OT but hit front rim. Bird got an O rebound and a FT to put them up end of reg. Bird and Mathews are upper classmen too. I just don’t like the other posts Martin plays all the time–I’d leave Rabb in there and spread floor with shooters/slashers quicker defenders. Utah is tough because of the big C, and he has nice moves.
The last play of regulation was a tough one, no one stopped ball or helped on the drive.
Whomever wins the league will get a high seed esp with Nova losing today.
Rabb has a lot of skills that don’t show much because others have the ball a lot. Nice kid but 1 more year if Cal is lucky. He’s a sure top 10 pick. Sean Elliott who did game last night loves him, more than Brown.
Oregon blowing out the Utes.
A Juan Perez sighting. He’s trying to make the Cubs roster.
Didn’t Peavy get tattooed last Spring, too? Balky back again? I’d be more worried about him than Cain, I think. By a whisker.
I’m surprised there’s not more warriors discussion. Maybe I’m on the wrong blog.
wisc, that was good game last night, maybe a little too good considering how bad Suns have been.
Booker looked great, variety of moves and range.
Warriors without Iguodala will be interesting to watch. Other than an occasional 3 Rush does little out there.
Livingston a great facilitator but needs more than Rush Barabosa out there to work with. He and Speights work great together. Varejao looked awful last night.
Meanwhile Spurs continue to roll and GS meets up with them few more times. Gotta keep that homecourt edge intact for playoffs.
Them both having incredible home win streaks will make it must see.
It’s just too hard to get fired up over ST results. Williamson hit another HR so did Parker, good for them. Btw the 2 games Giants ran 9 different pitchers out there who are AAA level and I’m sure other teams are doing same. Lot of fastballs thrown now as guys get loose. If Peavy is struggling a month from now, OK different story…but not 12th of March. I think he knows what he is doing and ST is a process to get through.
Heard some of Lurie show before he talked to Panik. Lot of speculation on how many innings Cain throws, with some guys thinking 110-150 ish. Seems definite he does not make start first time through rotation.
Upcoming Giants games on TV:
Today, vs. the Padres, at 3:00 PM Pacific Time, on the local NBC affiliate (Channel 31 in the Northern Central Valley; I don’t know what channel it is in the Bay Area.) Bumgarner starting.
Tomorrow night, vs. the A’s, at 7:00 PM Pacific Time, on the A’s Comcast channel (Ray Fosse, oh yay), and on the MLB Network in certain parts of the nation. Cueto starting.