Happy Holidays To ALL!
Flappers, I am taking a hiatus for a few weeks. I’ll be out of the country for part of that and it just won’t be convenient to try to blog or change the threads. So man the ship, keep her sea worthy, weather any storms and watch out for pirates. Hopefully when I get back (January 9th) we will have assembled a team that can sail off to glory once again.
Steady as she goes mateys, steady as she goes…..
A Place To Talk About Giants Baseball 
i’ll be around for the next 36 hours or so and in and out after that. I just wanted to make sure there was a thread up explaining the down time here at the Flap.
Flav have fun.
Lakers were often a lot more interesting to watch than GS last night. Warriors outside core 4 don’t have youth and athleticism, other than Bell. And zero outside shooting beside Young, who is a marginal player. Their picks sure look lot more talented than McCaw and Looney.
while Sabes and rebuild certainly don’t go together, acquiring OF talent has been a staple of his for a long time.
Not just through 3/5 with Pence Torres Pagan Burrell Ross, but all the way back to Kenny Lofton Ellis Burks and Reggie Sanders. Need is still there, so go get someone that can hit and play CF at least.
I like Loo’s idea of picking up Flores and Lagares. This would add much needed depth and of course help de-honkify team and give Cueto someone else to talk to.
Bell is a marvel. McCaw not so much. Looney is strictly a role player. But it is hard to hit when you are at the bottom of the draft. Kuzma should be ROY but likely won’t. When the Lakers get Bron Bron, they’ll be pretty tough. Paul George as well.
Fun fact: according to Baseball America, Heliot Ramos’ first name is pronounced exactly the same as the English name Elliot. That seems hard to believe to me. In my mind, Heliot was pronounced “eee-lee-oh.” I have no idea why I was thinking that. I was going a little French with that, I guess, like Monet. There is some French colonial history in the Caribbean.
The Giants need to hang on to Ramos. He’s 6’2″, has power, and plays well on defense in the outfield. He’s only about 18 years old. It would be an exciting thing for the Giants to develop him into a solid major leaguer, if they can. I think he is starting the 2018 season in Low Single A in Georgia. When he gets to High Single A in San Jose that will be fun. A lot of us will be able to see him play if we want to.
Here’s Baseball America’s prediction for the Giants at the #2 pick in 2018:
Scouting director John Barr and team president Brian Sabean have been involved in high draft picks before, but it was a long time ago. The Giants haven’t had the homegrown pitching success in recent years that propelled them to three World Series titles from 2010-2014, led by Madison Bumgarner, the retiring Matt Cain and long-gone Tim Lincecum.
This draft class is pitching-heavy, especially on the high school side, with Georgia prep Ethan Hankins poised to become the third prep righthander in five drafts to go out No. 2 overall, joining the Marlins’ Tyler Kolek (2014) and Reds’ Hunter Greene (2017). Scouts want to see more consistency out of Hankins’ breaking ball, but his fastball, size, dominant summer with USA Baseball’s 18U national team and makeup all push him toward the top of the draft class.
PICK: Ethan Hankins, RHP, Forsyth Central High, Cumming, Ga. |
For Detroit at the top pick, they predict:
Having the Tigers at No. 1 makes Florida’s Brady Singer a prohibitive favorite. They value top performers in the Southeastern Conference, and may have struck gold in 2017 when Singer’s rotation mate from the spring, Alex Faedo, inexplicably fell all the way to the Tigers at No. 18 overall. The duo could help jump-start a Motor City rebuild.
I’m still shaking my head about the Giants assuming Longoria’s $72 million over the next five years for a team that spent $191 million to lose 98 games last season and is on the hook for at least $175 million in 2018. Much of that money is tied up in veterans who, like Longoria, are wading deeper into their 30s: Brandon Belt (30 next season), Posey (31), Crawford (31), Cueto (32), Smarg (33), Melancon (33), and Pence (35) will earn . . . wait for it . . . a combined $128.9 million this coming year. There’s no relief in sight, either: With Longoria, the Giants have $132.9 million committed in ’19, $129.4 million in ’20 and $94.1 million in ’21 (to just five players!) and after the ’19 season, they’ll have to pony millions more to pay free-agent-to-be MadBum.
Flores and Lagares? That’s about all the Giants can afford . . . and forget about the other 2 outfielders, 1-2 pitchers, and 2 bullpen arms we need to fill. Oh joy!
Have a great trip, Flavor and a well deserved vacation from this crew.
Merry Christmas and HNY…
Loo, here’s probably the most sobering and brutal column I’ve read about the Giants this off season and the expected “rosterpocalypse” (great word I wish I had invented) which is coming.
https://www.google.com.vn/amp/s/www.mccoveychronicles.com/platform/amp/2017/12/22/16803286/mlb-sf-giants-evan-longoria-christian-arroyo-tampa-bay-rays-the-giants-are-bad
I think it’s a little too soon to be that down on next season. Let’s see what other moves are made before we hit the ledge. At least he knows he might be wrong…
The problem I have with Star Wars movies is that they are science fiction for people who aren’t science fiction fans. In other words, they aren’t even really science fiction. They’re kind of a space fantasy, more like Lord of the Rings.
There’s actually better real science fiction in a Rick and Morty cartoon.
I don’t like the nihilism in Rick and Morty, though, as funny as the cartoon is.
I like the science fiction of Kim Stanley Robinson, which always has an essence of optimism in it.
I’ll never understand the NBA scheduling of 3 games in 4 days. The schedule is long as hell but they pack 3 games in 96 hours. Dumb and dangerous. Like the NFL’s Thursday night football, it’s too much too soon.
Alen Hanson, a switch-hitter known for playing all over the diamond, announced on Instagram that he had signed a deal with the Giants. Last season, Hanson hit .231 with four home runs and nine steals.
Minor league deal
I like it!
Thanks, Magnus, for all you do here. Take a refreshing break. All holiday best to all Flapizens.
This niner shit is incredible. Blowing my mind.
Football Giants are worse than the baseball Giants…
Jimmy GQ is killing it. Now they have to sign him. Funny that it’s so exciting they are playing so well, but the wins messed up the draft and are making Jimmy more expensive!
Magnus, want to revive the stable mates?
Just want to wish all Flappers in Flap Universe a lovely Christmas, year-end, and new year’s….
Same to you, Paul and all you guys…
Jax defense is overrated. They’ve been playing tomato cans all season. THey lost to the Jets for God’s sake.
Merry X-mas one and all! And have a happy new year!
Merry Christmas to everyone in Flap-land!!
just saw headline about typhoon headed Nam’s way…Enjoy Holiday everyone and be safe and well.
Merry Christmas flappers!!!!
Merry Christmas, Flappers! Love all you guys!
Merry Christmas 🎁🎄 to all the Flappers everywhere !!🎄🎁🍾🍷🍸🤪🍺🥃
Niners win, Dubs win. God bless us, everyone!!
Giants have no OF and no bullpen. God help us in 2018
Yeah, Willie, “big” typhoon out of Philippines was supposed to clobber us here in the south… government ordered all schools closed Monday and today… but the storm ended up tracking further south, stayed over the sea and headed to Thailand instead. Result: 2 days off for Christmas that I wasn’t scheduled to get, and the weather is crystal clear and lovely today. Sometimes gov’t “over-stepping” its bounds is a good thing. 🙂
Giants fans in the middle of the 2018 season:
From Gimme Shelter!
I always felt a little bad for this guy.
I wonder how it turned out for him.
Did he get home okay that night?
Do you think he became a big successful businessman?
Is he a doting grandpa living in a mansion somewhere?
He seems to have vanished into the mists of time.
I seriously thought this was Brad Pitt.
Merry Christmas, Flappers! Hope all is well for everyone.
The TNT crew is rightfully hammering the T-Wolves and Lakers for the quality of play. It’s pretty ragged.
Warriors/Cavs was pretty sloppy as well.
GS – FG – 46.3% 3 pt – 27.0% FT – 76.5% TO – 15
Cle – 31.8% 41.7% 84.0% 14
The movie Gimme Shelter was on my mind because I recently finished reading Joel Selvin’s book “Altamont,” published last year.
I never thought much of Selvin’s concert reviews with the SF Chronicle over the years. He always seemed, to me, like a Baby Boomer pining for the greatness of the ’60s, and not really getting the alternative rock music of the ’80s and ’90s, and kind of lazy about it. He would give vague reviews that sometimes didn’t mention any song titles, as if he didn’t even bother to get to know the band’s music before going to the show. And I suspect that’s true.
“Altamont,” on the other hand, is excellent. Riveting, actually. It shows that Selvin, if given a topic right in his ’60s wheelhouse, can really nail it. It’s very well-researched and well-written, yet not overly long. A pretty quick read.
There’s so much more to the Altamont story than I realized. The movie is just a fraction of the story.
I wasn’t intending to read about Altamont, but I came across the book while browsing in my excellent local library.
People who have only watched the movie would be surprised to know that the Grateful Dead, shown arriving at Altamont, decided not to perform after hearing about the violence going on in the stage area. That left a two-hour gap before the Stones performed, allowing for the crowd to get more full of LSD and meth, and impatience.
The original idea for the free festival had been the Dead’s, although they had wanted it in Golden Gate Park.
A lot of people nowadays don’t know that Santana, and also Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young, performed earlier in the day and then got the heck out of there. And later refused to allow their performances to be shown in the movie.
Enjoyed that one too Zum. Stones come off really badly. Too bad the original plan of a free concert in SF got hijacked.
Flav, hopefully you get some good gambling in wherever you may go….
Was thinking over the break more of the Longoria trade, which I still think is a bad bad baseball move. This reminds me more and more of the Aaron Rowand signing (God I hope I dont have to watch anyone with that swing on our team ever again!!!). Remember when they signed Rowand (’09?), it was all about bringing in leadership yada yada and Rowand being a great clubhouse guy.
We are hearing the same about Longoria.
This tells me two things. Pence was the vocal clubhouse leader and now he is no more and not likely to be starting. The person who should be the leader in Buster is quiet as a church mouse.
There was also dissension among the team last year in the Buster-Belt issue but also the rest of the Pen being unhappy with Melancon and his lack of being their leader and him doing his own thing instead of what I guess has become a Giant tradition amoung the relievers.
So I am getting the feeling the Longoria trade is more about shaking up the clubhouse as demoting Boch’s coaches two years in a row is also a sign that Boch is probably unable to be that leader any longer. But like with Rowand, trying to force chemistry on a sports team is usually a bad move on its face and certainly doing so without the higher importance of being a good baseball management move usually portends bad things for that player’s future abilities on the field.
Good points.
It was also interesting seeing the Pavlovic article putting some cold water in the Jay Bruce idea and also the comment about Sabean being high on Slater being the future CF.
Didnt we just try going with two unproven young OF last year in Williamson and Pavlovic and we all see how that had turned out…I hope Slater is a stud of studs (no one im the baseball world has deemed him so so far, which should give us pause), but if this is a sign that we all fear that mgmt is going with another smoke and mirrors strategy and we will go another year without a major significant upgrade, it will be a long frickin year.
Yeah, when Evans starts touting the in-house “solutions,” we know the transaction activity is winding down.
Sabean, too.
The club is stuck with Pence so they have to make the best of it. Moving him out of RF has to happen but Williamson and Parker (who sucks) in RF? Yikes.
Slater has been decent in just over 100 abs. I’m fine with seeing more of him. He’s played more 2b and LF than CF across his minor league career. CF at At&t may not be a good decision for a guy that’s had hip issues but maybe he recovers well.
Parker turns 29 next month, LOL, and Williamson will be 27 next season, an old 27 with all the injuries he’s had.
Great post Zumiee . . . Also, the follow up by GH and the 2 posts below by Willie and Dirt.
This front office has zero clue. Personally, I think they exacerbate the Longoria mistake by adding Ironman – my new name for Bruce . . . He’ll make you wish Gorkys was playing his position after you see him in the field. Good arm, but that’s it. A liability in the outfield.
One of the downsides to last season was none of these guys, plus Arroyo, really got a full season in so Giants could get look at rebuild. While only Slater seems decent, the others didn’t get full shot either.
I’m OK with Slater in one OF spot and Shaw getting full shot in one corner with the others fighting it out for roster spots. Pence has to show he’s better than last year or gets waived. Him blocking anyone if he can’t put up .700 OPs is just not good baseball.
Right now Gorky, Slater, Pence, Williamson and Parker (who sucks) are on the roster. Unless they get someone like Bruce, that will probably be the OF to start the season. I’ve seen it mentioned that the front office wants Shaw to get some more seasoning so I’d be surprised to see him break camp with the club. He and Duggar will have to force their way into consideration.
Really could make the argument that improvements to the staff and BP are bigger concerns.
I think Parker must’ve officially changed his surname to Parker(whosucks)…. 🙂
I just read A Book of Walks by Bruce Bochy. It’s a gem. a pearl. a dandy little book.
I was hoping my local library would get that book, but it hasn’t happened yet.
It’s a tiny pocket-sized book. Bruce talks — clearly he was recorded and it was transcribed and edited, which ain’t that easy; I’ve done it as a ghost writer — and his voice is there. That’s half the fun of it. He talks of walks in SF (two different chapters), Milwaukee, San Diego, Chicago, NYC, Cincy-KY, Arizona. He comes across as a bit of a zen master. Not a surprise. The proceeds go to a writing center in Cali.
For my birthday, I was given Ron Chernow’s latest book, a 1,000 page biography of Ulysses Grant.
Chernow is known now for his Hamilton biography. I haven’t read that book. I still marvel that Hamilton is a hit musical. Who’da thunk it? I haven’t seen it.
The Grant book is very engaging. It’ll take a while to read, but Chernow has me hooked in.
I am about 100 pages in on Hamilton and that was a year ago. got my father in law that Grant bio last year and just got him the Da Vinci one…
Regarding the Altamont book, I had never heard the story of Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young hot-wiring (stealing) a truck from the Tracy airport and driving right into the Altamont Speedway. After performing, they helicoptered out, so that truck was left there for who knows how long.
And many of the Hell’s Angels used as stage-area security (gee, what could go wrong with that?) had brought pool cue-sticks to beat up on unruly fans or anyone who messed with their motorcycles. Pool cue-sticks. That should have been one of the signs that the day was not going to go well.
Dead silence on Giants rumor front, except for Billy Hamilton. He’ll fit right in with our other limp “spaghetti bats,” with a .248/.298/.334 career slash line.
I love his 46 defensive runs saved since 2014. Which is rank second among all center fielders, trailing only Kevin Pillar (52) of the Blue Jays. Too bad Pillar called Jason Motte a homophobic slur . . . As he’d be the better addition IMO.
Re A Book of Walks by Bruce Bochy: Did Matt Moore write the foreward?
Zumie, the same thing happened with Creedence Clearwater Revival and their performance at Woodstock. They thought is was so bad they didn’t want it included in the movie. Lots of people don’t even know they played there.
Yeah, the movie becomes the most well-known history. To me, a lot of the performers sound pretty ragged at Woodstock and Altamont. But part of that might be the sound systems used in those days for outdoor concerts.
Yeah, I think the Dead played for like 3.5 hours before them. Creedence started really late. As crappy as it sounded I still think the Star Spangled banner by Hendrix is one of the most amazing things you will ever hear someone do with a guitar.
Zum, sounds like a cool book. Wasn’t it the Dead who recommended the Hell’s Angels to the Stones for the Altamont security?
Yeah, but Selvin makes the point that, if the concert had been held in Golden Gate Park, the SF chapter of the Hells Angels would have been in charge of security; they had a good relationship with the music scene in SF, and they were more disciplined than a lot of those at Altamont, where it was a mish-mash of different Angels from all over California under no central authority. The whole event at Altamont was a mish-mash without a central authority. The Stones had gotten control of the event from the Dead, and then turned it into chaos. The Dead had experience with big free concerts in the Park. The Stones made negotiation mistakes that caused the event to be dropped from the Park.
And the Stones were thinking the Hells Angels at Altamont were going to be like the ones in England, who were not into the outlaw spirit.
After Altamont, the bands in SF disowned the Hells Angels completely.
And, for no particular reason . . .
Oh snap! The 49ers are finally on the right path!!!
Grant bio got good review in Chron Book section. He was not accorded much respect during his presidency, so I’m interested to hear anything new that might mitigate that.
I love college football but have yet to watch one minute of peach pit somebody’s sponsor name bowls so far.
But I want to catch local game. Purdue, where a friend of mine’s kid is a junior, had its best season since maybe Brees was there winning 6 games and beating in state rival IU Hoosiers.
Opponent is Arizona, with very exciting QB Khalil Tate. Saw him a few times, great runner with strong and sometimes accurate arm who made a winner out of Rich Rodriguez. Story is USC wanted Tate but weren’t sure he was gonna be their QB, so he said no thanks and went elsewhere out of state.
Schulman says he voted Vizquel into HOF on ballot he sent in and has column on why he thinks he is first ballot HOFer, while admitting highly unlikely it happens.
One of my favorite players.
Fun video of the Stones and the Dead waiting on Pier 23 for the helicopter to take them to Altamont. Little did they know of the carnage about to erupt. Don’t know that the earlier video of Hendrix with the Stones is . . .
By today’s standards, it would be an unfortunate incident.
You gotta get into double digit deaths to really make some news…
Yeah, all things considered, it was kind of miraculous there were only four deaths at Altamont. The famous one, Meredith Hunter killed by the Hell’s Angels right in front of the stage; and a drugged-up guy who tried to swim in the nearby swift-moving California Aqueduct canal; and two people who were hit by a guy racing off with a stolen car.
There were many injuries, including Balin and Jagger both getting punched, and the Stones’ road manager got some front teeth knocked out when he tried to stop some Hell’s Angels from stealing the Stones’ fancy stage carpet after the concert.
Selvin believes that the Airplane and Stones were never the same after the traumatic concert.
The Airplane did break up within a year or two (which may have happened anyway), and the Stones drifted through the ’70s becoming a less important band (which may have happened anyway.)
The winners at Altamont were the filmmakers. Gimme Shelter is one of the most remarkable rock music films ever made.
Meredith Hunter’s family sued for liability and was eventually only awarded $10,000. Not much of a payoff.
He’s buried in Vallejo.
Hunter did have a gun on him (which he shouldn’t have brought with him), but all the evidence proved he only pulled the gun out when he was getting pummeled by Hell’s Angels, whose biggest beef with him was probably that he was a black man there with a white woman. Lots of people that day got caught up in an early form of stage-diving. Jumping up on the ridiculously low stage (only four feet high. Woodstock’s stage was fifteen feet high) and getting shoved off by the Angels. Hunter was high on meth (as were many thousands there) and was probably trying to get on the stage.
He was 19 years old. His date was 18.
The Hell’s Angel who stabbed him repeatedly was eventually arrested and went to trial on a murder charge, but was found not guilty by reason of self-defense, by an all-white jury.
That Hell’s Angel had to go to prison for other crimes not related to Altamont. He was later freed, and in 1985 his murdered body was found floating in a canal, with $10,000 cash in his pocket.
While the Stones did drift through the mid-70s, two of their best albums came not long after Altamont: Sticky Fingers (’71) and, especially, Exile on Main Street (’72).
That’s a good point, with the only caveat that two of the best Sticky Fingers songs, “Brown Sugar” and “Wild Horses,” were written and recorded before Altamont.
Good stuff, Zum…
Thanks; I sometimes get kind of transfixed by “stranger than fiction” types of stories.
All credit to Selvin for writing a fascinating book.
To get to the Bay Area, I drive from the Central Valley over the Altamont Pass on the freeway (580) that goes through the coastal mountains near the Speedway. The Speedway isn’t visible from the frreeway. The Speedway is closed down and fenced off. It takes a country road to get there. I’ve never been there.
Most of the concert-goers parked on 580 and just went wandering over the hills in search of the Speedway.
Sometimes when I’m driving over the Pass, I give that concert a momentary thought.
In 1984, I was driving my car, a not-very-reliable 1970s Dodge Dart, back home from an event in the Bay Area late at night, and on the way home, the car’s electrical system went out, and I went over the Altamont Pass without headlights (not recommended.) I pulled off the freeway, parked the car, and took off walking on a country road. Pretty eerie. A guy driving an 18-wheeler felt sorry for me and pulled over. I risked getting murdered and got in the truck with him, and he took me to a truckstop where I could call my dad to come and get me. The truckdriver was very cool.
A lot of Central Valley drivers have an Altamont Pass story. It’s a relatively long climb that has broken down many a vehicle.
Nowadays, the Altamont Pass is most known for all the windmills generating electrical power.
One of the many interesting characters in Selvin’s book is Bill Graham, the legendary concert-promoter. He wasn’t allowed to be part of the Altamont event, and he was at first angry about that, but probably very glad later to not be involved with it. He comes across as very quick-tempered and incredibly-driven which often ran up against musician-hippie-ness and chafed him greatly. He went on to basically invent the modern rock concert and become hugely successful.
In 1991, he died in a helicopter crash near Vallejo, coming home from a Huey Lewis concert during a windy rainstorm. In the terrible weather the pilot didn’t see this transformer tower:
I think it would take 6 figures to get me into a helicopter…
One of the wild things about Altamont is the ages of the musicians at the time. Jagger was all of 26 years old. Richards was 25. Mick Taylor was 20! Watts was 28, and Wyman was the old geezer in the band at 33.
Stephen Stills and Neil Young were 24 year olds.
Regarding the film footage of Hendrix with the Stones, that might be backstage at Madison Square Garden from earlier in that tour.
MSG is the other concert footage in the movie.
Hendrix died about a year later.
According to the MLB Network, the Giants/Hamilton trade talk has really heated up.
I wonder if anybody has Jagger’s outfit from that night…
What cracks me up is he made a joke about his “trousers” falling off, in one of the performance sequences in the movie, and when I saw the Stones in concert in the early 2000s, he made the same joke about his trousers. That’s some serious mileage on that joke over the years!
Maybe he was making a joke about the joke for the real hard core fans…
And the audience was pretty blasted in the 2000s, too, mostly on booze. Middle-aged people were guzzling hard liquor like no tomorrow. I was pretty stunned. The audience was reverting back to some kind of crazy younger years. Maybe the Stones just bring that out. People want to get kind of crazy.
I’ve never owned a Stones album, but I’ve seen them in concert three times, from 2000 on. The elder Stones years. Still putting on a great show. Mostly the same songs in the set.
Yeah, you’re likely right that it’s a joke about the joke.
I saw the Stones once, late summer 1981, Candlestick. All of us boomers were smoking dope. I don’t recall any alcohol. Jagger wore a weird outfit based on the Oakland a’s uniform. They’d made the PS that year. I remember being mildly annoyed. I believe that was the first major concert to use cordless mics and guitars. iirc, the guy who invented that technology lived in Berkeley. George Thorogood opened and tore it up, although his mic and guitar were tethered. Only the Stones had the new stuff.
Thorogood knows his baseball. Trust me on that…
Sounds like an expert witness opinion based on a good foundation
“I think it would take 6 figures to get me into a helicopter…”
Yeah, I’m in no hurry to ride in one, either.
Willie might remember this . . . Sunnyvale had a commuter helicopter that my Mom took my brother and I on back in 1965 or 66. It was located by the old GE (or Signetics) building on Arques Avenue. It was a blast, albeit, only a 15-20 minute ride.
Everybody’s favorite Altamont concert moment, when somehow a stray dog wandered across the stage.
Why not?
The Kings defeated the Cavs!
The Hell’s Angels, kicking some hippy a##.
Somewhere in this Altamont mess there has to be a bobblehead commemoration that the Giants can use to sell out the park when they’re 33 games out…
Gotta love the Angels weapon of choice.
Homeland security should take note…
An entrepreneurial Hell’s Angel:
Not sure what was more impressive tonight: Sac’s Vince Carter scoring 24 vs. the Cavs one month away from turning 41, or the Pels’ Rajon Rondo dishing out 25 assists vs. the Nets. Probably Carter, given the caliber of opponent.
I gotta admit, Carter played great last night. And provided important veteran leadership in the 4th quarter.
Carter hadn’t even played last 3 games. Dunno what’s up with Cavs who mostly shot bricks except for Love vs. GS but still made it close. Kings scored more on them than Warriors did.
I don’t think trade for Thomas (still out tho due back soon) was a good idea. Irving is the better player and has already done in Warriors and beaten them in playoffs. Wonder what made him request to be dealt elsewhere that wasn’t for publication.
Big believer in vet leadership. Earlier Randolph stood up to Cousins in Kings W over Pelicans. Guy like Carter shows younger players how to bring it vs. LeBron and Cavs. Biggest issue with so many young guys that haven’t even played much college is how to prepare and conduct yourself through a long season and find where your game fits into team concept.
I think Irving wanted out because he was sick and tired or James’ act. From the outside looking in, James isn’t a leader that people want to play for. Want to build your brand? He’s your guy but within the team dynamic he seems like a douche.
Re Macdog’s 8:20pm of Dec. 26 [St. Stephen Day; reminds me of a good Dead song]: not Matt Moore but maybe Jonathan Sanchez, or Goose Gossage, who as a Giant once came in and loaded the fuckin bases.
zumieee, where the feck do you get these amazing pix: the transformer that “transformed” Bill Graham and the Altamont windmills?
I use Google and Bling, and I always attach the phrase ‘gif’ to the searches. Those items can usually be attached to the Flap.
It’s amazing the amount of things getting posted these days. I guess it’s the good and bad of so much information, just the sheer volume.
Some of the photos I stumble upon accidentally and can’t resist sharing. 🙂
Bing, not Bling I meant. 🙂
The Reds want Heliot Ramos for Hamilton. Forget that.
Absolutely no way. I have a good feeling about Heliot. They should take another one of our honkies, especially since Duvall worked out so well for them…
According to the MLB Network, Belt has one of the highest launch angles in baseball, and Stanton has a low one.
Launch angle isn’t everything.
Usually I read baseball books in the off-season, but I’ve been on a music book kick lately. On a recent trip to the library I got a bunch of books that I don’t know when I’ll get to. Memoirs by Elvis Costello, Springsteen, Carly Simon, and Patti Smith. And a book about The Replacements.
Meanwhile I just dove into a big book about U.S. Grant.
I get kind of compulsive around books.
How is the free agent market this quiet??? JD Martinez is the clear biggest get amongst the hitters and nothing. Not even chatter of who is talking to him and what finanical numbers??? Less a clear cut amongst the starters. Only relievers are signing and some getting $9 mill a year…baseball world is not what it used to be…
MLB Network talked about it today. So many of the new GMs are extremely sabermetric-oriented. And sabermetrics frowns on long contracts to relatively older players. It’s changing the way things go in free agency.
They also talked about the current Giants roster. The talk was fairly grim.
The Celtics look like crappola vs. the Rockets. The western teams are still far superior to the eastern these days in the NBA.
Not surprised MLB Network had a grim report on the Giants roster Zumie,especially when they found out they still use a abacus in their scouting department..
Celtics battled back.
And won.
Harden lost his composure at the end.
Pure torture: the Adidas “we’re creators” commercial. It’s a commercial to be hated for a lot of reasons, but it’s also really long.
I don’t know who a lot of the people in the commercial are, and why would I care?
And fashion? If we’ve learned one thing about fashion, it’s that, if you dress very strictly to a current fashion, it will look dated and ridiculous in photos years later.
Horned Frogs fun to watch, good game. Saw they have40 wins in last 4 yrs., way more than any other team in entire state of Texas. Not good showing for Pac 12 post season so far.
Ramos/Hamilton…by the time Ramos is ready for ml ball in few years, Hamilton could be out of the league. Next Michael Bourn, one time threat that just couldn’t hit well enough to survive.
“You can’t have 2 officials in a professional game” said J Harden, who shot his usual 15 FTs, afterward. What? The game was officiated like that forever.
You tell HS kids to adjust to whatever is/isn’t being called—hand checks, reaches, inside stuff. Just play. He can really shoot and score, but I can’t stand him.
B/R on Melancon
Sue Angulano tweets: All I want for Christmas is you traded!
Melancon tweets back:I’m not sorry you didn’t get your wish,but I do hope the rest of your day was filled with cheer and love:)
93 days until opening day!