Grilled Game Thread, oh yeah!
The A’s play their first intrasquad game today at “12:30 p.m. or so” (can’t you just taste the languorous pace of spring?). I can’t imagine there’s any online play-by-play, but it’s guys we know wearing green and gold playing baseball. So nice.
Lineups:
- Davis lf
- Pennington ss
- Chavez 1b
- Fox 3b
- Cust dh
- Gross cf
- Buck rf
- Powell c
- Cardenas 2b
P: Anderson
- Crisp dh
- Barton 1b
- Sweeney rf
- Taylor lf
- McPherson 3b
- Patterson cf
- Rosales ss
- Donaldson c
- Weeks 2b
P: Braden
Narrator of post-apocalyptic story wondering about post-apocalyptic stories:
And if that’s not hook enough, it opens like this:
The worst part – well, one of the worst parts, disregarding the collapse of modern civilization – is that it was my own stupid choice to leave Florida in the first place, and here I am spending my last days trying to get back there.
Apparently the highest existing SI designation is “yotta,” for 10^24. This change would simplify “high-magnitude nomenclature” like the number of atoms in 120 kg of carbon-12, which would become 6 hellaatoms. The mass of the sun would be 2.2 hellatons.
Lady Gaga says she’s celibate.
Brett Anderson has “redistributed his weight” (says Bob Alejo) and “gone from a little chunky to closer to svelte.” (says the Slusserific one)
http://freekraut.mayhem.cbssports.com/
The password is grill. The scoring is 1/2/3/4/6/8. March rules.
“that was a total waste of time”
Dierkes climbs onto mikeA’s bandwagon
Peepoo
up
That’s a great idea.
up
I take this to mean you think the science makes sense.
up
Without thinking too hard about it, yeah. But I also think there are great markets both for for-profits and non-profits in ultracheap goods for developing countries. That’s a really big focus of entrepreneurship where I am, and I’ve seen some pretty cool ideas get to the field testing stage.
One of my favorite ideas: fog-harvesting nets. Would love to see that one work out.
up
This is one of my favorites and it’s already working.
up
People are smart.
up
They also repel tigers.
up
I would love to have a permanent foggy haze everywhere I go.
up
No you wouldn’t. Trust me on this.
up
We’ve been buying the Biobags doggy waste bags for about 8 cents a bag which are supposedly 100% biodegradable. I’d love some of these Peepoos for my dogs. I’m not saying I’d bury them in my yard, but I wonder if they could then be put in my compost bin that they city picks up.
up
I’m not sure exactly what the city does in order to turn the collections from the green bins into compost, but I’d worry that the bags would get crushed or shredded before the lining had time to work all of its anti-pathogen magic.
up
That’s a good point. I’m not sure what they do either. I’m sure it involves a bunch of mashing or chipping or something.
up
♫ Peepoo. Peepoo needing people … ♫
up
love.
Spring is the time when I start to get pointless heartburn about lineups.
up
Does this help?
up
Now you’re trying to give me pointless heartburn about the active roster.
up
Didn’t even see that…. It’s a good thing I’m 80% Buddhist or whatever it was. I imagine Geren’s eyes even more hella-blank and his mouth hella-wide open as he devises these schemes.
up
You mean fishface?
up
I was just wondering if anybody on ** was bitching about the lineups?
I will only endorse “hella-” if we add an even higher power: 10^32 should be “custa-”
up
It should really be “hecka-” and then “hella-.” But I signed on anyway.
up
tru dat
up
Next needs to be fucka-
up
10^69
up
Sucka- surely …
up
fucka-motha
Poppy-bait is being posted
up
Not enough raccoons.
up
Fail. The correct answer was “not raccoon enough”…”not raccoon enough”…
Hunh.
up
He lost a bet.
Think about it, Fink! Writers come and go; we always need Indians!
The Atlantic interviews Michael Lewis for “what I read.”
I like that he does not subscribe to The Atlantic. I used to subscribe and really enjoy it, but they decided to make it terrible and some years ago.
up
Yeah, someone went out of their way to ruin The Atlantic. I like Harper’s still.
Era adjustments for
ballplayersSupreme Court justices.up
OK, now that’s the flavor of cluelessness I was talking about w/r/t “real” social scientists.
Wouldn’t a “real” scientist test out his theory first — to see if it correctly predicted justice votes on actual cases? I’d be willing to bet a whole lot of money that, for example, that the model woul get very few of the votes on Bush v Gore right.
up
I bet those justices are English majors.
up
Especially true because the role of justices has changed dramatically over time. Baseball players have always tried to avoid strickouts.
Some folks are Twittering the intrasquad game, here. Not usually my thing, but I’m home with a cold and bored.
Chavez hit into a double play his first AB. Light the torches and hoist the pitchforks!
up
Intrasquad games are confusing. Who/what am I supposed to root for?
up
Laundry!
up
I don’t think he’s pitching today.
up
I retroactively rooted for Barton, Sweeney, and Taylor against Anderson. nc on Chavy.
up
Good health and high socks.
But yes, if Braden throws three perfect innings, for example, should we be excited or demoralized?
up
You need to root for a scrub to pitch and for our offense to light him up.
up
Those tweets surprisingly don’t irritate me. Seems like a good use of tweets. Except for all the re-tweeting. That bugs.
Of course Slusser could Tweet the phone book and I’d probably like it.
up
They don’t seem to be using the #athletics tag all the time. Individual feeds here and here.
At Bat 2010 released
$15 this year, but still easily worth it especially for those of us living in the radio cone of silence.
up
Hm. I may have to get that.
up
Wow. This is going to be $15 very well spent indeed.
up
I was all excited about that, thinking my internet friends had turned me on to something I’d previously overlooked. Then I realized that I don’t have a cell phone.
up
I had pretty much the exact same reaction.
up
did you make yourself sad, too?
up
Your cell phone doesn’t cease to exist when you turn it off, you know… ;)
up
I know, but I have a Boost Mobile pay as you go, which means I’ll be stretching $10 worth of phone calls over the next 3 months. So I’m not sure watching or listening to games (or whatever that service does) is going to be applicable to my cell phone. I’m basically one step up from a Jitterbug.
I used it 3 times this weekend and I felt really modern.
up
Were you smoking Virginia Slims while you used it? Because you’ve come a long way, baby!
up
In my case, it’s an ipod touch, not a phone. Though I do have a cheep cellphone also. Smartphone plans are
hellacusta expensive.up
…what’s an iPod touch cost? And you can get apps for it? And if so, why wouldn’t I just get a cell phone? Oh cause the plans are expensive?
up
$200-$400 depending on how much memory you want/need (memory is mostly for storing music or video. apps hardly take up any room.)
Yeah, it’s more or less an iphone without the phone part. All the same apps. You need to be connected to WiFi in order to use the internet parts, which can be inconvenient.
An iphone is always connected but you have to pay at least $70/month for that.
up
Plus (unless you’re one of those really sophisticated jailbreak techy types) you have to be yoked to AT&T for 2 years.
up
He said “I ain’t spending my minutes here
I ain’t texting alone
Ain’t buying apps for Apple through AT&T
I’m breakin’ out my cracked phone”
up
even if they are Apple will periodically fry your shit.
They’re easily the most evil tech corp out there from a user’s perspective.
up
Want. WAAAAAAAAAAANT.
up
I’m now really agitated that there doesn’t seem to be a way to get it for Android yet.
up
DROID DOES!
up
I’m not fashionable enough for a Droid. I have a Moment.
up
I’m not fashionable enough for a moment. I have nothing.
up
Well, I can only be fashionable for a moment, so you have to look fast.
McPherson vs. Braden is a great matchup.
up
As was Alfonseca versus Perez.
Kids and bars. We used to bring junior1 into campus bars – super low key, mostly grad students playing poker or bitching about their research – until he was old enough to crawl.
up
1. Does anyone else feel compelled by the photo to punch that guy in the face?
2. Why is this a story? B/c the cnn writer, most likely, is friends/colleagues with (heck, given the odd elision of the little girl’s mother, perhaps even married to) the douchebag hipster in the photo.
3. Better douchebag hipsters take their kids to bars than to their (the parents’, that is) kickball games, I guess.
up
1. I didn’t at first, and then I got to ‘Sasha Raven Gross’….
up
I don’t get giving the kid a kooky/kewl middle name — seems really chickenshit.
up
Yeah, we picked “normal” middle names so our kids could switch over in case they hate being called Moonunit and Dreamweaver.
up
LEM and Acrobat
up
One of our vets is named Starfinder. We always knew him as Dr. Stanley, but then we looked at one of our bills and what do you know?–Starfinder. It actually suits him, though. He’s really into holistic pet medicine and treatment.
up
Starfinder Stanley is on Facebook
up
uh, yep–that’s him.
up
Do you do FB searches of everyone we mention on here?!
up
Why on earth would someone not do a google image search of someone named “Starfinder Stanley”?
up
true…
up
but has your search ever paid off so handsomely?
up
I was really hoping/expecting to find a pic of him juggling, or playing with one of those stupid *&@%#@ three-stick thingies.
up
Hey now, juggling is a noble pursuit.
up
His brother’s name is Starstream.
up
I was gonna suggest that his father’s name was Owsley … and it really is!
up
Wow.
up
Double WOW
up
That’s Custamazing.
up
Hella-Custa-good
up
I thought it was Fucka-Hella-Custa-good.
up
That’s sorta Raven.
up
I would have gone with “not really,” but that’s quibbling. Nicely done.
up
1. Yes.
3. It’s ok if I bring juniors1/2 to my softball games, though, right?
up
3. Softball’s fine. But no flashmob pillow fights.
up
3. And certainly none of those improv everywhere things.
up
Softball is awesome. Very traditional.
up
Wuss.
up
“Make out or pass out” would be a great tv show
up
game show?
up
game/reality
up
Give them a fifth of whiskey and have them question the contestant, Dating Game style, with the promise of her being either really, really pretty or really, really ugly.
Then they both have to drink the fifth and we film the whole thing.
What I root for in ST:
Health. This is obvious as an overall goal, but I especially want to hear that all the pitchers are throwing at-or-better than their normal velocity ranges without reports of discomfort or the need for extra days of rest.
Starters over role players. I want to see what I believe is the projected starting 9 (Zuki, Barton, Ellis, Kouz, Penny, Davis, Crisp, Sweeney, Cust) solidify their roles and head into the season looking good. I want the bench to be a collection of leveraged assets that will work best as role players, not guys that are kept around as pseudo-regulars who don’t really offer unique skills like strong replacement D or platoon advantages (in other words- I want operation Eric Chavez 1st Baseman to fail badly, he either can play the left side of the infield or he should be released).
Pet favorites. I have no idea why, but I want Patterson to be kept around. I think he’s a great fit as the 25th man on a roster and I would hate to lose him on account of signing Gross/Crisp. Also like Breslow a lot and would love to see Gio get a shot at being a regular starter.
up
up
Christ, what an assseat.
up
FAIL
Proper response (you didn’t click the link, did you?): Christ, what a recall
up
Wait. We can link with pictures?! How did I not know this?!
up
A notice went out to everyone’s cell phone …
up
sad panda
l
l
l
l
V
up
Sorry hoss, forgot to forward that one to your email. My cell is old and glitchy… yeah, that’s why I didn’t… it was the phone’s fault.
up
18-year olds, dude.
up
Is it true you played the saw for Finger Tip Amputation Hazard in college?
up
De Los Santos in game, has looked very impressive in bullpen sessions per SuSluTweet.
up
she just copied and pasted that from Rotoworld.
up
Incorrectly. It was actually Barton looking good at 3B.
It’s nice to see that the Chronicle has found someone who can address the issue of bikes versus cars by writing equally dumb things in favor of each.
up
Bike partisans being A’s fans strikes me as a very intelligent pro-bike point.
up
With the kind of hair and stache that guy has, you’d think he’d be rockin’ the Catfish jersey instead of the Fingers.
Speaking of catfish, we should invite ken arneson to post here.
Also, I’ve ridden my bike to the Coliseum for a few day games. There’s a bike rack by the flagpole in the North Lot. I was hanging our pre-game there once when a guy rides up on his bike and hands out four canned beers, on the condition that we return the cans to him. A few minutes later, he takes out a 8″ square piece of blackened thin metal mesh, which he props up on the 4 beer cans, under which he placed a dozen briquets, and proceeds to light a bicycle backpack-able BBQ. Neat.
up
That is outstanding. I’m definitely going to give that a try sometime. Did he use lighter fluid or just a carefully constructed pyramid of matchlights?
up
He used matchlights when I saw it, but said that on previous occasions he’d taken a 5th empty beer can, sawed off both ends with a multitool, and then used the remaining can cylinder like one uses those chimney-type charcoal starters.
up
I’ve got one of those. They’re cool.
up
sawed off busch lite can? You a rockefeller or something?
up
second and third the arneson invite.
up
OK, so I’ll get off my ass and send some frontman invites.
- Slusser
- Arneson
- Ratto
Who else?
up
Ken Korach.
up
Bob Zimmerman
up
I think he’s bean on tour for the last 17 years, although I’ve heard he has a trailer hew lives in located in Montana or Wyoming.
up
Rickey!
up
Owsley!
up
Elvis
up
I don’t know who Ken Arneson is, but this idea of wooing Slusser and Ratto is sort of weird.
up
Ken Arneson was the proprietor of the late lamented Catfish Stew and the Baseball Toaster blogs, the latter the Mothership Connection to the supremely cool Cardboard Gods feature, among many others.
Ratto and Slusser seem like longshots. But if we can get Ostler and Knapp around we could ratchet up the sanctimony and attendant flame wars by hellaposts.
up
Huh. I didn’t know those existed.
up
Sanctimony and flame wars? Or Ostler and Knapp?
up
-100 on Ratto.
up
That’ll show him.
up
His blog was great. If the archives are still up you can read it.
up
I’ve never met the guy…I’d imagine one of the rest of you must’ve…but his style strikes me as a really good fit here. Someone light the Catfish Signal!
up
I expect him to be writing for Slate by year’s end. Or co-parenting Sasha Raven.
Did he go to high school with you as well?
Also, re the car item — uh, exercise, anyone? Multi-tasking exercise + commuting? Not expending money (and electricity!) at the gym? Also: what’s the ultimate carbon footprint of sitting very still in a dark, chilly room, breathing shallowly? (Answer: Immense, mostly because of the massive amount of paperwork that needs to fly back and forth btw Langley and Foggy Bottom to approve it beforehand.)
up
No. “Upstate New York” is a big place. (And when someone says they’re from Upstate New York, it usually means they’re from the Eastern part of the state. People from around Buffalo and Rochester generally say we’re from Western New York.)
up
Corning, NY: birthplace of monkeyball (and monkeybro was born in Olean)
up
But are you a salty old sailor?
up
I have family in Troy. They say Upstate.
Did any of you miscreants know of this? And if so, why the fuck didn’t you tell me?!
Right on the bread!
up
Do they have one that will sear Jesus/Ba’al/FSM onto the bread?
up
Now if it only had Bill King saying “Holy Toledo” when the toast popped up, then you’d really have something.
up
I bet you could rig something up with the bottle-opener that plays Hatty’s 20th game walk off.
up
Paging the Aphid …
up
I tried to persuade him to incorporate the audio guts from a Bill King opener when he built this, but he was committed to using only parts salvaged from junkyards.
up
Meh – buy a regular toaster and slap a sign on it.
In fact, I know where some of my swag is going …
up
nonnonoono, the TOAST COMES OUT WITH THE A’S SYMBOL ON IT.
Think of it, FK:
Edible Swag.
up
Meh. I was married recently, and therefore have an entirely-too-fancy toaster. Seriously, there’s a button labeled “A Bit More”
up
TWSS
up
win
up
Now I’m going to be sad whenever I eat anything, because it doesn’t have an A’s logo on it.
up
TWFLGS
up
Re-reading this months later, I’m sitting here going, “Fiorello La Guardia?”
up
you have too much time on your hands if you’re re-reading old grills.
My, but this station plays a lot of Motley Crue and Van Halen.
I would have called it the “Custa.”
For any fan of 70’s television, this is not good news.
up
Hard to imagine that will be anything but suck.
up
I vote for super suck right now.
up
DO. NOT. WANT.
up
Hella-suck.
up
My Rockford replacement has been Burn Notice on USA the past couple of seasons.
Would not appreciate a remake of the original series.
up
Burn Notice had really irritating ads (the guy saying “Welcome to Miami” for no reason like it was a terrible rap video…), but I watched an episode and it was pretty good.
up
In a world with DVRs, complaining about ads seems silly.
up
Glad to see some Rockford love. I thought I was the only one the other day.
up
Burn Notice is more of a Magnum PI replacement. It’s also kind of dumb. (And I know that because I watch it pretty much every week.)
up
I love Burn Notice. It ain’t perfect but for what it is, an action show that has a bunch of clever lines thrown in, it does its job perfectly. It probably is my second favorite current show on television to Dexter. Lost and Psych are 3 and 4.
up
Good choices. Love Lost. Psych is awesome. Best cast chemistry I’ve ever seen on a show.
up
Fucka-sucka-suck
up
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. I love that show. fuck.
up
Aw, hell.
up
I agree, Nick Nolte. I agree.
Cooooooool
up
I don’t have kids (and I don’t see myself putting one out at a party,) but that looks like an excellent off-register baby gift.
up
You don’t see yourself putting out what at a party?
up
Just make sure you don’t confuse the one with the goldfish for the one with the rusty nails.
up
Young Scientist Lesson No. 1: NEVER TRUST AN ARGUMENT FROM AUTHORITY
up
Seriously kid, just trust me on this.
up
Your kid will never learn how to hold a bowl upright (a skill that, when mastered, makes the littlun far more useful around the house).
up
We’re planning to move to outer space
up
This reminds me of a talk I went to the other day.
The speaker was talking about design parameters omniphobic surfaces, which are surfaces that would repel not only water but oil as well (there are no naturally occurring such surfaces). The idea would be to make fabrics resistant to liquid spills of any type.
Anyway, it turns out that what’s important is the texture of the surface (think lotus leaves). Specifically, the ratio between the size of the surface features their and its repeat length was the critical parameter. But when he did the experiment, it failed miserably.
Why? Well, it turned out that the *weight* of the liquid droplet was really important, so you had to have relatively small features (on the nanoscale). But, the speaker noted, if one were in outer space, the original model would work, since the drops would be weightless.
But that got me thinking: why would you need to have fabrics resistant to all liquids in outer space? You can’t really drop ketchup in outer space, the blob would just float there and you could capture with a napkin (or, heck, your mouth) at your leisure.
I guess that story didn’t really go anywhere, but this what my mind does.
up
You should invent a film that repels tigers — in outer space.
up
3:09
up
I have trouble believing it works as advertised.
up
All the kid would have to do is grab the bowl instead of the outer handle.
up
TWSS
Neyer has a smart. Seems like the sort of thing Moneyball should mean.
up
This reminds me of my visit to the recently mentioned Sonoma County Crushers. I can’t remember what level they were (Class-A maybe?) but they were pretty low minors. Anyway, it was so cute–the booster club was having a BBQ in one corner of the parking lot and when the players from both teams arrived at the stadium, they all headed over to the BBQ and the booster club fed them lunch. It was very charming.
Hee hee!
Yankees players must repay $10K each to MLB because their World Series shares were calculated incorrectly.
up
You give me $365,052 and I’ll happily give you $10,000 back.
up
Even if you had to wear this hideous thing as part of the deal?
up
I’d pull a Canseco and put it on eBay.
up
Does that really say “The Century’s Team?” Gross.
up
up
Can I have $10K?
From my blog.
My job is pretty pathetic.
One step closer to the Monkey’s dream stadium:
This is “only” 60m x 30m, but it’s only a matter of time …
up
dubai?
up
Nah – couldn’t afford it.
up
fond du lac?
up
NEEDS LES SUNN
Lost
+1 for badass Sayid
+1 for (no spoiler) in the walk-in fridge
+1 for kontinued KrAZeE KlAiRE
-3 for continued prominence of the smoke monster
Parenthood
Various shots on location in Berkeley & Oakland (Fairyland, Oscar’s, I think lower Sproul). Prominent use of a Dylan song. Even an A’s reference. But still godawful. I can’t believe Tim Goodman liked that.
up
-10 for NOT HAVING ANY ANSWERS AS PROMISED.
up
you believed they would provide answers? After six seasons of actively promoting obscuration?
up
Well… they did say this week there would be answers… so yes?
up
What type of answers are you waiting for?
I felt the were plenty of answers, at least involving the direction of the show. Perhaps not the “answers” we hoped for, but still.
up
A few answers to questions raised earlier this season, at least, if not anything more deep or long-lasting:
Is Sayid possessed by some kind of Smokey-Locke energy? Yes.
Are the temple Others really some sort of Jacob cultists? Yes.
Is Kate really going to ping pong back from Sawyer to where she believes Jack to be, again? Yes.
I also found continuing support for what I believe to be their alterna/parallel thesis: that while the different events may lead people to new circumstances (Sayid’s beloved is married to his brother), the things that are fundamental to their character are unchanged (Sayid is a badass to whom violence comes easily). Nature over nurture, I guess.
up
I find waiting for answers to Joe Jackson’s question much more infuriating.
up
If my eyes don’t deceive me there’s something going wrong around here.
up
Where?
up
Those were all things we already basically knew. Don’t get me wrong, great episode, certainly moved in a fun direction and all, but if they are hyping “answers” as their big promo for the episode, I kind of expect something more than reconfirming things that are more or less obvious.
up
That’s fair enough.
up
Like I’ve said, I’m waiting. If they end in a way that makes sense, it could be one of my all time top-10. If not, I’ll look back bitterly.
up
I’ve enjoyed the ride enough that no matter where it ends, it’s in my all time 10. If not 3.
up
Have to agree. If the ending is disappointing, it would suck, but the ride has been great enough as it is. And at least they’re going out the way they want which most shows don’t.
up
Yeah, you’re right, I’m grasping at straws.
up
The funny thing is the only thing wrong with the episode was the promo. Had they just said “something big would happen” it would have met the expectations and more. Either way, it was a good episode making me continue to look forward to the next one.
up
Just watched it. The part about being busted for weed in Berkeley seemed…unconvincing.
up
I think the last time that happened was 1958.
Slusser: DISINVITED
up
I was just reading that one:
and also this one on McPherson’s back:
up
I watched some footage of him after the trade, and I didn’t get that at all. He reminded me a little of Byrnes and a lot of Denorfia.
up
Anything is better than Pennington.
up
I actually think that Pennington is far and away our best option at shortstop, which – yeah – is kind of sad.
up
Agreed. There might be a, I don’t know, ~15% chance Rosales or Tolleson could outperform him. For now, I’m content with Pennington playing because he’s almost surely the best bet on defense and offense. By the end of the year, I expect the A’s will need a new SS though. Jed Lowrie has been my pet idea for a while.
up
Christ. Our stupid acquisition is effed up already.
up
It’s not a new thing, it’s from his surgery (sticking 12 pins into him) on both shoulders that he had before they signed him… A positive way of looking at things might be that if he’s hurt the team won’t really suffer….
up
Didn’t realize it would delay him this much though.
–The A’s issued a press release announcing that Chris Townsend will take over the postgame radio show on 860-AM. Robert Buan still works for the A’s, and he tells me he’ll still be webcasting games down here in AZ, which is good news for fans of play-by-play which is so obtuse that it forces them to use their imagination to deduce the actual events being described.
up
(edited for accuracy)
up
Slusser endorses Buancasting (unclear as to whether she’s endorsing the phenomenon or the epithet, or both)
up
Somehow, I was unstunned when I went to MLB.com today and found that the price of Gameday Audio has gone up from $14.95 to $19.95. Still good value though.
up
I’ve been expecting them to raise that for years.
up
Obtuse?
“Visceral Giving“? Those are … nacho funds!