Only about 4% of babies born in the U.S. are multiple births, and of that subset of multiple births, 95% are twins. So while twins are rare, among multiple births they are the majority. Triplets, though, are rare however you slice it. That analogues nicely to the game of baseball, where triples are the rarest…
LANCASTER, Pa. — After successfully implementing the automated strike zone, the ability to “steal” first base, and several other rule changes into the Atlantic League, on Wednesday the MLB announced something more ambitious. “We sat down in one of our brainstorming sessions,” said Jason Domo from the MLB Commissioner’s Office, who spoke with us through…
Of the wide band of human emotions, grief is the most elusive, the most chimerical, as distinctive to each person as a fingerprint, as impossible to pin down as rain. In college I had a friend who died suddenly and for months afterward her mother, whom I did not know before the tragedy, emailed me…
The joy of playing in the All-Star Game: being recognized as one of the best among your peers, the opportunity to rub shoulders with the best in the game, introducing yourself to a national audience. Of course, that introduction also comes with a risk, as that audience, curious about this new star on the horizon,…
“Every pitch matters; we don’t need loss to remind us. We need grace while the sea resets its shores.”
I have tried to be polite and civil about this matter, as it is not my wish any player should wind up in shackles turning the giant wheel beneath Rob Manfred’s office that powers MLBAM, but enough is enough: professional baseball players of America, I need you to let me live my life! It was…
I – You’re left wondering how long he thought about doing it. He takes off without hesitation the moment Alcantara drops his head. Was it observing some pattern pre-game? Some trend an eagle-eyed staffer identified through hours of watching isolated footage? A simple wager between teammates? Did he think about it all year? Did he…
It was a nice hotel suite. My guest paid for it. He was sweaty the entire time, in any sense of the word I have seen it used. It was obvious he practiced his questions beforehand. I felt sorry for how hard he tried to make them sound off the cuff, to be honest. Each…
Former Giants outfielder Angel Pagan is safe and sound after being rescued at sea in Puerto Rico (via @DaltonJ_Johnson) https://t.co/e7E6pth5br pic.twitter.com/RVrWDCzH74 — SF Giants on NBCS (@NBCSGiants) May 29, 2019 He did not know, when they set out– Two men and a boy, on a fishing trip, The rhythm of his days now, Retired at…
Oh my goodness. You did it. You did a split. Is it an Olympic-level split? Probably not, no. It is close enough, though. It looked at the task at hand and completed it. Often that’s all you could ask for. You don’t understand why the word ‘serviceable’ has a whiff of insult to it. Maybe…
This past Tuesday, the Charleston RiverDogs, A-ball affiliate of the New York Yankees, hosted “Average Night,” a celebration of baseball averages, but also, averageness in the greater sense. “Are you one of your parents’ favorite children? A solid five?” asked the video promos, inviting you to come on out–on a Tuesday, the most average of…
I’ve long thought that a decent amount of baseball’s charm stems simply from the fact that the shape of the field is unique, rhizomatic. And it’s strange, really: one might point to the fact that nearly every other “modern” team sport takes place in the same rectangular dimensions, featuring goals or “ends” on either side…
In what can only be described as extreme algorithm malfunction, for the past week I have gotten a relentless stream of promoted tweets for Chanel’s new Camélia line every time I open Twitter. The copy, which can charitably be called sense-adjacent, is written in that bizarre tone that must function as Galton’s whistle for the…
Baseball has been played professionally in San Antonio since at least the late 1880s, when the city was a charter member of the Texas League. The history of chili in the city is much harder to trace, with many travelers coyly referring to “stews” that will “make one malodorous for days,” as one lady traveler…
When Christian Stephen Yelich, his oak tree strength forged in, fittingly enough, Thousand Oaks, California, hit another towering home run, or dinger, or tater, first coined as another word for home run by Phernum Terance “Sleepy” Rosewater in a Somerville, Tennessee Taco Bell in 1971, despite the fast food establishment never serving tater tots, according…
Despite pouring money into improving the product in the off-season, MiLB.tv remains charmingly low-rent, which is exactly how I like it. Give me broadcaster chatter and Power Point slide art and wonky camera angles any day over slickly produced MLB.tv content or that godawful Imagine Dragons song being shouted at me every half-inning through a…