All Articles by Matt Sussman

…Out With the Crowd$

How to Make the Rays’ Two-City Plan Bigger and Better$

Short Relief: Turn and Face the Strange

Make baseball a five-year-old you throw the wiffleball to, over and over in the summer sunshine, watching her miss each time. Then hiss crowd noise into the air when she finally puts her plastic bat on the ball and runs laughing around no bases.

Designated Hitters for All Who Want ThemB

Short Relief: All Things Considered, I’d Rather Be

What the flags of NL East(!) cities say about the team; let’s respect Todd Helton, a much better athlete than Peyton Manning; ‘The Curse’

What if the Astros Win the 2020 World Series?$

Short Relief: A Donut Hole Within a Donut’s Hole

The freshest Carlos Beltrán conspiracy theory; what your city flag says about your team: NL West; the horror when the Rays claim one of your guys off waivers

Short Relief: True Tests

Before the Reds signed Shogo Akiyama, they were the only MLB team to had never signed a Japanese player; finally, the AL East installment of the ‘What Your City Flag Says About Your Team’ series; two catchers try to figure out what a forkball is, exactly.

Best of Short Relief 2019: Champions

Always play like Roberto Clemente; a story on the greatest day in Brooklyn Dodgers history; trying to break the habit of rooting for the Yankees; words on players liked for their words; Casey should have been IBB’d; we honest to goodness found the least watchable hitter in the game; beware the October buzzsaw

Best of Short Relief 2019: Grief

Tyler Skaggs, grief, and magical thinking; when opioid overdoses make you think of home; Trevor Rosenthal will (and did) record an out again; Willians Astudillo is in the zone; keeping up with all of the Jeff Joneses; the 2030 Front Office All-Star Game

Short Relief: Cole for Chanukah

The second annual baseball Chanukah song from Rob Mains; what the city flags say about the NL Central teams; let’s talk about Gerrit Cole and that old sign of his; “free agency” is not exactly what it sounds like

Short Relief: Thinking of the Children

MLB The Show is going multi-platform for the first time, and that could be big; Baby Yoda reacts to the winter meetings; city flags symbolize a lot about MLB teams

Short Relief: Recipes for the Opposite of Success

Create your own edible Baltimore Orioles player; looking back at the first game of the decade (of course it was Yankees-Red Sox) and laughing; field dimensions: ranked

Short Relief: A Straight Shooter With Upper Management Written All Over Him

The Bobs help downsize minor league baseball; the importance of baseball in a marriage; finding Marie Kondo-approved joy in “meaningless” games

Short Relief: The Astros Stole the Original Title of This Post

Position player pitcher poetry; stolen Sáenz is nothing new; the pitchers most impacted by sign stealing; music in which to troll the Astros (finally)

Short Relief: Short Relief Butchers the Classics

Casey should have been IBB’d; someone bought a hammer; official offseason spokesman Rogers Hornsby was destined to be a jerk