All posts filed under: Baseball

How to Lower Your Blood Pressure

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When it comes to the Washington Nationals, I’ve figured out how to lower my blood pressure: simply stop watching the game (or leave, as was the case last night) before Rafael Soriano comes out to “save” the ninth! I am NOT a fan of leaving the game early, but Soriano’s brushes with disaster in the ninth inning are becoming much too predictable – and too hard on my heart!  Last night’s game was a case in point. Candice and I strolled into Nationals Park on a picture perfect Friday evening.  The surprises began as we walked in the gate:  who knew it was Wilson Ramos bobble head night?!  So in the man cave I now have The Buffalo, down in his crouch, ready to catch a pitch from my Stephen Strasburg bobble head!  (And with former Nat Michael Morse – the Beast – in the on-deck circle, among others.) In a break from tradition this year, the Nats jumped out early against the Mets, with a three-run first.  Young Tanner Roark was pitching a masterful …

Now THIS is a Cool Retirement Gift

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The stick-in-the-muds who write headlines for the Washington Post may have thought that this customized baseball card for retiring Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke wasn’t up to his accomplishments (see I saved the economy and all I got was this custom baseball card), but die-hard Nats fans – of which Bernanke is one – realize that this beats a gold watch any day! What true fan wouldn’t want to see themselves immortalized in that one medium that tells how good you really were…the baseball card.  I loved the career stats on Bernanke’s card: 2002:  First drafted from the Ivy League 2006:  Signed offer as Chairman 2008-2009:  MVP for most four-letter acronyms created 2009:  Named Time magazine Person of the Year 2010:  Inked new deal as Chairman Plus he had 79 Congressional testimonies and 226 speeches given in his “career.” Now, if you feel you need something more than a baseball card to capture Bernanke’s contribution to saving our economy (which – it should be noted – came with a great deal of help from the …

Petco Panorama

Baseball, Springsteen, infomercials and anything else that comes to mind

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Update: Since this blog was written, Joe Posnanski — like many bloggers — has shifted platforms one or more times. The first link in the post takes you to his current Substack page, where you can also find a link to his sports writing at The Athletic. Some of his posts will now be behind paywalls, while others are no longer archived. It is the nature of the digital platform beast, so reader beware. On my way home from work this evening, I decided to open my iPad to Joe Posnanski’s blog and just read and read until the train pulled up at the Silver Spring station.  Thirty-five minutes of bliss. Why? Perhaps I wanted to think about something besides work.  As my colleague Allie said yesterday, “It has been a very long short week.” Perhaps I am really getting sick of this endless string of days with temperatures in the single digits and wind chills below zero. (I vote for this as the real reason.  I don’t mind cold, but enough already!) Perhaps it …

No No-No, But Still A Special Night

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Well, that was a pretty special way to end Round One. Justin Verlander twirls a gem in the last game of the 2013 Division Series that included massive blow-outs, improbable walk-off wins, and one of the best days of baseball ever. Verlander must salivate when he can close out a series against the Oakland A’s.  For this year’s elimination game, he throws a no-hitter through 6 2/3’s innings, only to see it broken up by Yoenis Céspedes. (I mention Yoenis Céspedes just because I love writing “Yoenis Céspedes”…with apologies to Gail Collins.) But Verlander’s classic – supported by a surprise dinger from the injured Miguel Cabrera who, with only one home run in September, showed up in time in October to help the Tigers win the series – was just the latest in a good round of games. As the Nats learned last year, momentum can change quickly in these short five-game series.  Oakland looked like everything was going its way this year, until it didn’t.  Ditto for the Pittsburgh Pirates, who were rolling until …

Labor Day Grab Bag

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What do empty nesting, Keith Olbermann, a day at the pool, good food, and Lee Daniels’ The Butler have in common?  They are all part of this Labor Day grab bag of (relatively) quick observations – because it is still summer and I don’t want to work too hard writing long blog posts! Hopes for Year 3 of Empty Nesting:  As of 6 a.m. on Saturday, our third year of “empty nesting” officially began.  Candice and I took Claire to the airport for her flight to California.  Andrew went back to school about 10 days ago (even though – as you can see below – he is also managing to fit in things not school-related). My hope is that Empty Nesting: Year 3 will be the first “normal” one, following our health problems of the first year and the rehab-focused Year 2.  After extensive rehabilitation and a few months of myofascial release, Candice is walking – and feeling – better than she has in five years.  In fact, she’s so positive about myofascial release that …

That’s More Like It

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In a year of struggles, today’s Nationals/Phillies series wrap-up was one of the feel-good games of 2013. The day:  Beautiful late afternoon game at the ballpark with 32,355 other fans…including Andrew!  Third game in 8 days, and second with Andrew.  (Can you tell I’m on vacation!) Temps in the low 80s, and Section 313 starts out in the shade!  Smart decision to take the scorecard. Even the President’s Race was funny: each president wipes out Sharknado (don’t ask…something to do with the Discovery Channel’s Shark Week), Bill Taft gives him a body slam for good measure, and Teddy wins. On to the game itself… Stephen Strasburg:  First career complete game and a shutout for good measure.  No Philly makes it into scoring position. Totally dominant. Ten strikeouts. One walk. 99 total pitches – 66 strikes. Jayson Werth:  Second three-hit game in a row. Hitting ropes to left field.  Werewolf in London walk-up music shows he doesn’t take himself too seriously. Scores – along with Ian Desmond – on one of the best hustle/heads-up plays of the …

Summer Reading 2013, Part II: Or How the Nats Lost Their Way

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Technically, I read Shawn Green’s unique little memoir/meditation The Way of Baseball before summer began, but after a night at the ballpark watching our Nats utterly fold in a three-game series sweep by the division leading Braves and reading Tom Boswell’s insightful (as always) column about how this year’s season went so wrong, I was reminded of how much I enjoyed this book. Let’s begin with Boswell and the Nats. For two-thirds of a season we’ve been told that the Nats had “too much talent” to keep playing this poorly, and that they would switch it on in time to get back in the pennant race.  But the Braves put an end to that kind of talk, with as utterly dominating a three-game series as you could have where the total run differential was only 5 runs for the three games.  Boswell put it best when he described the sweep as “an execution by proper execution.” Amen. The Nats played so effortlessly last year that it is easy to forget how difficult baseball can be …

A Perfect Day for Baseball…and to Reach the Halfway Mark

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Sunday in Pittsburgh was a perfect day for baseball.  The hometown Pirates are playing the best baseball in both leagues at the moment.  The ballpark was packed with fans caught up in a pennant race.  The weather was picture perfect with temps in the low 80s. And Pittsburgh’s PNC Park – #15 on my list of 30 MLB parks to visit by 2015 – is a terrific place to watch a game. My request for this year’s “staycation” was to take a short road trip to Pittsburgh so i could check another ballpark off my bucket list of visiting all 30 Major League Baseball stadiums.  We saw that the Rockies were in town to play the Bucs for a weekend series, and so I scored four tickets behind home plate and we set out to build a trip around my baseball pilgrimage. This morning we all slept in a bit, and then after trips to the fitness center and showers, we took off for brunch at DeLuca’s – a Pittsburgh landmark in The Strip.  Pancakes, …

A Great Week for Ballparks

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In my bucket-list quest of visiting all 30 major league ball parks, this week didn’t really move the needle…but it was a great week nonetheless. Two cities and two ballparks.  That’s the way I like to travel. Last Tuesday, I was in Denver wrapping up a set of meetings, and joined some colleagues at Coors Field for a Rockies vs. Nationals game.  Yes, my Nats were in town! This was my second visit to Coors Field – which means I didn’t get to check off another park from my list. But while the outcome was disappointing (the Nats lost this game, yet won the series), I did get to catch a wonderful Coors Field sunset over the Rocky Mountains.  Few stadiums have better views, and all of us – Nats and Rockies fans alike – marveled in the sunset. Then on Friday, I was in Boston.  Those of you who know the schedule will say, “Hey, weren’t the Red Sox playing the O’s in Baltimore this weekend?”  Well, yes.  (I am actually catching the last …

A Gem of a Day

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By just about any measure, it was a pretty wonderful day for a baseball game in the nation’s capital. Sunday of Memorial Day weekend…the start of summer. (Check.) Sunny skies with temps in the high sixties/low seventies throughout the afternoon. (Check.) A huge crowd at the yard.  Official attendance of 39,033.  (You look for these things when you’re scoring the game.) (Check.) Wonderful daughter along for the afternoon. (Check!) As we left home for the metro around noon for the 1:35 first pitch, Claire and I had on appropriate game-day attire.  (I think she still finds it amazing that someone who is 20 – her age – can play major league baseball, so I offered up the Harper shirt.) Strasburg was on the mound, and he was sharp! The Phillies were confused all day.  Eight strong innings and nine strikeouts later – with the only blemish being a balk on his next to last pitch allowing a man on third to score – he showed that despite the strange 3-5 W-L record this year, he’s …