Chanpuru (potpourri)
When I was still stateside and wanted to do a post with a variety of different topics, I’d call it potpourri. I’m in Okinawa, where there is no potpourri. I don’t miss it. Here, there is chanpuru. A mix. So it is.
ESPN’s uber-columnist Bill Simmons’ latest is about how cheating in baseball affects the Hall of Fame. If only someone had written a book including this subject. A guide of sorts, one might say. A “cheater’s guide,” if you will, to baseball.
Derek should also know, of course, that I would never say that reader-author interaction is asymmetrical and authoritarian. No, I believe that rhizomatic conversations occur in blog-discourse, actualizing resistant space and opening up discursive lines of flight.
Nah, I’m just messin’ with ya.
Know who is huge over here? Tsuyoshi Shinjo. You can’t get away from that guy. If he isn’t showing up at games dressed as Darth Vader, he’s driving onto the field on a Harley. Now retired, he’s thinking about politics.
All I know is, I went for a hike at a waterfall yesterday. I drove two hours to get to said waterfall. At the base of the trail was a vending machine (I know, I know, that’s a whole other issue). Shinjo was staring at me, urging me to buy coffee. I’m allergic to coffee. Bite me, Shinjo.
Only a month to spring training. Japanese spring training, that is.
Also, Rick Rizzs evidently grew a goatee. How are we supposed to tell him apart from Evil Rick Rizzs now? This development heralds a triumphant return; I can smell it. Or maybe that’s just natto.
too bad, because it would be so timely, what with the HOF announcements coming ….
um. the Evil glint in his Evil eye?
oh wait! it wasn’t the players who were cheating!
Natto. Eww.
That said, I eat pickled herring.
I wonder if any American baseball players could successfully run for office. Mike Piazza (global warming sceptic, but repeatedly rumoured to be gay) might make a good bipartisan candidate.
“I’m allergic to coffee. Bite me, Shinjo.”
Great line!
Mmmm – natto – breakfast of champions!
Oh, come now, the best Shinjo appearance of this year, period, was when he went on SMAPxSMAP. and tried to learn to be a boy band dancing star, among other things. Good god, I’ve rewatched that show like three times and I still can’t stop laughing. Funniest thing ever.
Anyway, he’s got a lot of ad campaigns going on these days. I was pretty terrified by Shinjo in cardboard cutout mode. I have no idea if those have been deployed around the land yet though.
Also: Darth Shinjo
It’s better than last year when some of the Hokkaido papers were talking about Shinjo coming to manage the Fighters after he retired, at least…
(sigh, with Ogasawara AND Shinjo gone I don’t know who’s going to be my new Good vs. Evil on the team this year. Inaba vs. Hichori, maybe…)
Are we sure he doesn’t grow one every offseason? Perhaps he really is Evil Rick Rizzs, and he just shaves the beard and puts on the Willy-lovin’ non-Evil persona for the season. (If so, if the M’s are as bad as they promise to be there’s a chance the Evil One will bust out like some kind of auditory Hulk…)
Would that be this one?
Nah, that would be shirako. (Which you can get at Maneki, BTW, though I don’t think they’re open for breakfast).
Darth
and Ken Doll Shinjo
I think I have an unnatural fear of Shinjo now.
not so unnatural.
Jim Bunning is currently serving as the stupidest man in the US Senate.
I’m not sure it’s fair to rag on a guy for not having read a book that’s not available yet. Whaddawe gotta wait now, three months?
I’m not sure if that’s good or bad… Either way, I’m scared of a 6-1, 185 pound Japanese man with a .245 career batting average!
Seems like he retired fairly young, he’s only 35 now. I guess he really wanted to pursue his modeling career. Judging by all the advertising he’s doing, it seems to have worked out!
Personally, I think a goatee is a sign of intelligence. The man who scratches his goatee in thought looks like he is pondering the meaning of life or doing mental calculations of Willie Bloomquist’s 2008 PECOTA projection.
Can you do that without a goatee? I Think Not.
Does Evil Rick Rizzs come with the hair pieces, or without?
Can you buy them as add-ons with the action figure?
Remember when Shinjo almost got voted an all-star? He was the original Rory Fitzpatrick.
John Heyman is reporting that the D-Backs and Yanks are close to a deal for the Big Unit. Yanks would be getting quite a haul to from the names mentioned.
Would you rather have Shinjo or Vidro DH for us next year?
#16– mlb.com:
The D-backs will send veteran reliever Luis Vizcaino and a pitching prospect in exchange for Johnson. It’s believed that the Yankees will include some money in the deal to help Arizona defray the cost of Johnson’s $16 million salary for 2007. The pitching prospect will likely come from a group of Ross Ohlendorf, Micah Owings or Dustin Nippert. It’s unknown whether the D-backs will include another lower-level Minor Leaguer in the deal.
Fox says Vizcaino, Ohlendorf, and SS Alberto Gonzalez, with the possibility of another minor league pitcher to boot.
I’d rather have Vidro DH than Shinjo. If they could make Shinjo into a Designated Fielder, he’d probably be better off. Though, I would rather have had Shinjo on my team than Willie Bloomquist in any league in any country…
And yes, I was part of the whole “We signed who?? WHY?!?” group when the Fighters first signed Shinjo in 2004. I never thought it’d happen, but I grew to like the guy over the last few years, even though I still think he’s batshit insane most of the time.
I don’t think he’ll actually run for office, anyway. Despite how he acts, I think he knows exactly how qualified he is for most things (including playing baseball, which is why he retired).
Management issues aside, I would have liked to see the M’s in the discussion for Randy if he was open to coming back. The D-backs didn’t give up anything real to get him. Would have been nice to have him for 2 years.
#20– so he should just drift though life, perhaps accompanied by a theme song such as this old song from Forum:
I’m lovely,
All I am is lovely.
Lovely is the one thing I can do.
Winsome,
What I am is winsome,
Radiant as in some
Dream come true.
Oh, Isn’t it a shame?
I can neither sew
Nor cook nor read or write my name.
But I’m happy
Merely being lovely,
For it’s one thing I can give to you.
WFAN reported the Yankees are also getting RHP Steven Jackson. $2 million will be changing hands, too.
Good deal for Arizona.
Is he going to stop doing that stupid ESPN show? Because that thing sucks.
Randy rumors will have its own post momentarily. Thanks.
22 – you have absolutely no idea how close I’ve been to writing “Pretty Little Roster” to the tune of the obvious song from that musical… I didn’t think there were enough other Sondheim geeks in the blogosphere to get it, though.
geeks-r-us.
oh – #7, now that I am at home and can actually see YouTube (it’s banned at work), yeah, that’s the Idol Gakuen part of that show where they were singing and dancing, but the rest of the hour-long episode was even funnier. The most disturbing part was how well Shinjo fit in with the group…
I heard Bucky Jacobsen is trying to get on a team in Japan. Any info?