Saturday December 5th, 2009
by Davo Smith – OnThEGRiND BOXiNG UK

Tonight, supporting the Amir Khan vs Dimitri Salita card we will see what is certain to be an intriguing lightweight contest. On the undercard the young, undefeated, and ready for battle UK fighter Kevin Mitchell, takes on a man now widely known (at least on the UK domestic scene as the only man to beat Khan to date and with a blistering performance at that), the lanky Columbian knockout artist Breidis Prescott.
I’ve always enjoyed watching Mitchell. He really does bring it, as anyone who witnessed the Mitchell vs Johanesson fight in 2008 can vouch for. To compliment his game approach, he has decent movement too, with very good technical skills, showing good speed in his combination punches. I’d surmise Mitchell as a good to very good little fighter, with definite room for improvement, especially in the defensive department where he can be tempted to eat a shot to land a shot. It’d be great to see him push on from ‘talented prospect,’ and show whether he can truly cut the mustard at a higher level.

To be honest, as with Mitchell, I’d pop Prescott into a similar basket. He’s a good fighter with youth on his side to build on the flaws, its just seems that Prescott’s flaws are a bit more deep rooted, lacking the clear technical ability of a Mitchell. On the flip side, he appears blessed with genuine KO power as an equalizer. The KO power will likely only carry him so far though, and without great boxing ability to compliment it, he’s almost certainly not going to be able to ice every opponent (as he found out in his last outing).

Prescott will certainly have the main physical advantages in height and reach, which will undoubtedly make controlling distance a tougher task for the man from Dagenham. Mitchell will have to move well enough and be able to control distance against the longer reach of Prescott, while staying focused and aware of Prescott’s bombs. As the smaller man, Mitchell just needs to take his time.

Personally, I think the key in this fight is going to lie in two things. Whether Mitchell can handle the step up to lightweight, and the certain power of Prescott, and also more importantly if he can stick to a clever game plan will be factors. Mitchell has very good boxing ability and Breidis Prescott is there to be outboxed. Prescott has to drag Mitchell into a fight in order to win, and as Mitchell begins to feel a desire to impress the crowd, he has a tendency to oblige and trade. In this case though, “ice and thin” would spring to mind, and the young man from Dagenham may just end up tasting canvas.

Part of me wants to see Prescott back in the game with a sterling performance against Mitchell. This would ultimately set up that rematch with Khan and allow the boy from Bolton a chance to banish his demons, whilst at the same time winning back some respect from true boxing fans by restoring order on his record. Aside from this, I’m convinced that there can be some exciting nights ahead for Mitchell, and would love to see him terrorize Prescott from the opening bell. My worry is that maybe he should have stayed at super featherweight and aimed to establish himself more there first, before heading into deeper water at lightweight. For a first fight moving up, he certainly could have chosen an easier task. Ultimately, tonight is going to be sink or swim for Mitchell, and a chance for Prescott to remind the British public of his previous achievement. I just hope Mitchell is bouyant for his sake.

This contest has all the potential to be a great fight, and may the best man win.

I bring you the sixth and final pack of 1991 Upper Deck baseball cards that I ripped through this morning…

Notable – Harold Reynolds, Kevin Mitchell, Fernando Valenzuela, Mark Langston, and a ‘1917 Revisited’ Chicago White Sox team card.

Pick Of The Pack – Bert Blyleven – easily the happiset baseball card I have ever seen!!!

Here’s some excerpts from Ray Ratto’s story for the Chronicle on the Giants closing out the Cubs in five games with an afternoon game at Candlestick on October 9, 1989:

“The Cubs collected 10 hits and 14 baserunners yesterday, but until the ninth inning, all they had was a single, unearned run to show for it. That came in the third, when Jerome Walton hit a line drive into the path between Mitchell’s eyes and the sun in left field for a two-base error. Mitchell was without his sunglasses at the time, but said, “They wouldn’t have done any good anyway; the sun goes right through those things. I just put my glove where I thought the ball was going to be.” Walton then scored on Ryne Sandberg’s double to right.

True to form for the series, though, even that ended badly for the Cubs. Sandberg tried to make it to third, but chopped his steps rounding second and was thrown out by a combination of throws from Pat Sheridan and Robby Thompson.

“That was a big play, no question,” Giants manager Roger Craig said later. “If he’s safe, it’s a man on third with one out, and (Mark) Grace would be coming up soon.”

Reuschel faced other tight scrapes in the [first, with Mark Grace and Jerome Walton on first and third with two out], fourth, sixth and eighth, but escaped each time because of his skill and those of the gentlemen behind him.

In the fourth, he hit Andre Dawson on the wrist with a 1-2 pitch, and Luis Salazar followed with a base hit to right that sent Dawson to third. Shawon Dunston, though, grounded sharply to Thompson, who began the Giants’ seventh double play of the series.

In the sixth, successive singles by Marvell Wynne and a ubiquitous Grace put runners at the corners with one out, but Dawson, who finished the series with two hits in 19 at-bats, flied to right and Salazar grounded gently to Thompson.

In the eighth, Reuschel walked Walton, watched as Sandberg sacrificed him to second – Sandberg’s second sacrifice of the entire season – and walked Grace intentionally with two out to get to Dawson, who bounced back to the box, his eighth failure with men in scoring position in 10 opportunities.

With all those opportunities and all those zeros, the Cubs were probably asking for what they got. And what they got, of course, was Clark.

He started the seventh with a first-pitch triple that headed down the right-field line, ticked off Dawson’s glove and nestled in the corner, enabling a moderately gimpy Clark to lumber to third. “The ball just kept tailing away from him,” Clark said of Dawson. “I was around first, and he hadn’t even gotten to the ball yet to throw it to the cutoff man, so I just kept running.”

Mitchell followed with a one-strike fly ball to deep center, scoring Clark easily and tying the game.

“It really wasn’t even a strike,” Mitchell said, “but in that situation I’m going to be aggressive. They’d been working me away all day, so I had to go out and get one.”

[In the eighth] Candy Maldonado . . . fought the temptation to try to save his entire season with a swing and coaxed 10 pitches and a two-out walk from Bielecki. Then came Butler, who also worked Bielecki to a full count before walking himself.

“”I guess I was a little tired,” Bielecki acknowledged. “”I wanted to get that last out and take it from there. I tried to reach back, and there was nothing there.”

At that point, Cubs manager Don Zimmer went out to talk to Bielecki and decided to let him pitch to Thompson. “He asked me how I felt, and I told him I could get him out. I missed with the first two pitches, then I just lost it.”

The four-pitch walk loaded the bases for Clark.

Zimmer called for his stopper, Mitch Williams, and everything his fastball would allow.

“I threw him all fastballs except for one,” Williams said. “At 1-2, I threw him a slider, up and in and exactly where I wanted it. It should have struck him out, but he fouled it back. That’s the best pitch I’ve got, and he fouled it off.”

The next pitch was the fastball, and Clark lined it over second base, the perfect end to a near-perfect series.

“I was talking to Mitch (Kevin Mitchell) in the on-deck circle, and he said, “You remember this guy,’ ” Clark said. “I said, “I do,’ and Mitch said, “Go get it done,’ and I said, “It’s done.’ “

It was Clark’s third hit of the game – the team had just four – and his 13th of the postseason, in 20 at-bats. They were his seventh and eighth RBIs of the series, one short of the N.L. Championship Series record held by teammate Matt Williams. It was the hit of the season, one that Clark greatly merited as the series’ most valuable player.

But not quite the end, because the Cubs didn’t exactly go away. Steve Bedrosian, who replaced Reuschel, nearly pitched the Giants back into trouble because of successive singles by pinch-hitter Curtis Wilkerson, Mitch Webster and Walton, the last of which made it 3-2.

“My arm’s hangin’, man,” said Bedrosian, who gained his third consecutive save in his fourth consecutive appearance. “My fastball didn’t have a lot of giddy-up on it, so when Sandberg came up, I had to change up there. I’d just thrown 10 fastballs in a row, and you can’t do that.”

With the tables neatly turned and Sandberg, who had a moderately spectacular series himself, at the plate, Craig went to the mound to ask Bedrosian what he wanted to do.

“It wasn’t what he said, but the way he said it,” Craig said. “He said, “I want this guy.’ A lot of guys tell you that, but sometimes you can tell what they really want is to be the hell out of there.”

It took one pitch. Sandberg, who hit an even .400 in the series, sent a modest grounder to Thompson, who backed up a bit to make sure he got a proper hop and threw to Clark for the final out, at 2:54 p.m.”

The south has had reasonable weather for lambing and calving.

Even after last weekend’s cold snap there haven’t been reports of many stock losses.

It’s been much tougher in the Central North Island.

“This brutally cold southerly flow couldn’t have come at a worse time for Hawke’s Bay farmers. There’s a massive risk that the combination of snow and cold winds could put stress on newborn livestock,” says Kevin Mitchell, Federated Farmers Hawke’s Bay president.

“Several Hawke’s Bay farmers are in the middle of late lambing and sadly, some newborns may perish in the freezing conditions. The snow has unfortunately hit at a critical time in the farming cycle. Farmers I have spoken to worked through the night in order to save as many lambs as possible.

This unseasonal snow comes after a very dry autumn and in the face of falling prices.

Lambs which would have sold for $90 last summer are expected to fetch only $70 this year. Demand is high and supplies are low, but the high dollar is being blamed for depressing returns to farmers.

Kevin Mitchell’s article in The Observer (http://preview.tinyurl.com/nnf94l) on Sunday paints a familiar picture of crickets county championship. The picture tag screams ‘remaining on empty. A rare spectator behind banks of unneeded seating’, the text talks of the championship existing in a kind of nostalgic limbo, the ‘near forgotten bedrock of the game’.

I’ve been to three county cricket matches this year – at Guildford, Headingley and Scarborough. Each time there was healthy crowds (see video below and entry for Aug 19). But I’ve also ‘virtually’ been at many, many more games this year.

Web 2.0 technologies has revolutionised the way I follow county cricket. At some clubs I can watch daily highlights (Sussex and Surrey for example), I can listen to commentary through BBC online, I can keep up to date with cricinfo and I can have my say through various message boards (eg http://whiteroseforum.co.uk/).

The more web 2.0 throws at me – the more engaged I get and the more I use. This year for the first time since my youth I took out membership of the county club I follow (Yorkshire) in no small part due to the fact that from a distant county I can still feel thoroughly engaged and part of something.

So in addition to the ‘rare spectator’ that the article refers to – you might also count the thousands (?) listening, watching and commenting online from all around the world. It’s a very different experience to being there – but its also unique and communal. The message board footprint leaves a unique, sometimes painful accounts of the game moment by moment (for an example just check out the Yorkshire and Sussex message boards during their recent fixture).

Only these people don’t pay the £15-20 admission fee. Which poses a key question – how can you monitise this engagement – or indeed should you?

James Murdoch’s attack on the BBC recently in his MacTaggert lecture is actually quite pertinant here. One he argues ‘we can’t sustain free’ – and all this coverage costs money in real terms. Its interesting to compare Surrey TV with Yorkshire CCC TV here. Surrey TV is effectively edited by the BBC commentator and sports journalist Mark Church using the footage recorded by the club analyist. It succeeds because a) its utilising what Surrey and BBC London were already doing but using it in a different way, b) Church is a professional journalist paid to be there by the BBC and c) it relies on the passion, energy and commitment of the journalist being prepared to do more for (presumably) same money. Yorkshire CCC TV is run by the club itself – and their equally enthusiastic and digitally savy (see the online version of Yorkshire Cricket Monthly for example) marketing manager James Buttler. So far so good. But James has a massive job marketing the club and everything else – and as yet Yorkshire CCC TV is not a priority. So the results are patchy and infrequent – and all the material is specially recorded (so not used for other purposes – Church’s post game interviews are frequently used by BBC London). Likewise with local media in steep decline and the BBC under continued pressure (Ben Bradshaw the culture secretary calling for a ’smaller BBC’) the regular presence of at game journalists to carry out commentary et al might come under threat. In otherwords without enthusiastic individuals like Church and Dave Callaghan in Yorkshire, the commitment of the BBC or county clubs prioritising their online ‘adventuring’ – the current utopia might not last.

So if we assume these online audiences are valuable and worth nuturing how do you make it sustainable, even dare I say it, pay. Murdoch argued that commercial partners can’t keep up with the BEEB. Talking in cricket terms the most valuable (and therefore sell able thing) is arguably the online commentary. This is delivered by the BEEB so will – as long as it runs – always be free. As Sussex TV found out when they originally put their TV channel behind a pay wall – users simply said oh we’re happy enough with our free commentary and message board (although I suspect a micro payment system would have worked – I’d have happily paid a small per watch fee to see Yorks v Sussex but would baulk at a monthly fee).

So where to go? It actually strikes me the value of this online community is the levels of engagement of that fan base. Maverick, opinionated certainly – but also engaged, enthusiastic, committed and in the main well organised. In the not so distant future I could see those communities mobilising to fill the gaps.

In this age of the citizen journalist (and with equipment and technology costs dropping) its not hard to imagine members of online communities at the game recording their own highlight packages and providing text based commentary – via twitter, message boards and other means . Text based commentary is already happening a little on message boards from people on the ground with web enabled phones (phones which tend to have died by the final session!). Its also not hard to see those same online communities raising funds by setting up a two tier membership (free and fee paying) with the ‘enhanced membership’ paying for a young player of the year award, sponsoring a match ball or even hiring a corporate box for a members do or get together.

The question for the clubs themselves is how much they might engage with these (or other) initiatives – or to put it another way how out of the way they go to encourage and enable them. Might a club provide a fan media suite? Provide storage (or even provide itself) the equipment required? Allow access to players and coaching staff for post match interviews? Even simple things like providing a wireless enabled area, power sockets, fan press accreditation and permission for a fixed camera might go along way.

The benefit, surely, to them is the potential ‘eye balls’ (Yorkshire CCC recently celebrated there busiest ever web year – and that with a far from perfect site). More eye balls becomes more attractive to sponsors, advertisers and even greater opportunities to get messages out to a dedicated following. Ironically – unpolished, journalistically naieve content from knowledgable, passionate fans (and a different voice each day) might be very addictive. You might even see a situation where – in a partnership agreement – fan created content was handed over to the club to host with the club having the ability to place adverts around the content and even potentially a micro payment model (free to enhanced members of the message board of course!).

Its certainly too simplistic to say the more content = the more opportunities to engage with the club = more loyalty and interest = potential memberships and attendances. But there must be others like me…

Not really an example as my simple flip camera can only really catch atmosphere at games – but heres a sample of a video from Yorkshire v Warwickshire at Scarborough (and at the very least proof that spectators aren’t necessarily all that rare – http://blip.tv/file/2636277)

Since things have been getting a little more personal around here lately, I have some news I just had to share with you.

I saw Eskimo Joe in concert last night!  They were awesome, as I expected, and played a bit of their old stuff mixed in with tracks of their new Album “Inshalla”.  I am sure it was as different for them playing at a sit-down venue as it was for us to stay sitting down – and,  most didn’t. 

The Joe

Supporting them was Bob Evans (Kevin Mitchell), who I REALLY enjoyed live and would have enjoyed him a lot more thoroughly if he’d only asked thought he was very talented.

After the show (and before the Joe came on) he was signing autographs – and since I was wearing a Splendour in the Grass t-shirt, I asked him to sign that for me.

Me: Would you do me a favour?  I’d love it if you’d sign my t-shirt…

Kevin Mitchell:  Sure, where would you like me to sign?

Me: On my cock.  Thanks!

 He laughed and tried not to make eye contact, but deep down I think he really wanted me to leave.

That’s right.  I basically asked Kevin Mitchell to sign my cock.  And now I can cross one more thing off my list of ‘Things to do before I die’.  Awesome.

Eskimo Joe and Bob Evans live

Is it just us over here at The Erich and Joe Fantasy Show or does baseball have the weirdest injuries in sports?

Tuesday, ESPN reported that Kyle Farnsworth received 4 stitches after being bitten by one of his bulldogs. While the bite didn’t cause a full blown injury it did remind us of some of the weirdest injuries baseball has seen. Some of our favorites are:

• Clint Barmes broke his collarbone hauling deer meat and falling down.
• Kevin Mitchell strained a muscle throwing up.
• Sammy Sosa sneezed which caused back spasms.
• Marty Cordova burned his face while at a tanning salon.
• Jeff Kent broke his wrist after he fell washing his truck.

While some of these injuries were major and long-standing, some were more hilarious than fantasy worthy. Sammy Sosa and Jeff Kent sustained injuries that were impactful because they were major stars in the prime of their careers.

Have you ever had a weird injury impact a significant player on your team? Share your rants with us.

Mitch wasn’t quite a one-year wonder, but at this point it seems like he was, and yes, it was a wonderful 1989 season. Read some of the Chronicle’s game story for a 7-6 win over the Braves in Fulton County Stadium on June 2:

Kevin Mitchell hit the longest ball of the evening, but the biggest run of the Giants’ 7-6 win over Atlanta last night came off a walk.

On a night when balls and fielders were pounding the outfield walls of Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium, it was Ernest Riles’ bases-loaded walk in the top of the ninth that ended up scoring the deciding run in a game that Mitchell seemed to have guaranteed and the Giant bullpen seemed hellbent to return.

Mitchell hit two homers – one coming within 10 feet of being only the 10th ball ever to clear the first deck of the stadium – to steal the show from Rick Reuschel, who won his 10th game of the year; Robby Thompson, who homered and doubled to improve his average to .282, and Riles.

Mitchell doesn’t mess with ground balls. He aims for the stratosphere, sometimes pushing the envelope a bit. His second homer, which followed [Robby] Thompson’s sixth homer of the season and fourth in 11 games, was an enormous thing, one which bounced off the bottom of the auxiliary scoreboard in left and soberly was estimated at 440 feet.

“”That wasn’t my longest,” Mitchell said. “”Nothing was as long as the one I hit against Fernando (Valenzuela on April 12). His (pitch) was a fastball. This was a changeup.”

He did allow, though, that it might have been the longest home run he ever hit off a changeup. The victim was Tom Glavine, who was pounded for six runs in four-plus innings.

“”I love hitting here,” Mitchell raved. “”The ball really carries here. You don’t have to be a strong man to hit a ball out of this yard. If you don’t get out of here with 20 homers a year, you’re not going to hit 20 in any park.”

Mitchell’s season total currently stands at 17, with 51 RBIs.

Idag avgörs huruvida Anderas Stenlings säsong är över eller ej. Om så är fallet kommer klubben att förstärka. Allt enligt vk.se. Källor till Löven-bloggaren uppger att det kan handla om Danska Herlevs  svenske back  Martin Thelander, med förflutet i både Färjestad och Södertälje. Själv skulle jag gärna se exempelvis lönmedumpande Ljubljanas  Kevin Mitchell eller drömmen Pasi Petriläinen. Nu handlar allt till syvene och sist om pengar, vilket fortsättningsvis verkar vara en bristvara i Björkarnas stads stolta lag. Vi får nog nöja oss med Thelander och det kanske inte är helt fel ändå. I ärlighetens namn ska vi nog säja att Löven av idag inte är en spelares drömklubb och att vi tyvärr får nöja oss med vad vi får. Inte riktigt “Top Of The Line”, men där ligger den krassa sanningen.

Sometimes the elements are more amusing than the compound. Ladies & Gentlemen: Kevin Mitchell.

1. Kevin Mitchell was shot three times as a teenager.
2. Kevin Mitchell allegedly engaged in a fistfight with future teammate and fellow ill-behaved novelty and MLB all-star Darryl Strawberry in the weeks following the two players being drafted by the New York Mets.
3. While hanging out with that other famous talented Met/degenerate drug user, Dwight Gooden, Kevin Mitchell apparently used a steak knife to decapitate his girlfriend’s pet cat.
4. Kevin Mitchell has never worn a cup, claiming, “I couldn’t find one big enough for my junk.”
5. The Bare-Handed Catch*
6. Kevin Mitchell is apparently the only MVP-winner to have played for eight different MLB teams.
7. Kevin Mitchell once broke a tooth while attempting to eat a frozen doughnut.
8. Kevin Mitchell may be the most underrated hitter of all time.
9. Kevin Mitchell loves Rake Blog.**

• Fuck Major League Baseball for monopolizing videos of people playing baseball, and hence, making a clip of this fantastically novel moment all but impossible to locate.
• *Probably not true.

By all accounts, Kevin Mitchell had all of the tools to become a baseball superstar.  Mitchell started his career as a New York Met and ended his rookie season batting .277 with 12 home runs and 43 RBI.  This was enough to finish in 3rd place for the league’s Rookie of the Year award and Mitchell had started to become a star in NY.

In his 5th full season, as a member of the San Francisco Giants, Mitchell displayed his offensive dominance and won the league’s Most Valuable Player award.  Mitchell hit 47 home runs, drove in 125 runs, and batted .291.  Beating out players like Ryne Sandberg and teammate Will Clark elevated Mitchell’s status as one of the game’s greatest players during the late 1980’s. 

Mitchell followed up his MVP season with another solid season in San Francisco and then things started to turn against him.  Mitchell had averaged a respectable 132 games per season over the course of his first 6 years in the big leagues.  Soon after, injury caught up to him and he was only able to average 70 games per year over his last 6 seasons in the majors.

Despite playing in less than 1/2 of his team’s games during the 2nd half of his career, Mitchell still put up impressive numbers.  In 95 games in 1994 with the Reds, Kevin hit .326 while blasting 30 home runs with 77 RBI.  This was good enough to garner enough votes to finish 9th in the MVP race and he missed close to half of the season.

This really makes me wonder how impressive Mitchell’s stats would be if he had played in 80% of his team’s games.  At the end of his career, Mitchell finished with a .284 batting average and hit 234 home runs with 760 RBI.  His numbers could have been much closer to the .300/350/1000 totals in my opinion.

I recently interviewed Mike Pagliarulo, starting third baseman for the Yankees from 1985 to mid-1989. The interview was primarily prompted by this picture on the front page of the San Francisco Chronicle of him and Rickey Henderson embracing after hearing of Rickey’s trade to the A’s:

I talked with Mike about his response to learning that news, what he thought of the A’s teams of 1988 and 1989, and also his memories of playing against the Giants later in 1989, after he’d been traded to the Padres in July.

Q: To start off, I figured I’d ask if you remember the near-perfect game the A’s threw against the Yankees on May 26 in New York?
A: No, I don’t. What was that?

Q: The one guy to get on was Rickey Henderson, on an infield single, and then the very next hitter, Steve Sax maybe, hit into a double play. That was the only runner of the game.
A: Huh. That’s funny, I don’t know that game at all. We had an injury, someone-Winfield-was out with a bad back in 1989. That year my elbow was a mess. I tried to play, but it wasn’t fully recovered.

Q: What was your response when you learned of Rickey Henderson’s trade to the A’s?
A: In New York, we had all come up with each other in the Yankees’ tremendous minor league system. Played on the same teams, winning teams. And some guys from the organization, they had played with Rickey for 5 years. He was one of the guys, a great teammate, a phenomenal athlete, so it was hard to see people like him go.

Q: I was reading through some articles from the time, where the Yankees management was saying that Rickey’s legs were going, he wasn’t that great a player anymore. He’d been struggling a bit with the Yankees, but did you guys have any sense of him running down?
A: No, I wouldn’t say he was running down. When you play with a good teammate, you never want to see them go, whether they’re going well or not. You rely on each other day and day out, so you never expect someone to be traded. You never think in those terms. Rickey was a real impact player, he helped the whole lineup.

Baseball is the ultimate team game, your teammates affect how you play offense and defense, what kind of pitches you get to hit-look at the Red Sox this year, J.D. Drew batting ahead of Manny Ramirez, and how well he did. There are so many variables, it’s hard to say which one it is that impacts whether you do well.

Q: What was your impression of Greg Cadaret and Eric Plunk? Because when I went through those articles about the trade I saw Cadaret saying that at least in New York he’d still be able to talk about hunting and fishing with Plunk in the bullpen. Were they out of place in the Bronx?
A: [laughs] Well, some players don’t feel very comfortable in New York. It can be a rude awakening for some players, they’re out of place. Some, they adapt, but I was always real comfortable there, didn’t have to get used to New York.

Q: What, for you, were the biggest reasons why the A’s were so good in ’88 and ’89?
A: The A’s, they had those two big guys (McGwire and Canseco) coming up. I was talking to La Russa one day not long after he got hired by the A’s. When was that, 1986 or so? (It was.) And he had a pretty good plan for what to do with the team. They had Ron Hassey, a good friend and teammate with the Yankees.

On the A’s, everyone knew their role, what their job was, and that’s a compliment to La Russa. He ran a pretty tight ship, everyone had a place they fit into, and there was a really good mix of young and old players. Every good team I’ve been on has had that characteristic. It’s a prerequisite for winning. And they had really good coaches.

Lansford, he was a steady, steady, steady player, a real tough out. Stewart, I don’t remember how I did against. But like he was like Clemens: the ultimate challenge for a hitter. You want that so much-that challenge, and the great ones, they’re great challenges. The A’s were very prepared, they always gave their best game.

In ‘89, we had a coach, Dallas Green, we went outside the organization to get him, and people said, “this guy’s not a Yankee”-he wasn’t Billy (Martin) or Pinella or Yogi Berra. So it was different: he had some trouble adjusting, it wasn’t easy there.

Q: And then you got traded to the Padres not long after Rickey went to Oakland. What did you remember from playing against the Giants late that year? You guys in San Diego were running right alongside the Giants for the division title.
A: I remember Matt Williams having a great year, and that guy in left field, Mitchell, just everything they had (offensively). You’d look up and boom! there’s the ball flying out of the yard. The Padres had a tremendous team, one of the most talented sets of players I’ve seen. We had Jack Clark, Bip Roberts, Alomar, Santiago, Gwynn, but we were missing one pitcher.

GateHouse — See, the problem with this now is that I have to watch. The problem is that I have to organize myself so I’m in front of TVs, I have to get nervous on game day, I have to pretend like the last bunch of times never happened. I have to care, I have to get invested.

Over the next few weeks, I have to shed again the multilayered brickwork of psychological defense that I’ve carefully constructed over years and years — not out of enjoyment, but in the interest of sheer survival.

And the final problem is that I have to line up for the proverbial beating in whatever bizarre, nonsensical, “Inferno”-worthy punch in the important parts is coming that will knock the Cubs out of the postseason this year.

Something is bound to go terribly, terribly wrong, and obviously I’m not talking about a subpar pitching performance or two, or the absence of some clutch hitting. I’m thinking, like, in the fourth inning of Game 2, with the Cubs up 4-1 on the Mets, a comet will hurtle out of the sky and land directly atop of Derrek Lee. Or that shortly after the seventh-inning stretch in Game 1, a brontosaurus will crash through left field, consuming Alfonso Soriano and proving once and for all that brontosauruses were not herbivores. (I’ve also got a few theories involving evildoers from the future traveling back through time, but we’ll save those for a follow-up column. I’m starting to wear myself out here.)

Listen, no one’s happier than me that the Cubs are in the playoffs, but I’ll be completely honest: Part of me was hoping for some grand, Roman god-worthy unprecedented September implosion, for the very simple reason that then I wouldn’t have to go through this again. And don’t give me that blank check about hope and faith; I saw 2003 and 1984, the latter of which made me wonder, at the tender age of 9, what kind of god would be so cruel as to create a Steve Garvey.

But the weirdest part of all this is going in as some degree of a favorite. I don’t think I’ve ever been a fan of a team that’s been favored to do anything, except hold really nice off-season fundraisers. I know I’ve never been part of a team favored to do anything (I can fully remember my Dad once telling me, before I stepped in to face one of the most feared pitchers in all of my fifth-grade Little League, “Just stand in there and try to get a walk.” Striving for athletic excellence, as you can see, has been a deep part of my identify for quite some time.)

So here I sit, nursing a delicious beer on a lovely evening with an odd sense of melancholy, wishing that I wouldn’t have to make the decision to follow the Cubs in the playoffs this year.

It’s all lined up: No one’s hurt, Eddie Vedder has written an Irish pub chantey for us, and that nice, even 100-year anniversary is looming over everything Cubs like a ghastly, shapeless beast ready to be destroyed in mathematically pleasing fashion.

But if Cubs fans know anything, it’s that the future can be changed by alarmingly trivial things — reaching out your hand, putting a glove down on the first-base dirt at the wrong second, pitching to Kevin Mitchell — so guys, please, if you’re reading, please do it this year, because if you hurt me again I may not be able to love anymore.

Name: Kevin Mitchell

Position: OF

Team: San Francisco Giants

Age: 46 years old

Best Season: 1989 when he hit 0.291/47/125 and he won the MVP that year over Will Clark, Pedro Guerrero, and Ryne Sandberg..

Set it’s from: 2005 Upper Deck Classics

How obtained: eBay auction

Why this Card?: He was Bondsian, before Bonds was knocking 40 out of the park, except he was nice.  I just wish his skill set would have lasted more then 5 years (1987 – 1991).  It was one of the worst trades the Mets ever made, trading him, Kevin Brown, Shawn Abner, and Stan Jefferson for essentially Kevin McReynolds.  He was still one of my favorite guys to watch.  Plus he was always so nice to the public.  I remember going to several Mets games and him being so nice and chatting with the fans.

But What About the Set?: 2005 Upper Deck Classics was such a fantastic set.  Lots of old school players, autographs, relic cards, cut signature cards, and dual signatures cards.  The configuration is 28 packs a box, 1 autograph and 2 relic cards per box, 1 dual signature card and 1 dual relic per case, and 1 cut signature in every other case.  Not too bad considering that the box runs about $43.

Beckett’s Value: $10.00

eBay Value: I got it for $0.99

Baseball players are frequent visitors to the disabled list, but these bizarre ailments will really get you saying, “What the…?”.

1. Hunter Pence gets into a collision.

We’ve mostly all had the displeasure of sitting next to a glass window and experiencing what happens when a bird doesn’t realize that that there is a clear shield that it is about to slam into. In most cases, the bird gets up slightly startled and a bit off balance and we have a good chuckle to ourselves; but what happens when the victim is a human being that has had one too many alcoholic beverages. I’d say it’s just as comical. A little more surprising and worrisome, but just as comical nonetheless. Hunter Pence has a promising future with the Houston Astros, but strangely missed the first week of spring training this year due to his drunken mishap of shattering a sliding glass door with his body on the way to the hot tub. Apparently the owner of the door used Windex to clean it and fooled Hunter.

Hunter Pence is now deathly afraid of glass doors

2. John Smoltz getting the wrinkles out.

This one is said to only be an urban legend, but if that first guy is dumb enough to go through a sliding glass door, anything’s possible. John Smoltz may often be talked about as being one of the best pitcher’s of his generation, but he may not be the sharpest tool in the shed in this instance. He is accused of attempting to iron his shirt… while he was still wearing it. Perhaps someone should have given him an instruction manual along with that iron.

Ouch

3. Adam Eaton takes a stab at it.

I know you have all gone through it. You go to your local Best Buy and purchase that brand new DVD that was just released. You’ve been waiting months for this thing to come out so you can watch it and you won’t let anything get between you and your film… except that damn wrapper it is engulfed in, not to mention the 50 damn security stickers it is bound by. What to do next? How to we free this long awaited DVD? Use your teeth, perhaps a set of keys, or maybe a knife? Adam Eaton, a recent September call up for the Philadelphia Phillies, opted for the latter and found out the hard way that it was a horrible choice when he accidentally stabbed himself in the stomach while attempting to unwrap a DVD.

He makes funny signals and stabs himself. What a player.

4. Sammy Sosa clears his sinuses.

Slugger Sammy Sosa is most famously known for his long ball, but after this incident he is now known for clearing his sinuses, while inducing back spasms. Instead of Sosa playing on the field with teammates, he sat out the game in the clubhouse receiving back treatment. I guess his sneeze is worse than his killer swing!

Attempting not to sneeze

5. Wade Boggs loves himself some boots!

Hall of Famer, Wade Boggs, is widely known for being part of the 3,000 hit club and for being punched out by Barnie on an episode of the Simpsons, but he is now also known for straining his back while slipping on a pair of cowboy boots. “What in the…?” The injury kept Boggs out the line up for seven games.

THAT's what the cowboy boots were for!!

6.  Steve Sparks must’ve really needed that number!

While attending a motivational speech held by the Brewers, the former pitcher watched as the group ripped phone books in half and blew up hot water bottles. Sparks was apparently both moved and fired up by the session and so he decided to have at it and attempted to tear up his own phone book. Sadly, the book had at him and Sparks dislocated his shoulder while attempting to perform the stunt.

If you don't look capable of shredding a phone book, you probably shouldn't try it.

7. Kevin Mitchell can’t get enough sweets!

The former slugger has had his share of strange food related injuries. In one instance he was placed on the DL for straining rib muscles while vomiting due to food poisoning. My favorite, however, was when he showed up 4 days late to spring training in 1990 while he was injured eating a microwaved donut. Soon after giving into his sweet craving, Mitchell needed a root canal.

He may look invincible, but just give him a donut and he'll weaken. Just keep him away from your cat.

8. Bret Barberie spices up his life.

Former Marlins had difficulty securing a steady gig in the Major Leagues, but this incident landed him in the MLB’s Bizarre Injuries HOF. He once missed a game while inadvertently rubbing chili juice in his eyes. Bret, napkins were invented for a reason.

He must've been blinded by sauce when growing out his mullet.

9. Glenallen Hill has nightmares.

Nightmares can induce emotional and psychological stress. Unfortunately for the former outfielder, it also brought on a bit of physical stress as well. Hill tumbled out of his bed one night while having a nightmare that he was being covered in spiders. Sadly, the only thing there to break his fall was a glass table. Guessing he didn’t catch Spiderman?

This photo was taken during Hill's dream... pre glass table.

10. Jeff Kent likes to wash his truck.

Jeff Kent likes to keep things casual by washing his truck. Unfortunately he slipped while bathing his pick up at an Arizona self wash and injured his wrist while attempting to break his fall. No one bought that story, so he later admitted that he got the injury while attempting motorcycle tricks in a parking lot. I wonder why he lied?

Jeff Kent washing his truck.