Night Owl Cards

I'm fairly certain that I have never slid head-first in a baseball game in my entire life. When I was learning to play baseball, the head-first slide wasn't a thought. Almost nobody but Pete Rose did it back then. It wasn't taught in youth baseball or by any coaches. It was considered "hot-dogging it" by just about everyone. Obviously, that was a long time ago. Head-first sliding -- although it seems a lot more jarring and messy than feet-first sliding -- is now as common as any 100-year-old baseball activity. And it makes for very dramatic baseball cards and video highlights, meaning it's never going away. Head-first sliding means business. It gives the perception of urgency, of someone willing to do anything to get that base. But I don't know if it's any more successful than a feet-first slide. It seems like a lot of show. Imagine, if you would, Heath Bell charging in from the bullpen during the 2011 All-Star Game and instead of sliding ...

Christmas Eve greetings, all. When someone decides to blog about sports, they first must promise that they will write a post about their all-time team. It can be the "all-time best" at each position, even if that's rather pedestrian. Or it can be something less obvious. I prefer the latter. And I've already composed the All-Greg team , the All-Fish team and the All-Beer team . But it's Christmastime and any team on this festive day should be Christmas-related. So, how do you combine baseball with Christmas? They don't go together very well. Opposite seasons, you know. What to do. What to do. I thought about finding players' last names that evoke Christmas images. You know, Rob Deer and J.T. Snow and Jon Garland and Tim Mistletoe (he's a prospect you've never heard of). But that's probably been done before, possibly multiple times over the years. As I thought about it some more, I started to hear bells in the distance. Sleigh b...