Why my life is worse today because of the Giants win

Two quick points today to wrap up the Super Bowl postmortem. They both relate to how the New York win last night will impact my life in the short- and medium-term.

First, the big reason I didn't go off the deep end two weeks ago when Green Bay fell apart at home and let the Giants escape with a field goal in overtime was because I assumed that the winner of the NFC game just won the "get your ass kicked by the Patriots" medal.

So much for that.

(Did we ever get a solid reason for why Green Bay didn't want to rush the ball in subzero temperatures and insisted on trying to force the passing game? Aside from the Giants' front four, what was the reasoning behind keeping the ball out of Ryan Grant's hands? The Packers do realize that in the span of a dozen years the team has gone from winning a Super Bowl to losing home playoff games to Michael Vick and Eli Manning, right? Mike Holmgren must be rolling in his grave.)

In addition to not enjoying seeing the Giants win, I got a delayed suckerpunch from seeing New York pull out the win against the unbeatable Pats. I'm just saying that it could have been Green Bay. That was something I never even considered as a possibility.

I think that's why I'm still shocked at the upset.

Secondly, this is going to be an annoyance for me of epic proportions as the Red Sox season ramps up in two weeks. Whether it's on the surface or not, the subtext for Patriots fans who will probably just stay drunk until pitchers and catchers report in a few weeks (can't really blame them) will be that the Red Sox need to pick up where the Pats left off.

This has happened before as both teams have put together handsome post-season resumes. This year will be much worse.

Most baseball fans will just be able to enjoy the usual Boston freak outs, so remember this in May when people are screaming and acting irrationally on message boards because the Sox got off to a slow start.

It's going to make for a very long summer with meatheads blowing every stupid loss out of proportion for three to five months.

Thanks for nothing, least of the Mannings.

(Image from: SportsByBrooks.com)

The waiting is the hardest part

I have seen the Holy Grail

I've touched on this before - you can see that post here - but today when The Girl and I went back to St. Cloud to pick up a few packs of baseball cards, I saw it sitting right there in the case.

Yes, friends, I've come within inches of the wonderful mistake that is the Billy Ripken Fleer card.

"Ooooh, honey, loooook!" I said quite loudly in the shop. "It's the fuck face card!"

Tonight I'm kicking myself for not plunking down the 20 bucks to make it my own.

Instead, I pulled the Derek Jeter screwball card that has Mickey Mantle and George W. Bush in the background. It's not worth a fortune, but quite a few stupid people have payed upwards of $300 for it.

I was thinking about my dad's reaction when I was younger, collecting hockey cards and sorting them by prices I pulled from the Beckett guide. The top-end cards were maybe a few dollars with the others were 30 or 40 cents.

I saw my little collection go from the $50 bucks I'd paid for it to well over $75 when all was said and done.

"Well, you just need to find someone dumb enough to pay that much for them," he told me. Instead of a great father/son moment about the pure joy of sport and how hobbies should be judged on their intrinsic value, I got a nice wake up call to a little something called the free market.

So, without much thought, I think I'm going to take Jeter and friends, put it into the binder with the rest of the cards and leave it there, only to be seen every few months when I go through the collection or pull this baby out at parties, when someone refuses to believe that card exists.

If I get two, though? I'm totally eBay-ing that shit.

(Image from SportsHollywood.com)

Simple pleasures

The weather is cold.

The job is not so much fun.

Overall, it's pretty day to day here in Siberia - but there's hope, campers.

It's Truck Day.

For the socially adept who have better things to follow with their precious moments here on Earth, Truck Day is the day in each major league city when moving trucks line up outside of the respective ballparks and bats, bags and uniforms are loaded in for the trek down to spring training.

I'm almost certain that these are the same photos from last year, but who cares - this means that baseball is just around the corner again.

I know that I've said it before and I'll more than likely say it again, but it's the little things like these that bring a ray of sunshine into my life. Baseball makes things more fun and spring training means baseball is almost here.

Truck Day? Just another step in the dance. After the hot stove talks and the flurry of signings comes Truck Day, then pitchers and catchers and then our yearly trip.

I just hope the Cubs remembered to pack a closer this year.

(Image from Boston.com via BostonDirtDogs.com)

What bad, bad news

As if my ongoing struggles to outsmart the Comcast DVR in the bedroom weren't enough heartbreak on the cable television front, now there's this news from Deadspin.

Major League Baseball sold the rights to its games to Direct TV for the next seven years.

Those sons of bitches.

I know they can't just give the money back, but honestly, this has taken away one of the few things I really enjoy in this world. Being able to watch Cubs and Red Sox baseball all summer, in addition to the literally hundreds of other games was one of life's little pleasures and it's gone now.

No more watching most of the Opening Day games, no more following the Red Sox daily and back to the dark ages of bookmarking the Cubs schedule on WGN's Superstation, which is only really good for a quarter of the televised games anyways.

I know that it can sound like I'm playing this for laughs, but this is seriously a major shock to my system. I am so full of anger right now that I'm seriously considering calling the Twins and telling them to take their season ticket package and shove it straight up their greedy, enabling asses.

EA Sports locking in the Madden Monopoly was a shame.

This is nothing short of a national tragedy.

Best. Idea. Ever.

Since the dawn of man, we as a people have been striving towards common goals.

The quest for fire. The invention of the wheel. Cures for diseases from polio to AIDS. The ability to both watch a baseball game and eat enough to feed a small European village for a week at one, set price.

The Dodgers have done it, ladies and gentlemen. They will be offering an all-you-can eat section for the 2007 season.

According to the Los Angeles Times:

A ticket to the right-field pavilion — at $35 in advance and $40 on game day — will entitle fans to an endless supply of ballpark staples, including hot dogs, peanuts and soda but excluding beer, which hasn't been sold in the pavilion for years. The Dodgers tested the concept several times last season.

All the hot dogs I can stomach, a ballgame at Chavez Ravine and all the hot dogs I can stomach?

Man, the only thing that could make that deal better would be some sort of deal wherein other people would bring me as many hot dogs as I could eat as long as I kept asking for them...

Hey, wait a minute...

(Image from Chump.com)

The Cubs might kill this man

Reports from Chicago are that Lou Piniella is the new manager of the Chicago Cubs and I have no idea what to do with this information.

Frank the Tank (when not watching his StatCounter tally roll over like a long-haul trucker's odometer thanks to the Deadspin love today) was on the e-mail offensive today as we went back and forth over the Cubs and their impending decision. He's saying that this is the right move for the Cubs and I think he might be right, but I was thinking maybe we'd get someone a little less... combustible.

Put it this way, it's not that hard to find a picture of Piniella going off the deep end.

Even the page I found for the picture at the right was a compilation of managers who'd gone apeshit at one point or another. Number Two? The Lee Elia tirade, still a personal favorite.

One the other hand, you'll be replacing Dusty Baker - known for being nearly comatose (not safe to be narcoleptic with a toothpick in your mouth) and a "players' manager" with Sweet Lou, who may have a blood type of gunpowder.

When you have a historically underperforming team, this just seems like a recipe for disaster.

Piniella excused himself from several positions because he's sick of being around rebuilding years with teams that faded fast. I'm really worried about the guy's physical and mental health.

He's not getting any younger and if the Cubs play the way they have - and remain subject to the obscure laws of physics and bad luck known as Cubdom - there's a very real possibility that Piniella could end up in the hospital like the manager in Major League, screaming at a television from a hospital bed.

Still, I'm feeling better already about the Cubs' prospects in 2007 (laugh all you want) because Dustyball wasn't working. While I think that a heavy hand would have been more effective with the team a few seasons ago - primarily to tell Sammy to knock off all of his silly shit - maybe it'll be the shock to the team's system and help to get things back on track for the North Siders.

My real wish is for a solid, injury-resistant arm or four to take the place of the telethon-ready rotation that's been on the opening day roster lately. Let's just hope upper management doesn't hide behind the signing of a new manager and then go dormant until pitchers and catchers report.

I'm not a proponent of "change for change's sake," but when someone isn't getting the job done, there comes a point where you have to shake things up a bit. This is a good start.

Now, excuse me while I gosay a short prayer to keep A-Rod out of the Friendly Confines.

(This posting has been re-posted from the sister site.)

Update: ESPN has the signing as official now (as of 8:30 p.m.) Thank goodness, our long national nightmare is over...

(Photo from ESPN.com)

Some things bear repeating

Months back, I wrote a pretty lengthy post about Buck O'Neil and Minnie Minoso when both were shut out from the Hall of Fame that can be found here. I still get sporadic hits on both men, looking for more information on their careers and reasons for or against induction to the Hall.

This weekend, O'Neil passed away at age 94, having fallen one vote shy for Hall of Fame induction this spring, but philosophical to the end.

"Shed no tears for Buck," he said. "I couldn't attend Sarasota High School. That hurt. I couldn't attend the University of Florida. That hurt.

"But not going into the Hall of Fame, that ain't going to hurt me that much, no. Before, I wouldn't even have a chance. But this time I had that chance.

"Just keep loving old Buck."

And people did, right to the end. While there is only one story left on ESPN.com on O'Neil - fittingly enough by Steve Wulf who wrote a touching piece on him that I quoted heavily from in the first post - people are still coming forward with their memories today.

For my small addition to the conversation, I was only around the man once, this summer at a Twins game.

O'Neil's presence pulled cheers from the fans who cheer regardless of the person holding the ball for the first pitch and as those who realized exactly the man was, a standing ovation slowly spread across the crowd.

As O'Neil went through his quick act - undoubtly replayed at ballparks across the country - where he'd wind up, shuffle a few yards closer to the dish, wind again, shuffle again and repeat until he could hand the ball to the catcher, the crowd fell in love with him.

What I'll always remember was watching him make the rounds, shaking hands, saying hello, shuffling from the infield to the right field bullpen, making his way to the elevators in the tunnel in right.

He was old, and there was no way around that fact, but he moved with grace. It was striking to see someone who was the same time that frail and that powerful. I'll just remember him beaming the whole time.

Seeing grown men, from security guards to professional ballplayers, falling all over themselves just to shake his hand, it was pretty amazing just to be in the same building as him.

I won't make too big a deal of any of this, except to say that all of the reports of him lighting up a room were true. It didn't seem to matter if he shared it with a president or if the room seated over 40,000 people. For a fan, it was hard to take your eyes off of him and I missed the first pitch that night watching him cross the field.

I toyed with the idea of running over to try and catch him in the concourse, but figured that I didn't have a shot at timing it right, but now I regret that decision.

For a man who spent so much of his golden years defending how his life lined up when it came to baseball, I'm betting he would have appreciated something like that.

If I had to take anything from the stories I've read and appearances I've seen him make, it's always amazed me how well he's taken everything in stride. Personally, I think there's a lot to be said for playing the cards you're dealt and asking for nothing more than a chance.

It's been oddly comforting to see that he'd shown some flashes of frustration or anger from time to time, but overall he kept an even keel and I find that unendingly admirable.

I can't think of better things to teach a child than to show up, do your best, not to sweat the things you can't change and not to look back on your life with anger or disappointment.

Even while those close to him refused to believe that his heart wasn't broken when the Hall left him out this year, he kept his chin up, kept visiting ballparks and was a fixture in Kansas City. Personally I think another decade of Buck O'Neil wouldn't have been enough and not for his stature as a ballplayer, but for his contributions as a human being.

I'm pretty sure Buck would insist he was right on time.

"There's nothing greater for a human being than to get his body to react to all the things one does on a ball field," O'Neil said. "It's as good as sex; it's as good as music. It fills you up. Waste no tears for me. I didn't come along too early. I was right on time."

- Buck O'Neil
1911-2006

(Photos from ESPN.com / Post-Gazette.com - Philadelphia, Pa.)

Those Martinez brothers are brutal!

Yes, it's a baseball post away from the sister site, but this was too entertaining to hide over there, so kickass story, welcome to the Mothership.

For a little background, Jeff Kent can be a bit of a pain in the ass (he had a few run-ins with Barry Bonds in San Francisco among other high-profile blowouts) but this story may trump all the others. Additionally, it makes me wonder when someone will be banned from baseball for throwing a game so their fantasy team wins its league.

It seems that Tom Candiotti, a former pitcher who is a TV guy for the Diamondbacks these days, was in a fantasy league when he was in the league and Kent wasn't on his team.

From the San Francisco Chronicle and thanks to Deadspin for putting this on everyone's radar:

"It's '92 or '93," Candiotti says. "I'm playing for the Dodgers, Jeff Kent is with the Mets. I'm in a fantasy baseball league. I don't have Kent on my team and he's off to a torrid start and he's killing me."

The Dodgers are in New York to play the Mets. Ramon Martinez is warming up in the Dodgers' bullpen to pitch the series opener. Candiotti strolls to the pen and, within earshot of Martinez, tells pitching coach Ron Perranoski, "Perry, I just talked to Bret Saberhagen, and Sabes told me that if Kent gets drilled his first time up, he's mush for the rest of the series."

First inning, Kent steps to the plate.

"Ramon just absolutely buries one in Kent's ribs," Candiotti says. "It was so bad that he went down on one knee, and he had to come out of the game. I sat there thinking, 'What did you just do? You told a complete lie, you got this guy drilled!'

"After that, it was funny. Pedro Martinez (Ramon's brother) started drilling Kent, and so did all the other Dominican pitchers. For years, Ramon drilled Kent every time."

I don't know what's funnier, the retelling of this story, the fact that we all suspected it for years or that at some dinner for the Martinez brothers, Ramon tells Petey, "Hey, drill Jeff Kent when you see him. You do that, and he's your bitch all season..."

Guess it'll carry a little more weight next time I yell from the crowd, "Hey, Underperforming major leaguer to be named later! Get your ass in gear, you're killing my fantasy team!"

Chances are, they are killing theirs as well.

(Photo from HollywoodisCalling.com)

Not the tiny, cardboard investments they once were

Over the winter I was looking for things to kill time until the job market opened up and decided if an activity couldn't be cheap, it should at least be fun. So, in what wasn't one of the more rational moves I could have made, I bought a box of baseball cards.

Actually, it ended up being two and for anyone who was 12, you know that buying 36 packs doesn't mean you'll get the full set. No, there were plenty of holes and doubles of shitty players and overall it was pretty entertaining.

However, the whole experience was kind of disorienting. I went up north to St. Cloud to a shop that had a pretty good buzz from a collector board and it lived up to the hype. The funny thing is that it's in the basement of a strip mall (Strip malls have basements? Yup, but I kept thinking of Jan Hooks' scene in Pee Wee's Big Adventure) and I was pretty sure someone was going to hit me in the head and take my wallet.

Nice folks, though and we talked about e-mail spam and baseball and I asked the lady behind the counter what she suggested in terms of a good set. The reason I needed to do this was multiple sets from the same manufacturers and all sorts of other garbage.

Apparently I'm not the only one who misses the good old days.

Back in the day there were only a few sets that mattered: Topps, Upper Deck, Donruss and Fleer. Others floating in and out, but those were the big ones. Upper Deck took over as top dog and Topps just seemed dated. Without going into too much of a song and dance about a simpler time in 1983, it was a good time to be into baseball cards.

They were cheap and available all over, but the cards with Cubs players were the only ones to matter in our neighborhood. Now, there are separate sets depending on where you buy them (Target has it's own set through Topps- learned that one the hard way).

When you add all the intra-company sets and alternates, overpriced junk that is sold as rare or with special inserts from old autographs and such and the whole thing is kind of a mess.

I was told as I was packing up my Topps set this year that there were special inserts from the Pope, Ronald Reagan and others and had to ask myself why. Aren't baseball players cool enough anymore. More shocking than anything are the prices (into the hundreds of thousands) for these cards.

The closest I came was a small piece of the jersey that Victor Martinez wore in the 2005 All-Star Game.

It looks like the bottom line is that cards are becoming too expensive for kids who are gravitating towards game cards like Pokemon and company. I say if this generation falls away from card collecting, that's just fine. It'll be cheaper when I buy them for my kids... then fight them as we tear through packs just to see who's inside them.

(Image from SportsHollywood.com)

Shut up, Sammy...

After Sammy Sosa seemingly fell off the face of the earth a year ago - at this point is anyone buying foot injuries from Sosa in the middle of a steroid witch hunt? - he's back again.

And bitching.

Oh, Sammy, we've missed you.

He's upset because someone stole his blankie... wait, no - he got left off the Hometown Hero list from MLB. As Chicagoist hit on the other day, the lists look pretty solid, with some questions on the White Sox finalists.

For the record, five people outside of the Sosa family saw the list and asked where Sammy was. One was Ronnie Woo in between incessant woo-wooing.

Two quick side notes:

* I loved a story a few months ago where some reporter tried to track down Sosa and got as far as the new folks in his old condo who still get his mail. Other than that, he'd disappeared without a trace.

* Sosa telling the steroid probe committee that he didn't speak too much English through his attorney. This isn't given enough credit for being the defining moment of the Sammy Sosa experience. Sure, it was pretty typical that he bugged out after his last game as a Cub, decided to lie about it and was sold out by Cubs security, but Smilin' Sammy clamming up and taking the "Yo no hablo English, much..." defense was pretty outstanding.

Sosa's English has improved by leaps and bounds in a few short months, speaking to the Chicago Tribune and crying about not making the final cut.

"The city of Chicago knows about baseball; I am not a bad player—no way, Jose," Sosa said with a laugh. "With all the respect for Mr. Cub, my numbers can compete with everybody. When I heard that I was not on the list, I said, 'Oh, my God.' I was shocked and surprised. The five best players? You have to calculate my numbers."

It was a hell of a ride, but to put Sosa as the top Cub of all time is a stretch.

According to the MLB.com release:

Major League Baseball (MLB) and DHL, the "Official Express Delivery and Logistics Provider" of Major League Baseball and MLB.com, today unveiled the five nominees for each of the 30 MLB Clubs for the "DHL Presents Major League Baseball Hometown Heroes" program. This multi-faceted program was created to recognize those players who most embody the legacy of Major League Baseball and each respective franchise's history.

Sosa wants us to remember the good times, the home run chase, the home run chase and the home run chase. The Cubs legacy boiling down to corked bats, checking out early and steroid suspicions? Well, actually that checking out early bit might have merit, but it's not really the Cubbie way to compete for an entire season. Drug-fueled or not.

The most wonderful day of the year

Originally uploaded by Minneapolis Red Sox.

I'll try to keep the over the top musings to a minimum... at least until after the first few games Monday.

I will say this, no other day brings so much promise than Opening Day. Thanks to 162 games and months and months of play, I can honestly say that every team that takes the field tomorrow has a chance to make the World Series.

Some chances are better than others and some teams' margin for error is so thing that a week of losses off the bat takes them out of the running, but when the teams take the field tomorrow afternoon and evening every fan can honestly say that their team has a shot at the pennant.

Enjoy that while it lasts, Kansas City.

Barry Bonds is one sick bastard

I promise that this isn't going to become your one-stop shop for all things Barry Bonds.

The fact that I've made two Bonds posts in a month is really pretty shocking to me, considering my lack of respect or compassion for him, but how are you going to ignore what's going on the past few days?

When I first started seeing stories about the Bonds' steroid abuse... well, when I first started seeing the stories this week with regards to the Sports Illustrated reprint of the pending book, I e-mailed Frank the Tank asking exactly what Bonds had to do in order to receive any sort of discipline from the league.

Frank wrote back drawing parallels between the Black Sox scandal and this - citing a need to make an example of Bonds to clear baseball's name for the public and I tend to agree.

Despite reports to the contrary, ESPN has posted copies of the league manifest from 1991, outlining the league's decidedly non-friendly stance on their use.

Gene Wojciechowski hit the nail on the head in his column from earlier in the week:

Bonds is finished. He might play again, but there is only a chalk outline left around his integrity and home run totals. And the only way he gets into Cooperstown is if he spends the $14.50 for a Hall of Fame admission ticket.

Winstrol. Deca-Durabolin. Insulin. Testosterone decanoate. Human growth hormones. Norbolethone. Trenbolone. Clomid.

These are the substances and steroids Bonds is alleged to have injected or ingested. They are the medicine cabinet of a cheater... Clomid is prescribed to women for infertility. Trenbolone enhances the muscle tone of cattle. Deca-Durabolin is a medication used in the treatment of kidney failure-related amnesia.

According to the accounts gathered by the San Francisco journalists, Bonds started to treat his body as a chemistry lab when he saw Mark McGwire's reception in St. Louis during the 1998 home run record chase and got jealous. Basically, he put his body, career, credibility and the franchise in jeopardy because he felt that McGwire was getting too much publicity and that it was only because he was white.

He reportedly got jealous and upset because he felt he was a better player than McGwire (whch he was) and decided to level the playing field by junking his life to prove a point.

Admittedly, this is just the kind of stupid shit that has added countless problems and complications in my own life, but this seems a bit extreme, even for my tastes. It's beyond compare, but the best I can come up with off the top of my head is feeling jealous of someone getting attention for a twisted ankle and deciding to shoot yourself in the leg to pull back your share of the spotlight.

Is it shocking that Bonds was juicing? No. Anyone (even people who never watch sports) could have come to that conclusion. What is shocking is the rationale behind it. Not to pass his godfather or try to set him apart in the pantheon of great players, it was to show up McGwire, who will likely garner as much historical respect as Roger Maris. Bonds came into the league as a coveted five-tool player with the pedigree to match and McGwire will be forever seen as a one-trick pony with a really cool trick.

Whereas McGwire will be seen as a quick flash and a few great seasons, Bonds had the possibility to be one of the greats. He essentially threw all of that away with a series of awful mistakes capped by this bitter self-destructive showing. I can't even begin to express how sick this is.

Any way you slice it, it's pretty pathetic, which seems to be where most people are coming down on the issue. They aren't angry or hurt or betrayed, they just look around and feel uncomfortable and try to find an excuse to walk away. Have you ever been around a kid who really acts up when company is over and the parents have to discipline them while you're around? You feel kinda bad because the kid was only acting out for the attention anyways and you just stare at the floor or try and watch TV or talk to your date and hope the whole thing is over soon.

Well, little Barry just lit the carpet on fire, pushed your car down the driveway into traffic and broke off a broom handle in the dog's ass. Maybe it'd be best if we just walked away and called it a night.

(11/15/07 Update: Bonds was just indicted. Also, there's this. I feel much better despite the Barry Bonds Fan Club Rally in the comments section.)

(Photo from Boston Dirt Dogs)

Minnie and Buck

While these two aging giants may have names that sound like they came from an animated movie from Pixar, sadly it's more weighty than that.

Frank the Tank weighed in on this earlier in the week, but the gist of it is that a special panel released their 17 selections to enter the Baseball Hall of Fame. This was the result of a five-year process that acted independently of the Hall of Fame selection or veterans' committees and was seen as the last best chance for many of these aging stars to make it in.

For a little background, Phil Rogers had this to say in the Chicago Tribune on Minoso:

"Not only was Minoso 28 when he got to the big leagues to stay, but before he turned 23 he played in what Burgos calls "the sugar-cane leagues" of Cuba, essentially semipro and amateur town teams. It didn't take long for him to get discovered once he got into Cuba's top leagues; he was only 26 when the Indians signed him.

"But Minoso lost more years when the Indians kept him in Triple A, apparently not wanting to risk having too many men with dark skin on the field. The 1949 team he debuted on also had [Larry] Doby, Satchel Paige and Luke Easter."

Meanwhile, O'Neil has become somewhat of an elder statesman for the Negro Leagues and their surviving players. Baseball abounds with stories about O'Neil, including the day he was working in the Florida sun with his father, the foreman in a celery field, and was caught cursing about the job they were doing.

O'Neil told Steve Wulf the story in 1994 for Sports Illustrated.

One day I was having lunch by myself next to a big stack of boxes, and it was so hot, I said out loud, "Damn, there has got to be something better than this."

It turns out my father and some of the older men were on the other side of the stack having their lunch. That night my father told me, "I heard what you said today," and I thought he was going to reprimand me for swearing, but he said, "You're right. There is something better than this. But you can't find it here. You're going to have to go out and get it."

What he went out and got was a solid career as a player(he led the league in batting average in 1946), before managing the Kansas City Monarchs from 1948 to 1955 and players ranging from Ernie Banks to Elston Howard. His story follows a long arc of baseball history, from boyhood in Florida, watching the Yankees and others in spring training to the present day. He tells a story of hearing Babe Ruth's bat for the first time and thinking it'd be the last time he'd ever hear it, but would catch snippets of its thunder for years to come that is one of the best in the lore of baseball.

When his playing days came to a close, he became the first black coach in history with the Cubs in 1962 and has grown into his current position as ambassador of the game. For anyone who hasn't seen the Ken Burns documentary on baseball, pay particular attention to O'Neil's segments. To see the 80-something-year-old's face light up when he talks about the good old days is worth putting the discs on your Netflix list.

While we're on the topic, Sports Illustrated also released a compilation of baseball stories, Sports Illustrated Great Baseball Writing that is a must-have for fans, as well. The Wulf story can be found there as well.

When I first read these stories in local papers and on national web sites, I was getting ready for a post about how it's too bad some really great guys don't make it into the Hall, but that's what makes it special and that's why induction means so much.

With a few exceptions, the players who are in the Hall of Fame deserve to be there and those left out in the cold are usually there for a reason. Midway through several of these articles and to the point that I can't remember who brought it up first, some columnist mentioned in passing that it's not the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame, it is the Baseball Hall of Fame.

Negro League players aren't inducted as visiting inductees or special inductees and for the sake of argument, if the writers would vote together, a Little League manager should be eligible for induction just like John McGraw was. In light of this (and admittedly, I haven't done a lot of research on this, aside from confirming the semantics) there's no good reason to keep either of these men out, aside from difficulty in confirming stats from minor and Negro league contests.

And while I support Frank and his push for Minoso, I have to stand by O'Neil whose overall contributions to the game should make him a lock for the Hall. If there has been a better man to stand on behalf of baseball - and all forms and leagues therein - I'd have a hard time finding him. Not to take anything from Minnie, but if I had one vote for him or Buck, it'd be a no-brainer.

In any event, neither man is on that list of 17 members, and even if they were, there'd be other discussions about who had been left off in their place. It's too bad that they weren't included, especially considering the ages of both men, but the decisions have been made.

On a positive note, both also have incredible perspective on their situations, with Minoso saying he'd settle for being in individual fans' Halls of Fame. Frank voted him in on the first ballot.

"There's nothing greater for a human being than to get his body to react to all the things one does on a ball field," O'Neil said. "It's as good as sex; it's as good as music. It fills you up. Waste no tears for me. I didn't come along too early. I was right on time."

(Photo from MLB.com/Charlie Riedel/AP)