Graphing Rivera

Even if you don't like baseball (and you should, it's a beautiful sport) you should go visit this graphic by the New York Times.

Mariano Rivera is a Hall-of-Fame pitcher for a reason, and this is a really clear look at why he is so good at getting hitters out. Besides the coolness of the baseball knowledge, this caught my eye because it is an interesting blend of interactive graphic and a video. It's a creative method of communicating a unique set of information.

If anybody invents a time machine and would like to take me back to teach 8 year old Jeff how to throw a cutter, that'd be great!

wednesday graphic links

I think banning books is abhorrent and counterproductive - when I see the yearly list of "most banned books" or whatever, I immediately want to read them. To Kill A Mockingbird is an American - a world - classic. I would feel sick writing a letter asking to ban it.

If your worldview can't handle a children's book about two boy penguins raising a baby penguin, it is not the book that has the problem. Anyway, Good has produced yet another quality transparency showing the 10 most-challenged books of 2009. I don't actually like this graphic as much as I like most of their work; my main complaint is that the colors chosen to represent the different challenges don't readily correspond to the reason for the challenge. I don't know that I have a better way to do it. There are twelve listed reasons that people challenged books, ranging from offensive language to violence to suicide to age-unsuitability. Twelve categories are a lot to differentiate just using color.

Speaking of color, Randall Munroe (of nerdy webcomic XKCD) just concluded a color survey. Basically, takers of the survey would enter information about their computer monitor and their 23rd chromosome and then start to describe the colors of squares that would appear on their screen. The results are in, and some of his conclusions are pretty interesting. Not surprisingly, people get mighty tired of describing colors after twenty squares or so. The descent into madness seems to start to occur after the 3rd consecutive square of 'green.'

On a more somber note, legendary Detroit Tigers announcer Ernie Harwell passed away today. You can find more eloquent and personal stories about him from guys like Rob Neyer, Joe Posnanski, and Craig Calcaterra. I will merely link to a timely graphic from Wezen-ball. I saw this last week when Bob Uecker had his heart surgery, but it works today as well.

April 25th, Cubs v. Brewers

Last Sunday, I went to Miller Park with Calli's family for a Cubs/Brewers game. The Cubs won 12-2 behind 4 home runs and a strong pitching performance by Randy Wells, so I had zero complaints about the day.

The seats were pretty nice, as well - we were in the 20th row behind home plate. If home was the center of a clock, I'd guess were at about 7 o'clock...so certainly no complaints there.

One upsetting aspect of the game was this bizarre human sacrifice they conducted before the game:

Fielder, before he consumes his prey.

Maybe I misinterpreted this, but I'm pretty sure it was some sort of combination of Bull Durham baseball voodoo and Fielder's insatiable appetite (vegetarians can eat small humans? Is that right?).

Other things I saw:

Real baseball teams don't have cheerleaders. Then again, they don't let mustachioed giant-men go down slides after homeruns. Real baseball teams let plants grow on their ballpark's walls.

Shameless. I don't want to vote for the All-Star Game anyway.

Addendum: Real baseball teams don't beg for all-star votes on their field.

No.

I hope Kendra politely declined.

All in all, it was a delightful game. I had a blast, and am glad I got to tag along. The Cubs have a 1-0 record when I'm in attendance in 2010; they should start requiring my presence.




What's that? Coincidence? Schmall shmample shmize, I say to you. Get out.

The Answer to the Ultimate Question...

42, besides being the key to life, was also Jackie Robinson's number. Today is Jackie Robinson Day for Major League Baseball, where every player wears the number 42. Normally, the only player to wear 42 is Mariano Rivera - and he will be the last to do so. MLB retired #42 in 1997, and Rivera is the last active player who was wearing 42 at that time.

Flip Flop Fly Ball put together a cool graphic in commemoration of today, showing the last player on each team to wear #42. Go check it out - and also Go Cubs!

The Right Foot

At 2:00ish CST today, the Cubs played their first spring training game of 2010. While I'm a little guarded in my expectations for the '10 club (their best chance for postseason success came in '07 and '08, and we all know how that played out. Sadly.), they started it off well. Derrek Lee hit a solo home run in the bottom of the first inning off Trevor Cahill, and I stopped paying attention pretty soon after that. Cubs.com tells me that they won, but I don't much care. Lee started the year off on a happy note. Good enough for this guy.

Changing Seasons

Snow - ignore it.

Frozen lakes - while I appreciate their firmness when playing broomball, they don't matter here.

Archaeology - not happening right now. Doesn't matter.

March Madness - yet to occur; irrelevant.

Fantasy Baseball Draft on Sunday, 8:00 P.M. CST - Spring has arrived.


That's right, the team 'Ivy Lover' is about to be assembled for the 2010 baseball season. As I sound the conch to gather my ballplayers, the residual sound waves ripple throughout the atmosphere working their magic on the Wisconsin climate. This causes spring. It's science.

Unexpected Swastikas

I did not expect to ever title a blog post quite like this, but I think it will make sense. My great-great-aunt Glee passed away in September, and she left quite the collection of amazing curiosities for the family to examine. As we sorted through everything, my now-late Uncle Cedric brought out two incredible pieces of Native American clothing that Glee and her husband had somehow acquired in the southwest (and then stowed away in their attic forever). The first piece I'll wait to write about until later, but the second was a blanket:


...which was then modeled by my father...

I'd read about how the swastika used to be a symbol associated with things other than, you know, Nazi Germany. Until then, however, I hadn't seen an instance of that in person.

THEN, this week in nerdy baseball news - more swastikas!

The photo above was the catalyst for a pretty in-depth research journey highlighted by a Rob Neyer reference on ESPN this week. Apparently, the Boston Braves wore caps with good-luck swastikas in the early 20th century - go here for the full story. It's worth reading - but don't take my word for it!

2.17 Food links

It's a busy day today - pitchers and catchers report, Purdue v. Ohio State, Ash Wednesday, Dagwood and Blondie's wedding anniversary...you see. It's full of excitement.

Because of that, I'll just throw up some links to some cool foodstuff.

Serious Eats presents the mouthwatering/disgusting (I can't decide which) FLOOD BURGER.

Chef Jamie Oliver presents his TED talk on childhood obesity:

The TED talks are immensely interesting - go on Youtube and watch more of them. You won't be disappointed.

GOOD combines maps and food, so I'd be remiss if I didn't link to them. I'm most curious about the one hotspot of vegetable consumption in Texas surrounded by vegetable-phobes. That same 'island' also has increased meat/poultry consumption compared to the surrounding area...what's going on there?

I'm not very good at photoshop, but if I could learn how to bake cookies using it I would do it all the time.

Snow

I, for one, am sick of winter and all that comes with it. My skis are still in the garage in Monroe, and broomball is fun - but my fingers almost froze off last time.

Weather.com is telling me that there will be snow once again, and I don't like it. Even if it is just a little bit of powder, I have officially passed into February Crankypants Mode. The only thing keeping me from full-blown Curmodgeon Status is this comic teaching you how to read tracks (from XKCD).

I just bought eight Cubs tickets, so there's a bit of a mental disconnect for me when I look outside and see snow everywhere.

Dear Spring,
Please hurry up and get here already.
Love,
Jeff

Worse than the Fighting Meercats

The Fighting Meercats, of course, were the not-so-great (and short-lived) intramural slow-pitch softball team I organized in spring 2006. We lost the opening game of the tournament, largely due to my complete failure to throw strikes.

Despite the demoralizing loss, there are three good things to take from the experience.

1. Fighting Meercats - as a team name, this can not be beat. It was chosen because nobody else on the team suggested anything, and I was forced to write something on the sign-up sheet. I will continue to use the name...Fantasy Football 2010 watch out!

2. We lost, true, but that didn't stop me from shaking up cheap bottles of champagne and popping them afterwards. Always a positive.

3. It appears that we aren't the worst baseball/softball team ever assembled - Wezen-ball looks at Charlie Brown's baseball team and finds decades of heartbreak. (h/t to circling the bases)

I imagine his field goal percentage isn't very good either...

Good news/bad news

Sometimes, people come back to places they never should have left. That happened (again) today, as Greg Maddux returns to the Chicago Cubs organization as an assistant to GM Jim Hendry. While I love Maddux and am glad he's back working for the best team in baseball, it sure would have been nice to have him from 1993-2003 as well...stupid Cubs.

In the bad news segment of this post, Jon Leuer broke his left wrist in Saturday's game against Purdue. It's not good news - Leuer has stepped up his game this year, and when he's not in foul trouble (v. Ohio State and Penn State) or breaking his wrist (v. Purdue) is pretty tough to guard. Thankfully, he's only expected to be out 4-6 weeks, and his broken wrist is on the non-shooting hand.

Links from the Week

With the release of his latest book, Slate.com created a Dan Brown plot-generating tool... and it’s awesome. If you’re a fan of Dan Brown, Tom Hanks, or insanely bad mullets, visit here and play around with it!

Beyond the Boxscore, a terrific baseball blog, recently addressed efficiency in graphic design. Within that article, they used a map created by French cartographers depicting Napoleon's invasion of/retreat from Russia. It's brilliant and dense and beautiful.

Good is a treasure trove of really interesting graphic visualizations, and this week they linked to an amazing interactive tool showing the changing demographics of the American labor force since 1850.

Refreshing Honesty

Bronson Arroyo, a starting pitcher for the Cincinnati Reds, had quite a lot to say in an interview with USA Today. Go read it - it's interesting - but one thing that stuck out to me was this:

"You think this country really cares about what ballplayers put in their
bodies?" Arroyo asks. "If we really care, why are we pumping Coca-Cola in
every kid's mouth, and McDonald's, and Burger King and KFC? That (stuff) is
killing people.

It certainly is interesting comparing the things that get people riled up (PED's, touchdown celebrations) with the things that get 30-day jail sentences and community service/fines.

Arroyo might want to reconsider his supplement programs, however...the 5.04 ERA isn't pretty, and his 5.37 FIP is even worse.

Baseball? Graphics? Yes please!

Over the last two to three days the circle of baseball blogs/writers I read have latched onto a very cool site full of baseball-related graphics...go check it out! I think my favorite image is the fantasy showdown between the Wu-Tang Clan and the E Street Band (I'd love to see Nils Lofgren start a double play), with the Mike Morgan history coming in second. Oh, Mike Morgan. The 1986 Mets graphic gives me an excuse to link to a Sesame Street special, guest-starring (among others) Keith Hernandez and Mookie Wilson.

Rain Day

"Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, sometimes it rains." - Bull Durham

Today it rained. And snowed. Since it would be pretty uncomfortable and not that productive to try and do archaeological survey in those conditions, we had a rain day. To fill up the time, I went with Elizabeth and Susan to lovely Princeton, WI. It seemed like half of the stores were closed - including (presumably) a potter's studio. He must have a hell of a beard, since he named it "A Hairy Potter." We went into Twister, a coffeeshop/store. Susan and Elizabeth had mochas, and I had a completely unnecessary americano. It was my 3rd cup of coffee of the day...and the best, by far. I'm not one to complain about the Americinn's complementary coffee, but it's not winning any awards anytime soon.

In addition to the americano, I bought "The Modern Gentleman: A Guide to Essential Manners, Savvy & Vice" - so far I have read Chapter One: Out and About. Nothing too spectacular, but good for soaking up time in the hotel for sure.

We had lunch at La Casbah - I had a grilled vegetable wrap with a garlic sauce. I suppose I should be bringing my camera along for these excursions...you'll have to take my word that the wrap was quite good.

Back at the hotel, I did some reading and generally killed time until 7:15, when the Cubs and Cincinnati Reds squared off in game one of a three game series. Rich Harden pitched a good game, and the Cubs offense took advantage of Micah Owing's poor command of the strike zone (a trait that the Reds bullpen shared as well) en route to a 7-2 victory.

Listening to: David Gray, "The Other Side"
Reading: "The Modern Gentleman"