I typically watch games on ‘tape delay’ (on demand recordings).
I watched most of the Twins game and found myself rehashing my inner monologue about Verlander: to whit, he’s an amazing pitcher and I should be able to appreciate that, but man do I dislike him. For some reason, even when they were both killing the Twins on the Tigers staff, I’ve always preferred Sherzer to Justin. He was a so good last night, but man do I still dislike him. I was happy to see Urshela break it up, but I didn’t feel like 5 runs was achievable for the squad in the dugout. I was right.
Anyway, Bally kept their scores update scrolling along the bottom so I knew the Wild had finished the first period up 2-1. I wish I could have just gone to bed with that happy knowledge in my head. Instead, I stayed up to watch them get worked over for the 2nd & 3rd. St. Louis was just the cleaner operation after the 1st.
I got what I was expecting from Verlander last night, but I was hoping for more from Ryan. He wasn't spotting his slider well, didn't have the best defense behind him, and was up against one of the best pitchers of the post-millennial era. It just wasn't Joe's night for a showdown.
I felt sorry for Joe; he has a cobbled lineup working behind him, but I guess a game like last night's is a good learning experience if anything
I went to bed at 2-2, it was a good choice.
Covid has descended on the Crescent City, again. I've been in close contact with 5 people who have tested positive in the last three days, and have been in the orbit of 8 others who qualify as secondary contact positive cases (according to my bosses).
Welp.
We did a family gathering for the wife's side on Mothers Day and on Monday her sister the nurse tested positive. Since I'm ushering and have a lot of travel coming up this summer I'm getting my second Pfizer booster tomorrow. Starting to feel like the COVID jab will be a semi-annual event going forward. Read an interesting report yesterday, though, about the possible relation between blood types and infection rate and severity. It appears that people with O blood type and/or negative Rh factor are least prone to infection and severe symptoms. Beyond that, there may be an elevated infection risk for people with type A blood, but there's no data indicating a strong correlation between blood type and infection severity. I'd been wondering about that for a long time.
My wife has been tested at least weekly since tests first became available, as she is a Physical Therapist in a nursing home. Despite being in close contact to a handful of covid positives, she never tested positive... until a couple weeks ago. She was feeling a little stuffed up and took a test when she arrived at work, just to be safe. She tested positive and came straight home. I returned, once again, to the extra bedroom for a week. I took a rapid test each morning and never tested positive. She only felt crappy for that first day and then a mild headache for another. Sleeping in the wrong bed, led to back stiffness for me, which then led to injuring my back during golf league last Tuesday. I was stupid and finished my round despite brutal back spasms. But hey... we won the match. The next 5 mornings my wife basically had to help me out of bed as I was in so much pain. Once I got up and moving, I was ok. I finally broke down and saw a chiropractor for the first time in my life. He is a good friend, but there is a witch doctor-like quality to his bed side manner. He did some vision and balance tests and deduced that my right and left brain are not communicating properly. We will see where this leads. However, after 2 visits and a bit of electric stimulation treatments, I can get out of bed pain free again. Still stiff, but the unbearable pain is gone. Progress.
I admit to pretty much equating the whole profession to witch doctoring.
Anywho, I have been pretty dedicated the past three months to an exercise and range of motion routine from Stuart McGill (see Back Mechanic: The secrets to a healthy spine your doctor isn't telling you. Dumb title, informative book).
I've been dealing with sciatica and hip/lower back pain for months. This routine, which emphasizes building core strength to stabilize the spine and really discourages stretching Because Reasons, has helped me considerably.
A friend sent me this from JoPos's blog:
Then another strange thing happened. I was watching the game with the sound off so I wasn’t really paying much attention until Detmers returned — so all I saw was a lefty with a beard come to the plate. Predictably, Phillips threw him a 54-mph slider down in the zone, and the lefty golfed it 411 feet for a home run. And it was only as he was rounding the bases that I realized that the hitter was Anthony Rendon.
And I had this goofy Homer Simpson exchange with my brain:
Me: Wait, that was Anthony Rendon? There was something different about him.
Brain: Yes, he was hitting left-handed.
Me: How did he do that?
Brain: He switch-hit.
Me: Is he a switch-hitter? I don’t remember him being a switch-hitter.
Brain: No. He is not a switch-hitter.
Me: OK.
This was the first time Rendon had ever batted left-handed in the big leagues. During a no-hitter. With a position player pitching. He homered.
I learned to switch hit as a kid (thank you for the incentive, Rod Carew), and one thing it always did for me was make me focus on what I was doing more. If someone is coordinated/athletic enough, batting from the opposite side isn't impossible, but hitting a HR like that is quite a feat.
I taught myself to do it because my best buddy and I played marathon, one-on-one, fast pitch OTL with a tennis ball ("tennyball") every summer from about 4th through 6th grades. We would emulate MLB players' stances. Red Sox v. Reds, etc.
But i never had the nerve to try it in a real baseball game. Although I did bat lefty sometimes in slow pitch softball games in grad school.
That was quite a feat!
I did the same as everyone else, learning to switch hit to emulate my favorite Twins players. Also, my dad switch hit in fastpitch softball, and he jacked a lot of home runs from the left side. I don't think I switch hit much in baseball growing up, though. Never quite got the nerve.
After about 10 years of slow pitch, though, I got bored and hit left-handed for a couple of seasons. We kept stats over those years and I basically had the same stats as when I batted from the right side. The fun part was the first game I switched sides was against a team we knew very well (we worked with a lot of those players). Anyway, they knew I wasn't hitting "correct"-handed and the right fielder came way in. I promptly hit one to the fence and circled the bases. Yay!
Yup,I also began switch-hitting at a really young age to emulate all the batting stances, and I did it in games. More power right-handed; better bat control lefthanded.
Same.
I had very little power to speak of from either side, but I learned the Ichiro-esque slap down the 3rd base line in middle school from the left side of the plate. It was pretty effective
I also learned to switch hit for the same reasons. Never hit lefty in a baseball game due to coaches. I don't think I batted below .400 in any season from middle school through high school. In fast pitch softball I struggled against slow, junk throwing pitchers when I batted right handed. As a result, I often hit lefty against those fiends and would bunt, slap hit to short, or flare one over short. I miss playing ball .
My first (and only) left handed plate appearance also resulted in a home run. In my last at bat in the final game of my 15 yo season of Babe Ruth baseball I walked to the left hand box and took a couple of Willie McCoveyesque practice swings. In the dugout my teammates were laughing and my coach was yelling at me to “Quit screwing around!” As we had a pretty substantial lead at the time, and like the other citizens here I had grown up playing hundreds of hours of whiffle ball emulating the players of the day and batting accordingly, I figured it was now or never. The first pitch was a grooved 70mph fastball(?) right down Broadway. PING! (damn aluminum bats) I sent that ball on a high, towering arc down the right field line that eventually cleared the 330 sign. As I rounded the bases my teammates were laughing even harder and my coach had a slack jawed look on his face like he’d just seen a ghost. It was the only home run of my Babe Ruth career.
That. Is. Awesome.
Hopefully everyone makes it through the storms with roof intact and basements dry
I typically watch games on ‘tape delay’ (on demand recordings).
I watched most of the Twins game and found myself rehashing my inner monologue about Verlander: to whit, he’s an amazing pitcher and I should be able to appreciate that, but man do I dislike him. For some reason, even when they were both killing the Twins on the Tigers staff, I’ve always preferred Sherzer to Justin. He was a so good last night, but man do I still dislike him. I was happy to see Urshela break it up, but I didn’t feel like 5 runs was achievable for the squad in the dugout. I was right.
Anyway, Bally kept their scores update scrolling along the bottom so I knew the Wild had finished the first period up 2-1. I wish I could have just gone to bed with that happy knowledge in my head. Instead, I stayed up to watch them get worked over for the 2nd & 3rd. St. Louis was just the cleaner operation after the 1st.
I got what I was expecting from Verlander last night, but I was hoping for more from Ryan. He wasn't spotting his slider well, didn't have the best defense behind him, and was up against one of the best pitchers of the post-millennial era. It just wasn't Joe's night for a showdown.
I felt sorry for Joe; he has a cobbled lineup working behind him, but I guess a game like last night's is a good learning experience if anything
I went to bed at 2-2, it was a good choice.
Covid has descended on the Crescent City, again. I've been in close contact with 5 people who have tested positive in the last three days, and have been in the orbit of 8 others who qualify as secondary contact positive cases (according to my bosses).
Welp.
We did a family gathering for the wife's side on Mothers Day and on Monday her sister the nurse tested positive. Since I'm ushering and have a lot of travel coming up this summer I'm getting my second Pfizer booster tomorrow. Starting to feel like the COVID jab will be a semi-annual event going forward. Read an interesting report yesterday, though, about the possible relation between blood types and infection rate and severity. It appears that people with O blood type and/or negative Rh factor are least prone to infection and severe symptoms. Beyond that, there may be an elevated infection risk for people with type A blood, but there's no data indicating a strong correlation between blood type and infection severity. I'd been wondering about that for a long time.
My wife has been tested at least weekly since tests first became available, as she is a Physical Therapist in a nursing home. Despite being in close contact to a handful of covid positives, she never tested positive... until a couple weeks ago. She was feeling a little stuffed up and took a test when she arrived at work, just to be safe. She tested positive and came straight home. I returned, once again, to the extra bedroom for a week. I took a rapid test each morning and never tested positive. She only felt crappy for that first day and then a mild headache for another. Sleeping in the wrong bed, led to back stiffness for me, which then led to injuring my back during golf league last Tuesday. I was stupid and finished my round despite brutal back spasms. But hey... we won the match. The next 5 mornings my wife basically had to help me out of bed as I was in so much pain. Once I got up and moving, I was ok. I finally broke down and saw a chiropractor for the first time in my life. He is a good friend, but there is a witch doctor-like quality to his bed side manner. He did some vision and balance tests and deduced that my right and left brain are not communicating properly. We will see where this leads. However, after 2 visits and a bit of electric stimulation treatments, I can get out of bed pain free again. Still stiff, but the unbearable pain is gone. Progress.
I admit to pretty much equating the whole profession to witch doctoring.
Anywho, I have been pretty dedicated the past three months to an exercise and range of motion routine from Stuart McGill (see Back Mechanic: The secrets to a healthy spine your doctor isn't telling you. Dumb title, informative book).
I've been dealing with sciatica and hip/lower back pain for months. This routine, which emphasizes building core strength to stabilize the spine and really discourages stretching Because Reasons, has helped me considerably.
A friend sent me this from JoPos's blog:
I learned to switch hit as a kid (thank you for the incentive, Rod Carew), and one thing it always did for me was make me focus on what I was doing more. If someone is coordinated/athletic enough, batting from the opposite side isn't impossible, but hitting a HR like that is quite a feat.
I taught myself to do it because my best buddy and I played marathon, one-on-one, fast pitch OTL with a tennis ball ("tennyball") every summer from about 4th through 6th grades. We would emulate MLB players' stances. Red Sox v. Reds, etc.
But i never had the nerve to try it in a real baseball game. Although I did bat lefty sometimes in slow pitch softball games in grad school.
That was quite a feat!
I did the same as everyone else, learning to switch hit to emulate my favorite Twins players. Also, my dad switch hit in fastpitch softball, and he jacked a lot of home runs from the left side. I don't think I switch hit much in baseball growing up, though. Never quite got the nerve.
After about 10 years of slow pitch, though, I got bored and hit left-handed for a couple of seasons. We kept stats over those years and I basically had the same stats as when I batted from the right side. The fun part was the first game I switched sides was against a team we knew very well (we worked with a lot of those players). Anyway, they knew I wasn't hitting "correct"-handed and the right fielder came way in. I promptly hit one to the fence and circled the bases. Yay!
Yup,I also began switch-hitting at a really young age to emulate all the batting stances, and I did it in games. More power right-handed; better bat control lefthanded.
Same.
I had very little power to speak of from either side, but I learned the Ichiro-esque slap down the 3rd base line in middle school from the left side of the plate. It was pretty effective
I also learned to switch hit for the same reasons. Never hit lefty in a baseball game due to coaches. I don't think I batted below .400 in any season from middle school through high school. In fast pitch softball I struggled against slow, junk throwing pitchers when I batted right handed. As a result, I often hit lefty against those fiends and would bunt, slap hit to short, or flare one over short. I miss playing ball .
My first (and only) left handed plate appearance also resulted in a home run. In my last at bat in the final game of my 15 yo season of Babe Ruth baseball I walked to the left hand box and took a couple of Willie McCoveyesque practice swings. In the dugout my teammates were laughing and my coach was yelling at me to “Quit screwing around!” As we had a pretty substantial lead at the time, and like the other citizens here I had grown up playing hundreds of hours of whiffle ball emulating the players of the day and batting accordingly, I figured it was now or never. The first pitch was a grooved 70mph fastball(?) right down Broadway. PING! (damn aluminum bats) I sent that ball on a high, towering arc down the right field line that eventually cleared the 330 sign. As I rounded the bases my teammates were laughing even harder and my coach had a slack jawed look on his face like he’d just seen a ghost. It was the only home run of my Babe Ruth career.
That. Is. Awesome.
Hopefully everyone makes it through the storms with roof intact and basements dry