THE EARTH IS NOT A BLUEPRINT FOR A BASEBALL
Is a baseball a small-scale replica of our immense earth-ball? Gladly no, because of the latter's uneven circumference, with all its inverted protrusions and eccentric surfaces. Were a baseball to emulate this, the result would be a luck-over-skill imbalance. The ball would dipsy-do, skeetering like a whiffle-ball, skurving like a frisbee, in uncalculated bounces, like a football fumble that brutes re-dive for in out-of joint double-takes, making for duplex photos. Pitchers may thrive on this, but fielders, batters, and catchers would suffer finger-blows and toe-knockabouts, plus knee-implosions and elbow malfunctions, not to mention vanity dips. So please, earth, don't give baseball-manufacturers any weird ideas. Let a baseball be round by geometry, rather than a plaything to cruel gambles of chance, setting loose such unsportsmanlike chaos that anarchy would rumble hysterically over the old ball game. Even the foul lines would wander astray from their assigned positions. Demented umpires would run out of coins to toss, creating planetary freefall in the cosmic stock market. The crumbling firmament would lose its earthball-bearing, and the world series would not be played that year. Mere football would stick its crooked tongue out, mocking baseball's hairline display of dignity. Sacrilege! Get earth's orbit back on its slot. Let pure geometry preserve a sanitary roundness in our classically stitched baseball, which glistens in the sun's applause and plays fairly with the howling moon under the serenading arcs.
Marvin Cohen is the author of several books including Baseball The Beautiful (1974) and a former creative writing teacher at the New School. Marvin plays first base for Softball For The Love Of It.
Friday, February 26, 2010
Monday, February 22, 2010
SFLOI WINTER MEETING AND CELEBRATION 2010
From the esteemed Gil Schmerler:
You’re invited to
SFLOI’s Winter Meeting and Celebration
Sunday, March 7
4-6 pm
at the home of Anne Atkinson
22 West 96 Street, Apt. 2
(just off Central Park West – B or C train to 96th)
* Voting for 2009 awards!
* Furious rules disputes!
* Plans for ’10 season!
* Card- and tale-swapping!
* Havelock! And more!
Light food and drink will be served. Food or drink contributions welcomed,
although by no means required.
RSVP to Gil at ace@bankstreet.edu, if you’re coming.
You’re invited to
SFLOI’s Winter Meeting and Celebration
Sunday, March 7
4-6 pm
at the home of Anne Atkinson
22 West 96 Street, Apt. 2
(just off Central Park West – B or C train to 96th)
* Voting for 2009 awards!
* Furious rules disputes!
* Plans for ’10 season!
* Card- and tale-swapping!
* Havelock! And more!
Light food and drink will be served. Food or drink contributions welcomed,
although by no means required.
RSVP to Gil at ace@bankstreet.edu, if you’re coming.
GLEN LAWRENCE'S NEW BOOK!
Now available on Amazon.com from long-standing SFLOI outfielder Glen Lawrence, The Fats of Life! Excellent title to what I'm sure is an excellent book. Check out this flyer, and order the book today!
Thursday, February 18, 2010
FROM THE STATS LAB
I've come up with a crudely effective season normalizer for SFLOI stats, and ran 357 batter seasons from 1985-2009 through it. The cutoff was 2.5% of each season's total plate appearances, and each batter's OPS was measured against the league-average OPS over the same number of at bats. Now, this season's MVP debate will probably hinge on an unresolvable statistical question: would you rather have 300 at bats of high quality, or 250 at bats of really high quality? The following list gives no credit for people who play more often--it simply measures who you'd want hitting 3rd or 4th for your team on any given day. So, here they are, SFLOI's top 25 seasons:
25. David Sommers, 2006: .550 BA, 7 HR, 40 RBI, 117 PA.
24. Manny Santiago, 1990: .525 BA, 7 HR, 40 RBI, 122 PA. Batting and home run titles.
23. Ian Lebowitz, 2001: .535 BA, 16 HR, 52 RBI, 141 PA. Batting title.
22. Tony Connor, 1985: .500 BA, 0 HR, 14 RBI, 57 PA. Batting title. One of the finest seasons of the pre-modern era.
21. Kurt Hettler, 1992: .482 BA, 23 HR, 84 RBI, 210 PA. Home run and RBI titles. The 1992 stats contain some errors, for example one player is listed as going 23-for-23. This simply couldn't be, and therefore you could make a case for moving Kurt up a few places.
20. Chris Hall, 2005: .580 BA, 5 HR, 53 RBI, 174 PA. Batting title, also led league in hits and runs scored. Chris had the misfortune of having his best seasons in SFLOI's second dead-ball era.
19. Larry Savell, 1989: .520 BA, 6 HR, 36 RBI, 106 PA. Rookie season.
18. Ian Lebowitz, 2000: .545 BA, 12 HR, 38 RBI, 102 PA. Rookie season.
17. Kurt Hettler, 1993: .548 BA, 9 HR, 55 RBI, 181 PA. Batting and RBI titles, led league in doubles and triples.
16. Derek Martinez, 2009: .493 BA, 26 HR, 87 RBI, 249 PA. Home run and RBI titles, also led league in runs scored. Alltime HR record.
15. Alex Rivera, 2009: .532 BA, 16 HR, 57 RBI, 232 PA. Batting title.
14. Carl Weinberg, 2007: .464 BA, 14 HR, 72 RBI, 197 PA. Home run and RBI titles, also led league in doubles and triples. This was the off year of mighty Carl's 2005-2008 prime.
13. Phil Kotik, 1995: .488 BA, 25 HR, 53 RBI, 240 PA. Batting and home run titles.
12. Phil Kotik, 1998: .564 BA, 21 HR, 78 RBI, 186 PA. Home run and RBI titles.
11. Carl Weinberg, 2006: .565 BA, 11 HR, 78 RBI, 217 PA. Home run and RBI titles, also led league in hits, runs, doubles, and triples.
10. Phil Kotik, 1994: .479 BA, 22 HR, 67 RBI, 236 PA. Batting and home run titles.
9. Phil Kotik, 1999: .600 BA, 21 HR, 73 RBI, 167 PA. Batting title. Also led league in runs scored and doubles. 1999 was the highest level of offense ever in SFLOI, that's how there are 8 seasons better than .600 with power.
8. Phil Kotik, 1996: .476 BA, 16 HR, 65 RBI, 193 PA. Home run title, also led league in runs scored.
7. Larry Savell, 2000: .623 BA, 12 HR, 42 RBI, 114 PA. Batting title. Highest single season average ever, but it came in the 2nd best season for offense ever, so read on.
6. Carl Weinberg, 2002: .507 BA, 15 HR, 65 RBI, 158 PA. Triple Crown. Also led league in hits, doubles, and triples, so it's more like the "Sextuple Crown."
5. Phil Kotik, 1997: .548 BA, 21 HR, 83 RBI, 182 PA. RBI title. Sixth and "last" appearance on this list.
4. Phil Ciccone, 2007: .558 BA, 10 HR, 61 RBI, 180 PA. Batting title. Led league in runs scored.
3. Carl Weinberg, 2008: .541 BA, 18 HR, 82 RBI, 209 PA. Batting and home run titles. Led league in doubles and triples. Had a 10-RBI game. I kept Carl from winning the triple crown in the 3rd best SFLOI season ever. I want that on my next baseball card.
2. Phil Ciccone, 2006: .604 BA, 9 HR, 53 RBI, 120 PA. Batting title. SFLOI's version of Ted Williams's .406 season. As a digression, do you have any idea how hard it is to hit .600? I've heard talk around the batting cages that all you need to do is be a mechanical line drive singles hitter, of the Boggs / Carew / Gwynn type-- which of course is a rather infrequent type to show up in our game-- but consider this. 5-for-9 is a bad day.
1. Dan Schneider, 1997: .598 BA, 22 HR, 68 RBI, 126 PA. Batting and home run titles. Why this season? First of all, Dan jacked a home run every 6 times up. Even more impressive, he came within one hit of .600. And '97 was a good season for offense, but not as good as 1998-2001 would be, and the league average becomes a powerful determinant when sorting through endless seasons of .550 and 20 home runs. Dan's SFLOI career contains some mighty strange seasons. He won batting titles in 1992 and '97, had power outbursts of 16 HR's in 114 PA (1998) and 13 HR's in 64 PA (2000), and from 1997 to 2001 hit 65 in 411 PA's, which is kind of like Babe Ruth playing in Coors Field, or Mexico City. However, he also batted 304 times in 1995, and hit only 2 home runs, but had 15 triples and 10 sac flies. Looks like 1995 was played in a spacious outfield without fences, where the outfielders could play what we now call the "Brian Hernandez" defense. Anyway, if I had to face this guy in 1997-2001, he's getting walked. I know that people come to swing the bats, but pitchers shouldn't be used like one of Mike Tyson's sparring partners either, should they?
25. David Sommers, 2006: .550 BA, 7 HR, 40 RBI, 117 PA.
24. Manny Santiago, 1990: .525 BA, 7 HR, 40 RBI, 122 PA. Batting and home run titles.
23. Ian Lebowitz, 2001: .535 BA, 16 HR, 52 RBI, 141 PA. Batting title.
22. Tony Connor, 1985: .500 BA, 0 HR, 14 RBI, 57 PA. Batting title. One of the finest seasons of the pre-modern era.
21. Kurt Hettler, 1992: .482 BA, 23 HR, 84 RBI, 210 PA. Home run and RBI titles. The 1992 stats contain some errors, for example one player is listed as going 23-for-23. This simply couldn't be, and therefore you could make a case for moving Kurt up a few places.
20. Chris Hall, 2005: .580 BA, 5 HR, 53 RBI, 174 PA. Batting title, also led league in hits and runs scored. Chris had the misfortune of having his best seasons in SFLOI's second dead-ball era.
19. Larry Savell, 1989: .520 BA, 6 HR, 36 RBI, 106 PA. Rookie season.
18. Ian Lebowitz, 2000: .545 BA, 12 HR, 38 RBI, 102 PA. Rookie season.
17. Kurt Hettler, 1993: .548 BA, 9 HR, 55 RBI, 181 PA. Batting and RBI titles, led league in doubles and triples.
16. Derek Martinez, 2009: .493 BA, 26 HR, 87 RBI, 249 PA. Home run and RBI titles, also led league in runs scored. Alltime HR record.
15. Alex Rivera, 2009: .532 BA, 16 HR, 57 RBI, 232 PA. Batting title.
14. Carl Weinberg, 2007: .464 BA, 14 HR, 72 RBI, 197 PA. Home run and RBI titles, also led league in doubles and triples. This was the off year of mighty Carl's 2005-2008 prime.
13. Phil Kotik, 1995: .488 BA, 25 HR, 53 RBI, 240 PA. Batting and home run titles.
12. Phil Kotik, 1998: .564 BA, 21 HR, 78 RBI, 186 PA. Home run and RBI titles.
11. Carl Weinberg, 2006: .565 BA, 11 HR, 78 RBI, 217 PA. Home run and RBI titles, also led league in hits, runs, doubles, and triples.
10. Phil Kotik, 1994: .479 BA, 22 HR, 67 RBI, 236 PA. Batting and home run titles.
9. Phil Kotik, 1999: .600 BA, 21 HR, 73 RBI, 167 PA. Batting title. Also led league in runs scored and doubles. 1999 was the highest level of offense ever in SFLOI, that's how there are 8 seasons better than .600 with power.
8. Phil Kotik, 1996: .476 BA, 16 HR, 65 RBI, 193 PA. Home run title, also led league in runs scored.
7. Larry Savell, 2000: .623 BA, 12 HR, 42 RBI, 114 PA. Batting title. Highest single season average ever, but it came in the 2nd best season for offense ever, so read on.
6. Carl Weinberg, 2002: .507 BA, 15 HR, 65 RBI, 158 PA. Triple Crown. Also led league in hits, doubles, and triples, so it's more like the "Sextuple Crown."
5. Phil Kotik, 1997: .548 BA, 21 HR, 83 RBI, 182 PA. RBI title. Sixth and "last" appearance on this list.
4. Phil Ciccone, 2007: .558 BA, 10 HR, 61 RBI, 180 PA. Batting title. Led league in runs scored.
3. Carl Weinberg, 2008: .541 BA, 18 HR, 82 RBI, 209 PA. Batting and home run titles. Led league in doubles and triples. Had a 10-RBI game. I kept Carl from winning the triple crown in the 3rd best SFLOI season ever. I want that on my next baseball card.
2. Phil Ciccone, 2006: .604 BA, 9 HR, 53 RBI, 120 PA. Batting title. SFLOI's version of Ted Williams's .406 season. As a digression, do you have any idea how hard it is to hit .600? I've heard talk around the batting cages that all you need to do is be a mechanical line drive singles hitter, of the Boggs / Carew / Gwynn type-- which of course is a rather infrequent type to show up in our game-- but consider this. 5-for-9 is a bad day.
1. Dan Schneider, 1997: .598 BA, 22 HR, 68 RBI, 126 PA. Batting and home run titles. Why this season? First of all, Dan jacked a home run every 6 times up. Even more impressive, he came within one hit of .600. And '97 was a good season for offense, but not as good as 1998-2001 would be, and the league average becomes a powerful determinant when sorting through endless seasons of .550 and 20 home runs. Dan's SFLOI career contains some mighty strange seasons. He won batting titles in 1992 and '97, had power outbursts of 16 HR's in 114 PA (1998) and 13 HR's in 64 PA (2000), and from 1997 to 2001 hit 65 in 411 PA's, which is kind of like Babe Ruth playing in Coors Field, or Mexico City. However, he also batted 304 times in 1995, and hit only 2 home runs, but had 15 triples and 10 sac flies. Looks like 1995 was played in a spacious outfield without fences, where the outfielders could play what we now call the "Brian Hernandez" defense. Anyway, if I had to face this guy in 1997-2001, he's getting walked. I know that people come to swing the bats, but pitchers shouldn't be used like one of Mike Tyson's sparring partners either, should they?
WHO'S WHO IN SFLOI???
***NOTE: This post will keep resurfacing to the top once a week; this way we can get everyone on it at one point or another.
Since SFLOI rosters seem to constantly rotate, I thought it would be great if we had a sort of meet and greet here on the blog. This way players old and new can get to know each other a little bit better. Here's my info as an example:
Name: Sal Cipriano
Age: 34
From: Brooklyn, NY
SFLOI Info: Joined SFLOI in the Fall of '08 through Ian Parfrey; I play RF and 2B mostly, but love 1B most.
Occupation: Comic Book Letterer for DC Comics; Writer of various facts and fiction.
Your Teams: Yankees, US Soccer National Team; have followed the Giants, Jets, and Rangers in the past; will be a fan of the Brooklyn Nets when they arrive ;)
Other Info: I love movies, cooking, fantasy baseball, reading, graphic design, and throwing good parties amongst other things. I'm a rabid foodie who likes going to new restaurants and cooking new dishes. Besides SFLOI, I play softball for the DC Bullets in the New York Media League as the starting catcher. I designed the Bullets logo as well as the SFLOI one.
My Websites: http://www.salcipriano.com/, http://www.besballtalk.com/, http://www.flixfiend.com/
That about covers it. Now just copy my info, paste it into a comment, and replace it with your own!
Since SFLOI rosters seem to constantly rotate, I thought it would be great if we had a sort of meet and greet here on the blog. This way players old and new can get to know each other a little bit better. Here's my info as an example:
Name: Sal Cipriano
Age: 34
From: Brooklyn, NY
SFLOI Info: Joined SFLOI in the Fall of '08 through Ian Parfrey; I play RF and 2B mostly, but love 1B most.
Occupation: Comic Book Letterer for DC Comics; Writer of various facts and fiction.
Your Teams: Yankees, US Soccer National Team; have followed the Giants, Jets, and Rangers in the past; will be a fan of the Brooklyn Nets when they arrive ;)
Other Info: I love movies, cooking, fantasy baseball, reading, graphic design, and throwing good parties amongst other things. I'm a rabid foodie who likes going to new restaurants and cooking new dishes. Besides SFLOI, I play softball for the DC Bullets in the New York Media League as the starting catcher. I designed the Bullets logo as well as the SFLOI one.
My Websites: http://www.salcipriano.com/, http://www.besballtalk.com/, http://www.flixfiend.com/
That about covers it. Now just copy my info, paste it into a comment, and replace it with your own!
Monday, February 15, 2010
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Saturday, February 13, 2010
Friday, February 12, 2010
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Who Am I-- the unathorized bootleg
A Poor Percentage of Free Throws,
A Pennant in the Bag,
who are the students
at an All-Girls' School for Sheep?
A Pennant in the Bag,
who are the students
at an All-Girls' School for Sheep?
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
Monday, February 8, 2010
SFLOI Classics-- 6/28/09
With Sal in Chicago and Havelock busy writing haikus, it's time for another classic game of 2009. This game went 10 innings, and featured an 11-run explosion-- by the losing team!
Dave Rosengard and Havelock Hewes were the pitching antagonists in this matchup, and Rosengard's team jumped out to a 9-1 lead after 2 innings, sparked by back-to-back HR's from Brian Hernandez and Ian Parfrey in the first inning. Of course, no lead is ever safe in SFLOI, and in the bottom of the 3rd, Hewes's team exploded for 11 runs. The monster inning featured two costly errors by yours truly, a 2-run triple from Dave Sommers, and a bases-clearing tie-breaking triple from Chris Hall.
Both pitchers settled down and hung up zeroes until the top of the 6th, when two infield errors allowed Rosengard's team to tie it. The pitchers went back to work, and no further runs scored until the top of the 10th, when Hernandez and Parfrey went back-to-back for the 2nd time, Hernandez's blast coming with Phil Ciccone on base and clearing the bleachers of the next field. This gave Rosengard a 15-12 lead, which he held onto in the bottom of the 10th.
The winning team got 2 HR's and 6 RBI from Hernandez, 2 HR's and 3 RBI from Parfrey, and Phil Ciccone was 5-for-6 with 3 RBI. On the other side, Chris Hall drove in 5. All told, 27 runs scored on 37 hits.
Dave Rosengard and Havelock Hewes were the pitching antagonists in this matchup, and Rosengard's team jumped out to a 9-1 lead after 2 innings, sparked by back-to-back HR's from Brian Hernandez and Ian Parfrey in the first inning. Of course, no lead is ever safe in SFLOI, and in the bottom of the 3rd, Hewes's team exploded for 11 runs. The monster inning featured two costly errors by yours truly, a 2-run triple from Dave Sommers, and a bases-clearing tie-breaking triple from Chris Hall.
Both pitchers settled down and hung up zeroes until the top of the 6th, when two infield errors allowed Rosengard's team to tie it. The pitchers went back to work, and no further runs scored until the top of the 10th, when Hernandez and Parfrey went back-to-back for the 2nd time, Hernandez's blast coming with Phil Ciccone on base and clearing the bleachers of the next field. This gave Rosengard a 15-12 lead, which he held onto in the bottom of the 10th.
The winning team got 2 HR's and 6 RBI from Hernandez, 2 HR's and 3 RBI from Parfrey, and Phil Ciccone was 5-for-6 with 3 RBI. On the other side, Chris Hall drove in 5. All told, 27 runs scored on 37 hits.
Sunday, February 7, 2010
SFLOI Gets Permit Approval!
Softball For The Love Of It has received notification from the New York City Parks Department that our request for a Sunday morning permit at Hecksher Field in Central Park has been approved. I will go to the Park Department office this week and finalize the agreement. The permit is from 9 am until 11 am and runs from April 11 through August 29. For the last few years, the Parks Department has, in early August, issued us a permit extension through the month of September. I hope this will happen again. The permit for April through august costs $336.
Saturday, February 6, 2010
Who Am I?
I returned to New York yesterday after a week in Bermuda. During my time in the cursed bermudas, where the ghosts of seafaring men who came to their end on the barrier reefs still whistle in the wind, images came to me. I wrote down what I could in words. The result is about twenty poems (I know they are poems because no one would buy them). I chose my ten favorites which I will share with you, one each day, in ascending order. While these brief collection of words come from my experiences in the wilderness it is my hope that each one will scream out a reader's name as surely as i heard the dead sailors song. I am titling the series "Who Am I?" Please comment if you have an answer.
Who Am I? (poem #10)
i Challenge
a Detective
to Ruin, A Little,
a Young Adult's
Hat
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
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