Tag: baseball

Undefeated, no longer

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

One of the many things I hate about very likely having COVID is whenever anyone insinuates that it’s remotely close to okay, because the infection numbers are so rampant that it’s almost inevitable that everyone will have caught a variant of it at some point.

My response to that is that a loss is a loss, and there’s no wiping a loss from your record, no matter how successful you are afterward.

Because I’m me, everything is an analogy to sports or wrestling, and the way I see it, everyone who has managed to evade COVID as long as I and my household had, was basically undefeated. 

Fewer things in competition are as hallowed as undefeated streaks, and there’s little more frequent narrative of a streak to inevitably break, with it growing more and more value the longer it goes unbroken. 

The ‘72 Dolphins. DiMaggio’s 56-game hit streak. Ripken’s 2,632 consecutive game streak.  The Oakland A’s 20-game win streak. The Cleveland Indians’ 22-game win streak. Goldberg’s 173-0 streak. Asuka’s 914-day undefeated streak. The Undertaker’s 21-0 Wrestlemania streak.

And in my head, every single person who has managed to go without COVID since it came into existence, y’all are also undefeated.  And up until a week ago, my wife was.  Up until more recently, so was I. 

But now, (very, very likely) not anymore. 

No, it isn’t the end of the world. My wife will recover. I will recover. We could thrive afterward. But it’s still a loss on our records, and that will never go away.  And I fucking hate it.

Back in like 1995, I was playing a season NBA Live ‘95. I wanted to have a season where the Orlando Magic went undefeated with my Penny Hardaway having 100% field goal percentage and averaging like 169 points a game and a triple-double.  I put a lot of time into it, but after about 30 games, the game apparently didn’t like such unrealistic conditions, and next thing I knew, I had a loss to the Seattle SuperSonics on my record and my Hardaway’s numbers were all tarnished. 

I quit the game.  That and-1 was a loss that I couldn’t expunge no matter if I won every single game afterward.  It ruined the ultimate goal.

Having the ‘Rona brought into my home and infecting my household makes me feel like the 2007 Patriots.  We were doing so well, only to be derailed and defeated by an unlikely party.  And the worst part is, I highly doubt the offending party realizes just how much they’ve fucked us.

Whereas they can go home to a childless environment with nobody but themselves to care to recover over, or any real demanding jobs to go to, mythical wife and I have two young kids to be mindful of, boatloads of duties that still have to get done no matter how addled we are; on top of our respective jobs.

Ask any parent how it feels to have to deny their kids an embrace that they want, and tell me that it’s still “fine” that “everyone’s going to get it eventually.”  Don’t try and calm me down with that bullshit reassurance that everyone will get it or that Omicron isn’t as lethal, because I will tell you to go fuck yourselves.

Life is already very difficult as it is right now, but to throw fucking coronavirus into our mix, sounds like a pretty crushing loss and way to end an undefeated streak in a terrible fashion.  I will always resent it, and unlike a video game, this loss on the record is permanent and there’s no turning off and quitting it.

A wrestling analogy I’m proud of

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

I can’t say that I’ve ever watched much Impact Wrestling in my lifetime, whether they were NWA-TNA, TNA, TNA-Impact, Global Force Wrestling, or whatever iteration the promotion ever was under the ownership of the Jarretts, Dixie Carter, or whomever.  The peak of my viewership of the product was when a distant acquaintance and former schoolmate of mine, Sonjay Dutt was a regular performer, and I was curious to see a guy I went to grade, middle and high school with, live out the dream he always had as long as I had known him, in being a professional wrestler.

But in this day and age when professional wrestling seems to be doing pretty well, with the WWE and AEW sitting comfortably on top of the industry, there are all sorts of tiers beneath  the top of the mountain, and if I had to make a pick, Impact Wrestling would probably be the #3 promotion in North America.  Followed by other promotions like the NWA, maybe Ring of Honor again one day, along with a litany of even smaller independent promotions.

Much is being made these days with all the talent that’s been liberated (read: fired) by the WWE, and how AEW is hoovering up many of the names as soon as their non-compete clauses expire.  Personally, I think AEW’s roster is bloating to unstable proportions, but they’ve yet to collapse under the weight of their talent and their payroll yet.

I saw the card for Impact’s Hard to Kill PPV, and thought that damn, that’s a pretty loaded card.  Numerous championship matches, and what I really like is how Ring of Honor champions are just kind of randomly showing up at other promotion’s shows, to defend ROH blets, and Jon Gresham only adds to the credibility of the card.  In a different point of my life, I’d literally drop what I was doing and hop on a flight to Dallas to try and watch this with my brother, that’s how decent of a show I think this has the potential to be.

AEW has been doing a lot of impressive stuff over the last few weeks, and I hear the chatter, but as I’ve made fairly clear that I just have a hard time caring about the things they’re doing.  In all fairness, I have a hard time caring of what the WWE is doing lately too, but the difference is that I still have Peacock access and can see their PPVs.But despite my general ambivalence towards Impact historically, I’m finding that I’m rooting for them in the midst of all these wrestling promotional battlegrounds.  And I made an analogy that made more and more sense the more I thought about it, and I have to say that I think it’s pretty accurate.

The WWE is obviously the Yankees; they have money, they have history, and they’re the biggest baddest franchise in the business.  AEW is the Dodgers, who are blending all sorts of new-school strategy and flinging obscene amounts of money out on the market to bring in top-tier talent to bolster their roster, even to excess.  But that makes a promotion like Impact, the Oakland A’s, a cash-strapped promotion that does well enough, but has to really maximize the value out of every asset they have and try and play smarter than the richer competition in order to survive.

And when it comes to sports fandom, who doesn’t appreciate the plucky underdogs, especially when going up against the big bad rich opposition?  Hoping for Impact to do well has no consequence or conflict to any allegiances if I had any, and when the day is over, the successes of other promotions outside of the WWE and AEW are better for the industry as a whole.

Whenever wrestlers are released from WWE, most of the time I’m usually like, man that guy/girl would be perfect for New Japan, or Impact, but just about everyone ends up in AEW, due to the money they’re flinging.  I don’t hide that I have these general ideas about promotions, and I think most big white oafs always stand a chance at being the next big bad foreign heel in NJPW, and if there’s one thing that Impact has always done well historically, is that they’ve always cultivated good women’s wrestling.  Even long before the WWE did, Impact doesn’t get enough credit for their contributions to women’s wrestling, and Hard to Kill has some pretty good women’s matches on deck that I most definitely wouldn’t take a piss break through.

Almost makes me think I should perhaps seek out some replicas of the Knockouts Tag Blets, so that my girls can be double champions.

A 2021 year-end post

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Looking back at all my old posts on a near-daily basis through the On This Day plug-in I use, I realize that I’ve written a whole lot of year-end posts throughout the years, which makes me feel somewhat obligated to write one for this year as well.  Initially, my thought was “fuck, ain’t nobody got time for this shit,” but then I stopped to actually think about the year 2021 as a whole, and realized that making one, really shouldn’t be that difficult.

Seeing as how in my double dad duty life, I’m typically always in search of the path of least resistance, “shouldn’t be that difficult,” pleases me.

Although plenty of things happened both in my own little bubble, as well as the rest of the world, for me, the year really can be summed up pretty succinctly as a tale of two halves.  The first half of the year was spent preparing for the birth of #2, where my job made me miserable and was sucking the life out of me.  And then literally halfway through the year, #2 arrived, embarking on the second half of the year where my job still made me miserable, but it was compounded by the ever-living difficulty of parenting two under two with insufficient help.

All while the coronavirus pandemic that plagued most of 2020, still raged on throughout the entire 2021, regardless of how stupid, arrogant and ignorant the rest of the world seemed to become because we’re all a bunch of selfish fucks who can’t understand the importance of quarantine and distancing, and have to be out in public events and crowded restaurants.  Vaccinations came into fruition, and smart people got them, but it didn’t make everyone suddenly invincible, as much as it dulled the fatality capabilities of coronavirus.  But that was good enough for everyone, and I stopped pondering which was worse between the unvaccinated and the vaccinated who thought they were bulletproof.

On that description alone, it sounds like 2021 may have sucked, and I’d be the first to admit that I did have a tremendous amount of time with dark clouds over me and inside my head.  But none of it has any bearing for the love I have for my children, no matter how hard they’ve made my life in this current juncture, and no matter how much I bitch and write pissy brog posts, they are still my happiness and the greatest things to have happened to my life along with mythical wife.

This isn’t to say that the year was entirely a wash.  It’s just pretty easy to sum up in very broad strokes, that make it sound negative.  Aside from the birth of my second child, she brought baby luck into play, and despite thinking I wouldn’t ever see it in my lifetime, the Atlanta Braves won the World Series.  I mean if that isn’t the very embodiment of baby luck, I don’t know what was, the Braves had 88 wins and had no business making the playoffs, but they did, got hot, and rode the momentum all the way to the Commissioner’s Trophy.

I also got the NXT UK Tag Team replica blet, that I’ve been waiting to come into existence for three years.  That pleased me greatly and was a good way to wind down the year.

Oh, and the new job I secured with the year winding down.  A substantial raise, elevated job title, and for the inevitable future where I have to report back into an office, a shorter commute.  Plus, it gave me the long-awaited departure from my toxic current boss, and I can’t wait to get the fuck away from her.  That shit is really fantastic news too.

But because I’m a nerd that takes general notes on the happenings that interest me, the following things also occurred in 2021:

  • Baked potato worshippers basically tried to throw a coup and invade the Capitol in Washington DC in defiance of the failed 2020 election
  • I took a UX course to try and pivot my career path
  • Got vaccinated, had it kick my ass. Got a booster later in the year, which kicked my ass again
  • Tried the Dr. Now diet from My 600 Lb. Life of eating 1,200 calories a day; I lasted a week before throwing in the towel, but still lost 3.1 lbs.
  • The housing market in America went completely bonkers, and I capitalized on it by refinancing on my house to help ourselves financially
  • Alabama won its 52nd National Championship
  • Tom Brady won his 43rd Super Bowl; but first with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers
  • The Milwaukee Bucks, yes Milwaukee Bucks, won the NBA Finals
  • My upstairs HVAC died in the middle of summer and had to be replaced, causing a very uncomfortable week in August
  • And finally, speaking of deaths, notable passings in my world included: Hank Aaron, Larry King, Screech from Saved by the Bell, Jessica Walter, New Jack, Norm Macdonald, John Madden, Betty White, and most tragically, Sonny Chiba. 

But let’s not end this post talking about deaths.  As droll and depressing some of the tone of this post might’ve read, there is absolutely no reason for me to not be optimistic about 2022.  I have a new job that pays better and gets me away from the toxic situation that shit all over my 2021, and as my girls grow and develop, life should become a little simpler, and pave the way for me to get bits of my own life back, gradually, little by little.

Those things alone carry great weight, and as long as those things can progress positively, not even the dismal state of the world’s handling of coronavirus can drag me down.  And with that, I close the brog book on 2021, and hope for nothing but the best going into year 22 of fairly consistent brogging.

R.I.P. Braves Minor Leagues

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Source: Endeavor Group Holdings purchases nine minor league baseball teams, among them the Atlanta Braves’ AAA, AA and High-A minor league affiliates in Georgia and Mississippi

Since few people other than me really gives two shits about Minor League Baseball, how it works is that scattered all across the country are minor league baseball teams, with wacky names, goofy promotions, and smaller ballparks, who affiliate themselves with the 30 Major League Baseball organizations, where the baseball players of tomorrow work on their game and hopefully grow into useful players for the parent Major League club.

However, in a number of exceptions, there are occasionally some minor league teams, that are outright owned by their parent clubs.  The Yankees, Cubs, Cardinals, Giants are examples of teams that one one or more of their affiliates.  The Braves, own four of their affiliates: Danville (rookie), Rome (High-A), Mississippi (AA) and Gwinnett (AAA).  Presumably, ownership of affiliates grants higher control and micromanagement of these clubs, and probably among the highest of priority is geographical lockdown of clubs, so that they never have to play musical chairs with their minor league clubs for when affiliation contracts expire.

But over the last two years, and most definitely not at all helped by the pandemic, minor league baseball has been in somewhat trouble, as far as its future is concerned.  Even before the pandemic, there was lots of discussion of cutting large swaths of teams from MLB affiliation, and even rejiggering the whole holistic organization of minor league systems.  If I had to guess, money is at the root of all this, considering the mass whistleblowing that had been occurring about how minor league players and personnel make less money than your average McDonald’s worker, and how cogs in a machine that earns billions annually, can allow this to happen. 

All the same though, it appears that the Braves and several other franchises have decided to cut their obligations, even at the potential expense of control, and sell off their minor league affiliates.  Make no mistake, these are entirely financial moves, and if I had to guess, the teams who have sold franchises probably all feel that the future of minor league baseball is too murky and uncertain for them to want to risk carrying the financial obligations of having their own minor league organizations.  By selling them off now, they are basically betting that these teams will more likely suffer mediocre earnings if not outright fail in business, than becoming the next Dayton Dragons and sell out every game for 18 straight years.

The perception is definitely cold and callous, and to a degree sad for baseball fans and purists alike.  No matter what, money controls everything in baseball as it unfortunately influences most everything else in everyday ordinary life.

However, there is very bright and silver lining to this.  I don’t know who Endeavor Group or their slave companies who will ultimately operate these teams are, but now that these minor league franchises are all cut free from their parent organizations, the world is now their oyster when it comes to promoting these squads.

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Being a man of my word

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

A wise man; the Ultimate Warrior to be specific; once said: blah blah blah skeletons, blah blah blah, sacrifice.  Rooooarrrrrrrr snarrllllll

Chris Jericho said it best about the Ultimate Warrior: I don’t know what he said but it sounded cool yaaaayyyyy

Anyway, this isn’t a post about the Ultimate Warrior, Chris Jericho, or professional wrestling, for once.  Those were referenced just to zone in on a single concept, that’s kind of stuck with me, especially when it comes to trying to tempt fate and potentially get the things that I hope to get: sacrifice.

I have this belief that seldom do good things occur without some degree of sacrifice involved.  It’s basically like when kids behave and act good because they want something.  And when I’ve wanted things like, the Braves winning the World Series, I most definitely think that there should be some sacrifice made by all Braves fans, if they really wanted to see a World Series win.

A few weeks ago, I dogged on Dugout Mugs, and basically how I thought they were the most useless products on the planet.  And how in an era of pandemic, wealth inequity, teetering on the precipice of financial ruin everywhere, the absolute last fucking thing anyone needed was a cup made out of a baseball bat.

One of the last things I blathered about how was that I should probably make a sacrificial bet that if the Braves won the World Series that I should get a Dugout Mug, in spite of just how abhorrent I think they are, because if I really wanted to see the Braves win, I should make a sacrifice, after all.

I wasn’t at all writing all that, in an attempt to superstitiously manipulate fate, and put on a show.  Believe me, I have done it before, and naturally it doesn’t work, but my disdain for Dugout Mugs is very much legitimate.  They’re useless products, AND they have a ridiculously ludicrous $70 price point for a fucking hollowed out bat head.  The Braves winning the World Series would definitely cost me something, that I would never purchase in any other circumstance.

And despite the fact that I made this bet with myself, and probably zero people even read or knew about it, when the Braves finished the Astros, I went ahead and bit the bullet and purchased a fucking Dugout Mug.  Thankfully, there was some sort of promotional deal for early purchasers, and I was able to get my mug for not-$70, but it was still basically the cost of a brand new video game once taxes and shipping were applied.

I didn’t have to do it.  I could’ve denied everything and just said eating my words should be enough.  But when it comes to fates and superstition, I am that gullible, so I believe that it’s probably for the best that I remain a man of my word and fulfill the obligation I made for myself if the Braves were to win.  

Considering how long I’d been hoping to see this, $57 is a paltry price to pay, and even if I think this mug and all other Dugout Mugs are bullshit, at least everything will taste something like victory for a little while from it.  Even gross-ass IPAs.

Time to get a new Braves cap

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

I got this cap during the tail end of the 2008 season.  The Braves lost 90 games that year and they were not a very good team.  But, I was working for Cartoon Network then, and as a Turner network, one of the perks we got were these booklets of house money that was redeemable for tickets.  And then one day, a colleague told me that they didn’t work on just tickets, and could be used to purchase merchandise in Turner Field.  So I cobbled together what remaining vouchers I had left, and decided to get a new cap.

NewEra was still young at that time, as hard as it is to believe considering they’ve been the official baseball cap of just about everything forever now.  And my unknown-brand red and navy Braves cap was beat to death, so it seemed as good as any to get a new one if I didn’t have to pay anything out of pocket.

I went with the road navy, because I already had the aforementioned two-tone, and I just really dug the all-navy.  I loved the way it fit, and I was sold on NewEra caps, and it quickly became my default cap.  It’s so old, that it was before NewEra put their logos on the side of caps, and the only identifiers to the brand is all the 59Fifty markings on the inside of it.

Over the next 13 years, this cap has been to countless Braves games, MLB games, MiLB games, a World Baseball Classic game, and visited 14 of the 30 MLB ballparks.  It has been worn in 117F degree summer games, 49F spring games, and been rained on countless times, and had enough sunlight beaten into it to power a house if could absorb the solar energy.  It has never seen the Braves win on the road (except in Washington DC, where I’ve seen numerous Braves games against the Nationals). 

Now I could make up some story about how I vowed to never change this cap until the Braves won a World Series, but I’d be lying if I said that, but seeing as how the Braves have become world champions 13 years later, I think now would be as good time as any to explore retiring this cap, and getting a new one.  The color is faded and tired and the integrity of the fabric and brim is flimsy.  But mostly because this cap is a size 7 3/8 which fit perfectly back in 2008, but my head alarmingly is now a 7 1/2. 🙁

But in all likelihood, the new one will be another road navy, because it’s classic, subtle, but just the fucking best.  However, in true fashion to myself, who can get sentimental over the littlest shit, here is a fond farewell, to a baseball cap.

Finally, let’s talk about the World Series Champion Atlanta Braves

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Firstly, baby luck is real, boys.  If you want to see your team win a championship, go have a kid.  I’ve seen it work for the Cubs.  I’ve seen it work with the Nationals.  Both those teams were laughing stocks not very long ago, and good friends of mine with their then-new children, got to witness the pinnacle of baseball fandom. 

Despite the fact that the Braves lost megastar Ronald Acuña, Jr. to a blown ACL, Mike Soroka blowing out his arm, and Marcell Ozuna getting suspended indefinitely for a domestic abuse incident and were sitting as low as fourth place in the division at one point, #2 was born, the Braves stopped sucking just enough to win a horrid division, and then got hot at the very right moment, and rode the momentum all the way to the top.

And now baby luck has worked for me, finally getting to witness a reality where the Atlanta Braves are World Series champions.  How can anyone not love baseball when an 88-win team that had no business making the playoffs ends up winning the whole thing?

Honestly, I never thought I’d see this in my life.  Between the Braves, Virginia Tech football, Korean national teams in, anything other than video games, I don’t have a lot of world championship potential, so y’all will have to excuse me if I’m still in a little bit of disbelief at the fact that the Braves are actually champions.

I wasn’t a Braves fan in 1995, when they won the World Series previously.  Growing up where I did, the team to root for was Cal Ripken, Jr. and the Baltimore Orioles, and the O’s got bounced by the same Cleveland Indians who went on to lose to the Braves in that World Series, but I make no claim to that championship.  So 2021’s World Series, really is for me, as it is for all Braves fans who have waited over 20 years for another championship.

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