Tag: braves

Filling up the proverbial plate

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Preview image from MegaCon – these guys were my favorites

I just got back home after spending the last few days down in Florida, for a fairly loosely planned trip, basically to get out into the world and do things.  Needless to say, I do not sleep well in random two-star hotels, so I’m a little bit weary having going straight back to work after flying back.

But before I put myself back into a self-imposed mountain of personal tasks of writing things, processing and editing a ton of pictures to share with the rest of the internets, I will say that it was a very good trip, that I have no regrets about (actually, there is one trite regret, but it’ll be brought up later).

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Extending happiness

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

A little while back, I read this article about baseball payrolls, and one of the interesting things it pointed out was this little tidbit:

  • In 2001, the Atlanta Braves payroll was roughly $90 million dollars ($91,936,167), and was #1 in the National League and #3 overall in Major League Baseball.
  • Going into 2014, the Atlanta Braves payroll is estimated at roughly $90 million dollars, and ranks #8 in the National League and #15 overall in Major League Baseball.

Considering the cost of a Coke bottle has nearly doubled and the cost of a gallon of unleaded has nearly quadrupled since 2001, it’s pretty clear that the almighty dollar isn’t what it used to be these days.  As anyone can see, spending roughly the same amount as they did back in 2001 no longer makes them the biggest spenders in the league, but pretty much, smack dab in the middle.

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Happy trails, Brian McCann

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It seems like it was just yesterday, when Brian McCann hit a three-run home run off of Roger Clemens in the playoffs.  And in the metaphorical tomorrow when we refer to next year, the 2014 season, Brian McCann will no longer be a member of the Atlanta Braves, but the New York Yankees, who have historically been known to gobble up players of the highest talents simply because they can afford to.

Contrary to the popular notion that “everyone hates the Yankees,” I actually don’t.  Sure, it’s sometimes frustrating to hear how the rich keep getting richer, whenever the Yankees secure the services of yet another highly talented free agent, but the fact of the matter is that in spite of their organization’s propensity to believe that championships are acquired by amassing the most talent, regardless of how much it may cost, the Yankees are just as subject to the crap shoot of winning baseball championships as would be teams with far lesser payrolls, like the Oakland A’s, the Tampa Bay Rays, and the Atlanta Braves.  They’ve won just one championship since the start of the millennium.

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The Atlanta Braves moving to Marietta?

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Long story short:  the Atlanta Braves, seeing as their lease with Turner Field is expiring soon, announces that they’re going to build a new stadium in Marietta, and plan on moving into it by the start of the 2017 season.

First off, FUCK.  Here I am, trying to enjoy my day off of work, and I read about this, and now my mind is filled with a jumble of emotions, people on Braves websites are all flipping out, people on Facebook are shitting on the Braves and baseball, and I’m getting all worked up about it unnecessarily and now I want to write something about it, god damn it.

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The 2013 Braves’ ironic conclusion

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Blah blah blah apathy, etc, etc. Yeah, all of my seven readers have read it before. But I’ll be damned that seeing the Braves in the playoffs again after a few years has been some of the most tension and excitement-filled baseball I’ve watched in quite some time, and I have to admit to feeling somewhat invigorated by it, in spite of the unfortunate way the season came to a close last night.

Ultimately, I’m not surprised that the Braves lost the series, because my educated guess was that they simply didn’t have the pitching to hang with the Dodgers, or any other World Series contender, but it didn’t meant that I wasn’t going to root for them regardless. And it doesn’t make that feeling of exhausted and draining defeat suck any less when it did happen, because in the end, that’s not what I wanted from my team. I wanted them to win the whole fucking shebang, and not get bounced in the first round yet again.

But it’s how it all transpired that I felt like writing about, because it defied all logic and convention, and as far as making educated guesses go, was not how it was supposed to happen. And like all high-tension critical games go, it was of course, the emotional rollercoaster that makes victory sweeter for those on the winning side, and defeat that much more painful for those on the losing side.

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The perils of winning

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I asked the wheelchair-bound man if I would be bothering him if I took some pictures while kneeling beside him.  He said that it wouldn’t be a problem at all.  I knelt down and took two quick snaps of Freddie Freeman fouling off pitches, and then an usher was on my ass like it was delivered from the sky like in Sharknado.  Telling me I couldn’t take pictures there, I couldn’t stand here, there, and that I needed a ticket.  I could have questioned him, but it was pretty clear from the onset that black-man-on-a-power-trip was going on, so it wouldn’t have gotten me anywhere.  I simply said okay, and left.

Earlier in the evening, and I use the term evening loosely, considering it was 5:15, almost a full two hours prior to the first pitch, sunny and beautiful, and with less than 300 people in the entire stadium.  I politely asked the usher in 103 if I could go down to the bottom of the section to snap a couple of pictures of some players taking batting practice.

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