Monthly Archives: July 2012

Mike Trout and Bryce Harper pictured together at the 2012 All Star Game (Photo: SI).

The All Star Game is usually a showcase for baseball’s most established veteran superstars, but even with the presence of iconic players like Derek Jeter, Justin Verlander, and David Ortiz, most of the focus during this year’s Midseason Classic seemed to be on the game’s two youngest players. Beyond celebrating the obvious talents of the Angels’ Mike Trout and Nationals’ Bryce Harper, however, was the sentiment that the two phenoms represented a youthful resurgence brought about by steroid withdrawal. Although that line of reasoning fits nicely into the anti-steroid narrative,  is baseball really undergoing a transition to younger players?

Distribution of Major League Debut Ages, by Decade

Note: Total includes all players who debuted at the age of 21 or younger. Team Seasons is the sum of all teams in each year.
Source: Baseball-reference.com

Because Harper and Trout are so immensely talented, it is easy to see why their presence would overshadow the underlying trend. Since the 1970s, position players have been promoted at an increasingly older age, while younger pitchers have debuted at a steady rate. Even the most recent data falls in line with these trends. It might seem like Trout and Harper are leading the march of youth, but aside from the Nationals’ rookie, only five (four pitchers and one hitter) other players below the age of 22 have made their major league debut in 2012.

Distribution of Call-Ups, by Month

Note: Includes all players who debuted at the age of 21 or younger.
Source: Baseball-reference.com

With over one half the season remaining, it’s possible that 2012 could wind up yielding a bumper crop of young talent, but it’s worth noting that over the last 20 years, the number of prospects promoted in the second half, and particularly in September, has declined significantly. Instead of the traditional practice of giving young players a chance to experience the majors at the end of each season, teams are now allowing the arbitration clock to determine promotions. As a result, players with the potential to impact the pennant race are being called up in the middle of the season (usually in mid-June to July, when they can’t accrue enough service time to shave a year off team control), or not at all.

Average Major League Baseball Player Ages

Note: Graph is not a time series, but rather an average age sampling from the start of each decade compared to 2012.
Source: Baseball-reference.com

Even though the number of active 40-somethings has been on the decline, baseball is still an “older” man’s game when compared to the past. The arrivals of Harper and Trout have certainly been exciting developments, but what makes each player so special is more their talent than their tender age. Granted, the combination of Trout’s and Harper’s youth and ability make them a particularly dynamic duo, but baseball fans shouldn’t expect too many similar cases to emerge in the near future.

Check out this impressive gallery of photographs by Camille Seaman over at The Atlantic (which I found linked over at Kottke).

Another day, another win for the Yanks over the Browns. This time, it was a 7-5 win, the team’s twelfth in a row. It took DiMaggio until the fourth inning to get his hit, a solid double to center field. He would add a single later on. The Indians were busy losing to the A’s, so the Yankee lead was now a healthy five games.

[Featured Image via The Pintar Rag]

Here’s a cool article over at Slate by my man Dave Tompkins on why the Fat Boys still matter.

And check out Jesse Serwer’s 2008 interview with Prince Markie Dee.

That cool, refreshing drink.

Saveur gives us lemon shake ups.

[Photo Credit: Food Addict]

[Photo Credit: Sumeja Tulic via Je Suis Perdu]

Elektra via Comic Book Artwork.

Listen to William Faulkner’s Nobel Prize Speech.

On July 11, 1914 Babe Ruth made his big league debut.

Yesterday, the Photo Booth blog at the New Yorker ran a photo gallery of Ruth to mark the occasion.

Smoochin’ and more. Photographs by Mario De Biasi.

Over at the always outstanding, Everyday I Show.

Sunset in Manhattan. I remember walking up Broadway during the summer as a teenager. As I crossed each block, I’d look down past West End Avenue and chart the sun lowering in the sky until it had disappeared beyond the Hudson River and the sky was pink and orange. It was like a walking flip book. Then the lights from the stores and traffic signs and cars popped on the city street. Magic hour, that surreal moment between night and day when everything seemed like it was out of a movie.

[Photo Credit: Atenacius via This Isn’t Happiness ]

Over at the New York Post, Steve Serby chats with Brian Cashman.

At this point, it must have seemed like DiMaggio’s streak would keep going forever. Forever comes just one day at a time, and on this day DiMaggio kept the streak going. The Yankees opened up a four-game lead as they beat the Browns, 6-2, for their eleventh straight win. Once again, DiMaggio singled in the first inning to reach fifty in a row, but he was far from done. He would single twice more and then finish his day by smashing his league-leading twentieth home run in the ninth inning. He was 4 for 5 on the day, which brought his average up to .365, still far short of Ted Williams. The Boston slugger had been slumping of late, and his average had dipped all the way down to .398. As history tells us, he’d recover.

Simple.

From Serious Eats, lemon polenta cookies.

[Photo Credit: Carrie Vasios]

Sorry I’m late in sharing this story about Arnold Hano.

For more on Arnold read Hank Waddles’ two part interview (part one and part two).

[Photo Credit: Scott Smeltzer]

…Found?

The people ride in a hole in the ground… Oh, for the love of Julie Munshin.

Edward Steichen, 1936

Then I rose, wiping a blunt’s ash from my clothes, then froze only to blow the herb smoke through my nose.

Lyrical masterpiece.

I never liked Madonna’s records or her acting. Watching her being interviewed is painful. And as a sex symbol I’ve only occasionally been drawn to her. I’m not turned on by the women-pretending-to-have-balls schtick, at least not in her case. So when she was in her prime, I didn’t dig her.

That said, I admire her for sticking around so long and for all that she’s accomplished as a pop icon. And I learned some more about appreciating her after reading this 2002 GQ article by Jennifer Egan:

For Madonna, it’s fantasy only; even when her moves have looked self destructive, she’s always emerged unscathed. To be loved as a celebrity, she once said, “You need to disappear, run out of steam, run out of ideas…You need to have a drinking or a drug problem. You have to go in and out of rehabs so people can feel sorry for you. Or you need to kill yourself, basically.” But Madonna has avoided all of that: no rehabs or suicide attempts, no arrests or collapses or devouring lawsuits or serial divorces or appalling plastic surgery — scandals, yes, but always of her own making and always, finally, to her own advantage. Sometime very early on, Madonna learned a different way to subvert her rage and quell the fear and pain that are usually handmaidens to an ambition as ravenous as hers: hard work. “I ultimately end up making my own work,” she has said. “I don’t sit around waiting for other people to give it to me. I’ve had to do this to ensure myself constant employment.”

Morton’s account of Madonna’s early performing years is a litany of wrong turns (including the fact that her first single, “Everybody,” was marketed as the work of a black artist) that could have terminally discouraged a less tenacious and resourceful performer. But no matter what went wrong, Madonna always had a next move. She kept producing good material by playing to her own strengths and finding people to compensate for her weaknesses. This ability to create year after year in the face of loud and persistent nay-saying is the single thing that has ensured Madonna’s ongoing success. I can only admire it.

Now comes the point where the writer is supposed to indulge in a bit of prognostication: what’s next? I could do this–ruminate sagely over the staying power of her marriage to a macho guy ten years younger or tsk that those tank tops might not cut it when she’s 50. But by defying twenty years’ worth of such speculations, Madonna has made a lot of smart people look like dummies. So I’ll pass. Better to admit that I have no idea what she’ll do, except that I can’t imagine her stopping. There’s pleasure in not knowing–especially when term limits on fame seem shorter than ever and the surprises we get from celebrities are rarely pleasant. Madonna hasn’t exhausted us because we haven’t exhausted her, which is another way of saying that she hasn’t exhausted herself.

[Photo Credit Via Village9991]