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MLB Regular Season 2013 |OT| - Natinals Already Won

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B

Branduil

Member
Why are all of our batters turning into bad Josh Hamilton? I mean I'll take this lead with Darvish pitching, but still... a hit with the bases loaded would be nice.

Edit: Thank you based Berkman.
 
G

GhostWriter24

Member
rando14 said:
vmartlicked.gif
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Make Bish the catcher and home plate the new post button.
 
B

Branduil

Member
Is it just me or does Mike Trout purposely take stupid routes to fly balls just so he can show off by making "amazing" leaping catches?
 
G

G-Fex

Member
THE STREAK NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

DAHAYUMN YOO PADRES

San Diego sucks. Worst city I've been to
 
3

3N16MA

Banned
Curtis Granderson takes stupid routes but unfortunately they're not on purpose. He just gets horrible reads and then lets us all watch his weird ass route.
 
D

Dmncnby2k9

Banned
Prade said:
Shit looked like it hurt lol. Probably was shaving cream too. No one likes this kid lol.
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The Curious Case of Jordany Valdespin

The night of the T-shirt fight and the night of the pie. That is the most useful comparison to explain the movement toward acceptance by teammates of Jordany Valdespin, El Hombre, “most hated guy in here,” Mr. Clutch, whatever else you want to call this complex, thrilling, maddening and most interesting Met.

The T-shirt fight was the bad time. Last July in San Francisco, Valdespin violated team policy by wearing a white undershirt on the team bus to AT&T Park. You are required to wear a collar. With that mix of caring and bullying unique to locker room culture, a few veteran teammates cut up the shirt during the game, and defaced it with magic marker.

When Valdespin discovered this, he went ape. Screaming, cursing, storming toward Ike Davis and Josh Thole, neither of whom had anything to do with it. Terry Collins had to rush from his office, in street clothes, to diffuse the near-fracas.

“He’s an idiot,” one miffed teammate said that night.

“He’s a d-----bag,” added another the following morning.

Now for the pie night, which came late Wednesday. Valdespin did what he does, bashing a huge home run. This was his greatest performance to date, a walk-off grand slam against the Dodgers’ Josh Wall. Ball sailing into the right field seats, Valdespin whooping at the sky and chucking his helmet. Mayhem.

Justin Turner is usually the pie guy in moments like this. Minutes after this homer, he was in the clubhouse kitchen, preparing desert, when LaTroy Hawkins stepped in and requested the honor. Service time trumps all in this game, so the veteran got his wish, and Turner handed it over.

But Hawkins got himself busted in the dugout. Valdespin saw him with the pie, forcing him to pass it to John Buck. With a firm thrust, the burly catcher landed the tin and its contents on the side of Valdespin’s face, and everyone -- the victim included -- retreated to the locker room giggling, locked into boyish camaraderie.

“He is getting better,” one veteran said on Wednesday. “He still has a ways to go, but he is getting better.”

What, exactly, is the problem here? With Valdespin, it’s a complex blend of legitimate and silly violations. Rookies and sophomores are not supposed to pound their chest after hitting triples in the late innings of blowouts. They are not supposed to ask veterans for money for clothing by saying, “I’m a rookie, you have to buy me a suit.”

They are not supposed to show up on the team bus in an undershirt. Or declare themselves “the man” after their first big league homer. Or fail to run out popups all through the minor leagues. Or be suspended twice in one winter ball season for insubordination. Or miss the cutoff man often. All of these things, Valdespin has done.

From his perspective, he is just being himself, having fun, enjoying life, refusing to conform to the game’s conservative norms (many of which, he’s right, they’re stupid), while insisting that there is no real issue. “We’re a family,” he said. “We play hard every day. We have young guys in here. We have veteran guys in here. We have everybody on the same page.”

The veterans see it differently; they view it as their responsibility to teach young whippersnappers how to act like big leaguers. There are a lot of disconnects at play here -- cultural, generational, personality -- but both sides have shown incremental movement this year toward one another.

“It’s getting better,” one player said Wednesday. “Last year he would get mad when we tried to help. We’re like, ‘we’re trying to help. You’re a part of this team.’”

The games themselves have also presented a complicated blend of abandon and maturity. One teammate noted the contrast between’s Valdespin’s two at-bats on Wednesday. Entering as a pinch-hitter in the eighth with a runner on base and two outs, Valdespin flailed at the first pitch, and grounded out to end the inning.

Terry Collins noticed his reaction, and was impressed. “He came in and was disgusted by it,” the manager said. “(He said) ‘I’m jumping at the ball. I’ve got to stay back.’ All the things that hitters say. And then the last one, he went in there and he was as nice and peaceful and quiet as anytime.”

Valdespin took the first three pitches of his tenth-inning at-bat, before sending his teammates into a giddy frenzy with the walk-off. The afterparty was real, and it was fun, and it was all because of him. This was the good time.
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