In the Bleak Midwinter

With temperatures running in the 0° range, it's sometimes hard to think of baseball. Not that baseball and winter don't make a beautiful combination, such as this photo by Dennis Flood Check out his work at his website.

Another striking wintry baseball photo I found on the web:

In unrelated news, Joe Torre has a book coming about, about The Yankee Years, that reportedly isn't flattering toward the organization and specific individuals, not naming any names cough, Cashman. Fans have been referring to the $25M man as Pay-Rod for years, but apparently his New York teammates call him by another nickname - A-Fraud. One of my favorite baseball books was Sparky Lyle's The Bronx Zoo; I think I'll enjoy this one as well.

How Many Days? Everyone keeps asking me. They want to know about Opening Day, but I don't do a count down for that. The count down is either to Pitchers & Catchers Report to spring training, Feb 14, or the B-Mets home opener, April 16. Hurray, hurray for the B-Mets opening on the road this season, maybe we can avoid chilling temperatures and the necessity of shoveling snow off the field. The first is now less than three weeks away, and the second is 79 days. But who's counting?

Talkin' Baseball Fantasy Leaguers, are you ready for draft day?

Early Card

The Cincinnati Red Stockings were the first professional baseball team, and they apparently had the first baseball team card. It's not a baseball card in the sense we usually think of, the bubble gum card type or its predecessor the tobacco card. It's more like the team photo promo piece.

Still, it's amazing that a bit of ephemera from 1869 acknowledging that first time is still around and in fairly good condition, considering it's been stuck away, forgotten, uncared for since who knows when.

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