Today's Birthday Team includes a batting tee designer and a guy who really hates spiders.

he's the only Joe Smith of consequence in history

It’s eminently possible that [Domonic] Brown, given the right environment, could grow into a Ken Griffey Jr. clone.

There was something vindicating about watching the 2004 Red Sox win the World Series with our worthless manager and our malcontent ace. Something perverse that made me uncomfortable with winning.

During the 2006 season, I started following the Kansas City Royals. Not as a replacement for the Phillies, but as an insurance policy. I was worried that the Phillies would suddenly become a National League power, which, of course, they did, and that I would be unable to cope with cheering for a winning team. If that were to come to pass, I would have to have a backup plan in place.

But now that everything’s not going right, it’s like I’ve died and gone to the late 1990s–our stars are always injured, we only have one good starting pitcher, we need to make a big trade, we’re one critical piece away, we should start bringing up our minor league starting pitchers…there’s something comforting about being transported back to when you were 12 years old. It’s like coming home and visiting your old elementary school teachers, then eating your mom’s spaghetti for dinner.

That’s why, even though I hate the Braves, I find losing to them strangely, well, comforting. It’s almost as if, after four years of breathing the rarified air of National League royalty, we’ve finally come home again.

I’ve never bought any of the various Kyle Kendrick resurrection myths that have been bandied about since he came crashing back to Earth in 2008 like command deck of the NSEA Protector at the end of GalaxyQuest.

Now only presidents of countries get this treatment (and usually only the prez of US in the American media).