Before I completely forget this (and run the risk of someone in December finding the contest in the archives, then accusing me of weaseling -- and yes, I'm pretty much looking at you, HowTheyScored), I should probably wrap up the contest and award the tix.  Here's the link to the contest and, thus, the entries: http://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2008/7/20/575612/2nd-half-gamer-parody-cont

Thanks to everyone who entered or commented.  A specific opposite-of-thanks to Natto, whose famous "Jaunty Shelled Armando" is on the t-shirt I happen to be wearing at this moment.  Anyway, you folks definitely added laughs and smiles in an otherwise dismal year.   You're all winners (except, of course, for the Giants and Natto).

But in another, more accurate sense, there are only two winners.  I have decided to award two prizes.  In the category of Straightforward Parody of the Misbegotten, Misguided, Crappy 2008 Giants Ad Campaign, I am awarding a pair of tickets to SoFa King Mike for fixing the Zito poster.   Also the Giants' legal team should thank him for saving them from a false advertising claim.

And speaking of that, the other big wiener is nvsfg for his fauxnnouncement from the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission.  While not precisely a spoof-type parody of the ads, it cleverly nails them in their non-existent nuts in a different format.

Contact me to figure out a game that works for you, exchange address, etc. 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/07/24/yankees-eye-barry-bonds-a_n_114867.html

So Hank Steinbrenner, one of five people currently alive who has a chance of being more repugnant than George Steinbrenner, apparently is going to "bring up" the idea of getting Barry Lamar Bonds to play for the Yankees for the stretch drive. 

I assume we all pretty much hate the Yankees, but would you rather see BLB get a chance to do something this year in Pinstripes rather than do nothing?  Is Hanky illiterate and thus didn't get the Collusion Memo?  Has Cashman really not being considering this and needed his owner to "bring up" Barry?

Your thoughts.

Now that a bit more than half the season is gone, I thought it would be fun to reprise -- and re-prize -- the great Parody Contest of the Giants 2008 "Gamer" ads.  Here is the link to the pre-season contest, in case you're nostalgic:

http://www.mccoveychronicles.com/2008/3/14/269631/parody-contest-all-out-all

As always, the standards are pretty amorphous. Clever, witty, funny is WAAAAAY more important than technically excellent Photoshopping/what have you. 

Winner gets a pair of my tix for some mutually agreeable game.  IN 2008, not when the team's good again.  Have fun, and thank you talented people for creating some fun for the rest of us.

Brian Horwitz came up to bat last night, (1) making his ML debut,  and (2) thus facing a pitcher he had never seen before, (3) probably even on video, (4) in a tie game, (5) when the Giants had been punchless for a few innings, (6) in a situation in which if the Giants score, game over and we win.  So he swings at the first goddamn pitch.  AAAGGGHHHHH.  It takes minimal brain capacity NOT to swing.  So he (I think) takes the next pitch, right down the middle.  He then, naturally, swings BADLY at the 3rd pitch for a 3-pitch K. 

And his was not the first 3-pitch K of the evening for the Giants.

So am I being either rash or harsh for thinking that Carney Lansford should be canned as our hitting coach?  Mind you, I'm not saying he should be axed because Horwitz didn't get a hit, but just because Horwitz went up there with NO plan at all, even something as simple as the advice I would have given him: "Son, I don't care what the pitches are, do not swing at the first two pitches.  Get a look at the pitches and the man throwing them, remember to breathe, and start having fun at the 3rd pitch." 

Horwitz isn't the only of our young guys who seem to go up with no plan and hack at first-pitch slop in tough situations.  It never works.  I am not in love with Bowker, but I give him credit that he SEEMS to go up with a plan in mind.  But the other young guys, not so much.  And I'm not holding Lansford at all responsible for Aurilia, Vizquel, Molina, or any of the other vets who aren't hitting well, as I think those guys are well beyond coachability.

Your thoughts.

From the people who brought you World Series with only night games and a structure that now permits teams to have evening starts for Saturday games throughout the summer -- both moves guaranteeing that young fans don't develop into lifelong baseball fans -- we now have a Memorial Day with... nothing.  I think I remember that Memorial Day has always had a triple-header on ESPN or a national game carried by MLB's broadcast partner.  Am I mistaken?  Why would MLB schedule so few games on Memorial Day?

Question:  What is your least favorite thing about how MLB or even individual teams relate to their customers? 

I personally find it unforgiveable to schedule evening games on Saturdays all through the summer (I have a 2 1/2 year old son who I take to weekend games, but cannot if they start at 6)... and this wasn't made totally clear before I bought my season tix.  I also find it unpleasant that there was no baseball today (other than a Cubs game on WGN, which I don't care about).

There I was at tonight's game, fuming at the baserunning idiocy that cost us a minimum of two (and quite possibly three or four) runs on our side, and the perfection that is ray goddamn durham, who cost us a few runs on the other side, getting good and angry... and OutKast's "Hey Ya" starts playing, and the camera is panning around, and catches Goofus dancing goofily, and then he put his arms around the lovely Mrs. Goofus, who smiled. 

It ruined a perfectly good pissed-off mood.

I am too dorky to be able to post links to the ads, but perhaps one of you can add them in a "FanCommentPostStimulusResponse" or whatever they are now.  Anyway, I will give a pair of tickets to the March 27 exhibition game vs. Seattle for the best parody of "All Out All Season" and a pair of tickets to the March 28 exhibition game vs. Oakland for the best paraody of "Gamer."  Deadline is Monday evening, as I will need to put them in the mail on Tuesday.

As with the parody contest for the All-Star logo, the standards are kind of amorphous, but obviously humor is about 90% of it, give or take 10%.

Sure, everyone here seems to love the "Gamer" commercials and the "All Out, All Season" tag line.  But let me point out a small something that might show a small imperfection in the marketing team's otherwise error-free play.

The season tickets were delivered yesterday, and they come with the customary pictures on them.  This year's theme is the 50th season in San Francisco, so the pictures are of great players in the San Francisco era.

There are 81 tickets to fill. (Gift to Grant -- better known as a Grant Grant -- you are free to use this as your next comment starter as you recover from illness: what images from 50 years of SF Giants ball should be "enshrined" on the tickets?  You're welcome.)

So who do they pick?  Jason Schmidt, who went on to play for the stinking dodgers. Same with Jeff Kent.  Kent was an MVP here (though shouldn't have been), so maybe there's an argument to be made that he should be on the ticket, but his dodger tenure and his anti-SF comments after leaving should disqualify him.  Schmidt was excellent, like, one season for us.  Enh.  Dodgers suck-- just saying.

Then there is some guy named "John Montefuso" on the 4/12 ticket. I don't know who that is, but the picture looks like John Montefusco.

The Opening Day ticket is double width, a nice enough touch, with a photo of the first pitch versus the stinking dodgers in SF in 1958. Fine. What's the next day's ticket? Bob Brenly. Prick. Before Mays or McCovey or either Bonds.  Brenly. Prick.

Al Gallagher, Jim King, Valmy Thomas-- they're all here. But no Marvin Benard. Hey, anyone who knows me knows me -- and many hundreds of fans within a few sections of View Box 311 -- knows I detested Benard, but what were the selection criteria for this 'honor'?

This was a good idea to put so many images from the past on the tickets, because the present is horrible. This is a year in which the Giants marketing should focus on what makes baseball so great and the experience so wonderful, et cetera. But with just stock photos of players and no pictures of great moments in SF history, and odd choices of players... I don't know. I guess I would have to say the Giants Marketing squad committed the rare error.

Here's a letter that B.R. Sabean just sent. I still haven't renewed my season tix - the deadline passed and I just couldn't justify feeling like a sucker anymore. If anyone wants to buy a quarter or half of the season, I could change my mind, but I just can't get my head around shelling out thousands of bucks for a loser plan-- I don't seek or need guaranteed wins and a guaranteed post-season berth (we're not Yankees fans, for god's sake). But if I'm going to throw real money into something, I have to see that it's going to some intelligent effort, and I don't see that with the Giants.  Am I wrong here?

Anyway, here's the Sabean letter of today, January 28.
____

Dear Richard,

With three weeks until the pitchers and catchers report to Scottsdale for the start of the 2008 season, I want to take this opportunity to give you a state of the Giants message. This off-season has been an exercise in patience, both on your part as our loyal fans and from the club's standpoint in acquiring the right type of impact players who will help the Giants not only in 2008 but into the future.

In recent years, you have become accustomed to us building our teams with an influx of veteran players, in many cases on a one-year basis. Moving forward, we are looking to build our teams with solid all-around players from within our system and supplementing them with high-integrity, impact players who will play major roles on our club for years to come. We have seen this formula work for clubs such as the Atlanta Braves of the early-1990s -- whose strength much like the Giants was strong starting pitching -- and we all know that they went on to win an unprecedented 14 consecutive division titles.

One of those players who will make a huge impact not only on the 2008 team, but over the next five years is our new Gold Glove center fielder Aaron Rowand. As we stress pitching, speed and defense in the new era of Giants baseball, the 30-year-old All-Star embodies those three attributes while also coming off the finest offensive season of his career in 2007. Perhaps his most marketable trait to us as we look to change the culture around our team is his "all-or-nothing" attitude once he takes the field.

When Rowand takes the field, he will be roaming center field at AT&T Park behind one of the top starting rotations in the National League. This winter our assumptions that Matt Cain and Tim Lincecum are two of the top arms in the game today were confirmed by all of the teams which wanted to acquire them. While off-season acquisitions often make headlines, I think our best moves have been the ones we did not make. In holding onto Cain and Lincecum, they combine with Barry Zito and Noah Lowry to be the foundation for a very strong rotation for years to come.

While the game starts on the mound, having a solid defense is crucial especially if you have to manufacture runs. The baseball axiom of having a strong defense up the middle applies with this team, as Rowand combines with catcher Bengie Molina and shortstop Omar Vizquel for 14 Gold Gloves. Our outfield defense will be much improved this year, as we could possibly have three center fielders covering the gaps at AT&T Park this season in Rowand, Dave Roberts and Randy Winn. That trio, along with youngsters Rajai Davis, Fred Lewis and Nate Schierholtz, will be an asset to our pitching staff as their speed will allow them to cover a lot of ground and hold runners from taking extra bases as they have in the past. In turn, that will keep the doubleplay in effect and help lessen pitch counts for our pitchers, allowing them to work deeper into games.

While pitching and defense will be key ingredients in our formula for success in 2008, we are also going to have to execute effectively at the plate and use a speed game to drive our offense. Bruce Bochy wants to instill an aggressive, selfless style in 2008 in which each player will be asked to do the little things and play for one run in an inning. The Giants have traditionally been a team that has relied on power, but this year's edition will be one that will need to execute the fundamentals and use aggressive baserunning to thrive.

Going into Spring Training, we are definitely going to give our younger players a chance to compete for significant playing time this season. Daniel Ortmeier and Kevin Frandsen embody the type of players who play an all-out brand of baseball. To not give a fair shot to players like them, who seem ready to play on a regular basis after what they showed down the stretch last season, would be counterproductive to getting our club on the right track.

One of our major downfalls last year was losing close games, as we played the most games in the majors decided by two runs or less (39-55). We expect to close the gap in those tight contests with an improved outfield defense, better situational hitting and a bullpen with young arms who have another year of experience.

I'm heartened to know that we have three viable candidates to close games in Brian Wilson, Brad Hennessey and Tyler Walker. As we all saw in September, Wilson has made great strides and appears to be ready to take the next step towards being an extremely valuable man in the late innings. Hennessey is a valuable commodity for us, as his versatility really give Bruce and Dave Righetti many options on how to use him -- starting, middle, setup or closing. Remember, he led our club with 19 saves last year. I am definitely intrigued by the return of Tyler Walker from Tommy John surgery at the end of last season. With even more time for his arm to recover, I look forward to seeing him help us close out victories with his late inning efforts.

Even with Spring Training just around the corner, I assure you that we are not standing pat with our club. We are always looking to strengthen our team for both the present and the future. With that said, it is quite possible that the team that reports to Scottsdale in three weeks will not be the same team that opens the season March 31 at Dodger Stadium.

Not only are we taking a new tact on the field, but we also made three major new additions to the front office to help supplement our baseball operations staff. To add the baseball knowledge of former White Sox GM Ron Schueler, longtime Dodgers' scout John Barr and former Pirates scouting director Ed Creech to the decision making process can only strengthen our personnel moves, both on the major- and minor-league levels.

As we enter a new era in Giants baseball, I think that you will enjoy watching a core of energetic players who will leave everything on the field in pursuit of victories when you come to AT&T Park. Like any time there is change, there is the potential for growing pains, but watching a group of young players grow into established major leaguers that lead a winning team can be even more rewarding. I look forward to seeing you at AT&T Park this season to watch the dawning of a new era in Giants baseball.

Sincerely,

Brian R. Sabean
Senior Vice President and General Manager

_____

Gotta say that I don't love seeing the phrases "the little things" or "will need to execute the fundamentals" (emphasis added).  Um, yeah, they will need to execute the fundamentals... is there any reason to think they, you know, will execute the fundamentals?

I appreciate that he's saying Ortmeier and Frandsen are going to get a "fair shot" (whatever that means). Does that mean Durham is expendable or become bench material... or does it just mean that Frandsen is going to get to play a lot in spring training and then ride the bench all year, not getting any better, not getting any experience, etc.?

Over to you.  Help me decide whether to renew my season tix, or rather become the Ex-Mayor of 311.

http://www.slate.com/id/2180392/

Very interesting stuff.  I love when graphics illuminate the data, not merely repackage it for its own sake.

And this just further highlights the randomness/luck/idiosyncratic factor of this report: had the Mitchell report not had THIS particular informant, the report would have been two pages long and mostly about good restaurants they discovered in their travels.  People should keep in mind that if all the Radomskies came forward or were known, the list of PED users would be waaaaaaaaaaay longer.  It's the random/lucky nature of research like this. If the street lamp is a few feet the other direction, or if there were more street lamps, the drunk would find more stuff.