Results tagged “Fanorama” from Who Made You Mirabelli?

The latest of a 227-million part series of Red Sox links worth reading on the web ...

-- Final Reward; Stan Grossfeld, Boston Globe: A terrific piece about the unconquerable quest of some devoted Sox fans to have their ashes sprinkled on Fenway soil.

-- Baseball Notes: Yankees Are in Another Fix; Nick Cafardo, Boston Globe: Cafardo makes the case that the pinstripes could be in for more early struggles. Here's hoping he's right.

-- Manny Swings Powerful Club; Jeff Horrigan, Boston Herald: The Herald beat man puts Manny Ramirez's powerful, rising home run total in perspective, with the help of some of ManRam's esteemed colleagues.

-- Awake at a Lumber Party; Michael Silverman, Boston Herald: The other Sox beat man puts Boston's resurgent lineup in its place, right back up towards the top in average and power.

-- Will Jim Rice's Blog Put Him in the Hall of Fame?, Red Sox Monster: The title pretty much says it all for Dan Lamothe, though he hits on what may already be the best blog question/answer Rice will ever post.

-- Thoughts on Fenway Park: Where Do We Go From Here?, The House That Dewey Built: A compelling case to tear down the Fens? Say it aint so!

Which, given the events of the past week, means something positive for a change. Let's face it, after a brutal five-game losing streak, all Red Sox fans need it.

Luckily for us, an obscure YouTube poster has tripped across his personal calling in life: imitating current and historic Red Sox players' batting stances. Really. The user calls himself "Batting Stances" (he also has a Yankees, Cardinals and 1980s montage and, we hope, more in the chute) and his personal parody walks the narrow line between brilliant fascimile and overwrought imitation. Quite frankly, it's perfect.

We'd claim a favorite, but this guy is just too good at everyone. The inimitable Jimmy V. of a particular suburban Boston daily sent this along to WMYM, and he was partial to the Mo Vaughn swings. That's pretty hard to argue with, particularly considering the fact that Young Mr. Stances found a way to swing in full hunchback mode without throwing out his back.

As for WMYM, we're awful drawn to the Kevin Youkilis swings, despite that fact that Youk has yet to reach all-timer status. Starting his lower hand above the top of the bat is incredible, as is the Youk reaction on the called third strike. And how can you downplay the Manny reaction at seeing his supposed homer was a double?

Brilliance folks. All we could ask is for a little more early 90s, please. Mike Greenwell anyone? What about a Troy O'Leary appearance?

OK, we know. Too much analysis, not enough flash. Here's your video of the day. Enjoy.

WMYM's latest installment in newsworthy notes and links from around punditocracy and the blogosphere ...

-- Nothing Sweet For Red Sox: Boston Herald, Michael Silverman -- Silverman's gamer is truly punctuated by this gem of a one-liner: "Who needs the Yankees as rivals? The Rays can put up as good a fight as anyone in the American League East apparently. As the final set in their 20-games-in-20-days test, the Red Sox sure picked a bad time to face a good team."

-- Loss May Prove to be a Tremendous Victory: Boston Herald, Rob Bradford -- Bradford's strength has always been that he truly gets it. He gets what's important in the course of a very long baseball season. He gets what makes the Red Sox such a unique civic-baseball love-fest. And he also gets how important the one bright spot from the past three days has been: Clay Buchholz's gem of a loss could pave the way for much bigger things to come.

-- The Ghost Of Irony 15 Years Later: Red Sox Monster -- Just check out Dan Lamothe's list of pseudo celebs in that video right below the YouTube clip. Classics like that don't come easy, trust us.

-- Baffled: Emyreal Environs -- Great headline for a gamer recap. Wish WMYM had thought of that. Kudos.

-- Angels @ Sox Gallery: Justin Masterson's Debut: A Red Sox Fan From Pinstripe Territory -- More evidence why MLB needs to make sure it keeps allowing civilians to bring in their personal digital cameras.

-- "Irwined": The House That Dewey Built -- Occasionally a word is worth 1,000 words. Or just a really bad weekend.

We're long overdue for an episode of YouTuberific, but that, combined with fans getting into the swing of craziness as the season hits it's stride, only means one thing: The clips are top notch right off the bat. So instead of dwelling over a brilliant spot start by Justin Masterson wasted, or the ongoing, real-time tribulations of Jon Lester, let's revel in Boston idiocy.

1) Is there any way that the return of the Bullpen Band on Patriot's Day WOULDN'T be the top clip? We think not, particularly considering the fact that their incessant jug band style drumming sparked another rally. Coincidence? Not likely.

2) In case there was any question, Red Sox fans and Yankee fans still don't get along. Though the bitterness seems to be equally shared down in that New York borough now, doesn't it?

3) Everyone's seen this by now, but it's still worth watching out of sheer Schadenfruede. At least the "cursed" jersey sold for $110K for the Jimmy Fund.

4) More of the bedlam in the Yankee Stadium stands, though shouldn't a New York cop NOT be able to throw a fan's hat off the upper deck?

5) If anything, the World Series titles seem to have made Red Sox Parents even crazier than normal. WMYM is all for teaching the glorious ways of the Sox, but shouldn't Elmo get a little more face time first?

6) Say what you will about the New Hampshire Union-Leader's Sox coverage, but you have to give them this: As with this Masterson video, they often have impeccable timing.

7) Ahh, more of kids, Sox and hating the Yankees. Hard to go wrong with that combo.

8) We have a little credo here at WMYM: When in doubt, finish with a drunken old man dancing in the Fenway stands. The real question is whether he was getting down to Neil Diamond or just an old organ tune that was one of his childhood faves.

Why wait until 9 or 10 tomorrow morning to get your headlines when you can steal them here first? Well, at least that's the philosophy behind WMYM's "Late Links", where we occasionally stay up far too late so you don't have to.

- Boston Globe, Amalie Benjamin: Buchholz Delivers a Win - Benjamin starts her gamer with Buchholz's own ominous beginning, yet does a decent job of capturing the rapid devolution of the Rangers, from former Sox hurler Kason Gabbard's awkward stride to some of the worst middle relief you'll ever see.

- Boston Globe, Amalie Benjamin: Lugo Getting it Done on Offense - It may only be the notebook, but it tells a profound truth. Don't believe it if you don't want to, but it's true, Lugo is swinging a hot bat. Unfortunately for him, so is Jed Lowrie. The race is on.

- Boston Herald, Steve Buckley: Don't Be Too Quick to Judge Big Papi - Please, don't get WMYM wrong. We HATE to link to anything from Steve Buckley. We get enough saccharine from snorting packets of Splenda every day, and the last thing we need is an older sweetener. Still, like Benjamin's notes piece, Buck has a point in preaching patience as Ortiz continues to fine tune his swing and, perhaps more importantly, his stance following off-season knee surgery.

- Red Sox Monster - Life Lesson: Sometimes Karma = Gravity - Red Sox Monster blogger Dan Lamothe pulled himself out of his most recent UMass basketball related depression (losing Opie, err, Travis Ford) to note the horrendous drop from the upper deck on Patriot's Day. Luckily for all of us, he's got the video replay to prove how bad it truly was.

- Over the Monster - Comeback Kids Times 2 - WMYM LOVES graphs of all shapes and sizes, yet it was horrible at math. Take that irony.

- SawxBlog - Best Weekend Ever in Boston - You know how sometimes a title really can be truth in advertising (unlike, say, Feats of Clay)? Well, let's just say that SawxBlog is soaking it all in.

- Yanksfan Soxfan - Next Year's GM - In case you didn't already know, the best time to go haunt YanksFan SoxFan is at a time just like this, when the Sox are rolling and Yankees just dropped two of three to the Orioles. Oh, and anytime Hank Steinbrenner says anything. He's like the Christmas gift that just keeps giving.

WMYM is going to roll out a new YouTuberific format this week, where we'll give you the breakdown of what each video is and then drop all the videos before. That way, if you don't want to comb through all the clips you won't have to in order to find some of the week's wackiest Sox clips. And, if you do, you'll know what's coming a little bit quicker.


Not to mention that it makes it a hell of a lot easier on WMYM, who spent two hours last week trying to format the video frames correctly only to see them cut into the text nonetheless. Gotta love the interwebs.

So, here's what WMYM dredged up this week, all while rowing Tim Wakefield down a river of his own tears after WMYM's personal anithero was released yesterday.

1) Just because it's spring training for players doesn't mean that mascots are lagging behind the eight-ball, too. Just check out Wally and Raymond, of Tampa Bay and crushing Sox dolls fame.

2) The Fort Myers News-Press was looking for the best Red Sox fan to chronicle for a day during spring training games. Needless to say, the "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" renditions aren't winning any spots on American Idol.

3) Hey, manic Red Sox fan is nothing new, but trying to teach a baby named Benjy to confirm season suppositions? A bit much, isn't it?

4) Pedroia hit Jim Rome's "Rome is Burning" show, and while a little distressed that he would make that appearance BEFORE the season, WMYM is nonetheless thrilled that he didn't deem it worthy of turning his hat the right way around.

5) Brokeback Yankees. Will the grill au' Rahgah and Andy ever get old? It's a dish WMYM could dine on every night.

6) It may be an easy target, but what did the Yankees expect when dropping a standup comedian in the leadoff hole? Billy Crystal struck out and ... WMYM's Schadenfruede ensues.

WMYM has a thick basket of Red Sox YouTube clips to push through this week, so there's little time to waste on honorifics and erudite intros. Intros? We don't need no stiinnnking intros!

Naturally, we have to lead off with clips from Mike Lowell's charity fundraising dance fest. Big props to Red Sox Monster for digging these bad boys up on YouTube, which is a heck of a lot better than resorting to boston.com footage:

So, we can bring you Pedroia the Destroya, taking redneck shirtless dancing to a whole new level:



And what Red Sox dance off would be complete without Papelbon looking like a metrosexual lunatic?


Is anyone surprised that Mike Lowell, smoking what actually could be a Cuban cigar, has by far the best moves?

Well, Alex Cora might defend his own performance on the dance floorWe can't show you the Red Sox cookie off here, but trust us, you want to see it right here. Now THAT is a great tradition.

Somehow, Red Sox Monster also dug up this. How, exactly, does one teach a dog that "Yankees" equals "you're not getting a cookie or a walk for a month". And can we do that?


As if we didn't already have enough dancing, evidently Papelbon really is an inspiration.

Seriously, do people really think that they're going to land a record deal by dropping a Red Sox musical slideshow on YouTube?




Some people should NOT be allowed to buy small, doll-like replicas.

Well, maybe they weren't THAT young, but WMYM will never skip the chance to drop Lebowski quotes. Never.

So, what the hell are we talking about? Clearly, we're talking about this:

Jesse Levis, a former big-league catcher who last year completed his first season as a pro scout for the Red Sox, faces two felony counts of lewd and lascivious behavior on persons under 16 after an incident Monday in a Port St. Lucie, Fla., hotel.

Naturally, Gordon Edes is a bit more delicate with his terminology than we are. Here's what the guy was doing: Masturbating at a window. Yup. The former big league backup catcher was looking for ... well, the joke just gets intolerably distasteful from there, but you get the idea. Because he got rapped in Port St. Lucie, WMYM is guessing one Mr. Levis was doing some advance scouting of the Mets, or perhaps was involved in talent evaluation in case the Sox ramp up trade talks with wheeler-dealer extraordinaire Omar Minaya. Of course, you can read a lot more about Senor Minaya's exploits and slow, impressive attempt to build a world class team with every Latin American star on the planet ... plus David Wright over here. What's more interesting to people who would wander onto a site named after another backup catcher is whether this could be a developing trend among backup catchers. We're hoping not, but we decided to pop into photos of backup catchers to see if there's anything that gives off the creeptacular vibes that we stereotypically associate with the men Walter Sobchak like's to tell The Dude are "Pederasses":
                                             
                                                                       Kelly Stinnett