Around The Horn

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I have been nominated for President of Red Sox Nation by Larry Lucchino. All I ever wanted was a job somewhere in baseball, and now I am trying to go to the top. The competition is steep at redsox.com they list me with the:

Celebrity Nominations

1. Joe Castiglione
2. Hazel Mae
3. Sam Horn
4. Mike Barnicle
5. Peter Gammons
6. Bill Simmons
7. Dennis Drinkwater
8. Cindy Brown
9. Rob “Just A Regular Rob” Crawford
10. Rick Swanson, “The Fan’s Commish”
11. Doris Kearns Goodwin

Then Boston Dirt Dogs ran this story about me, “The Fan who would be President”

Here is my Platform Statement to be President of Red Sox Nation:

Rick Swanson, born in New Britain, resides in Glastonbury, CT. Married since 1985 with 3 children.   P.E. teacher. I  went to my first Red Sox game in 1957, when TW hit a tying home run in the ninth against NY. Lucky enough to be there for Longborg, Fisk, and Papi, faithful enough to be there for Bucky, Buckner and Boone.

Wrote the following to the owner, president, and GM of the team after game 2 in 2004.  ”I’m going to say something now that probably no other Red Sox fan would even say, or even think. I hope they lose game three and fall behind 3 games to zero. Then I want to see the greatest comeback ever in the history of baseball. The 2004 Boston Red Sox will be the first team in baseball history to come back from the grave, and win a 7 game series after losing the first 3 games. Then on top of that they will then go on to win the World Series in four straight, over the Cardinals.”

The number one priority of my platform, is to influence the leaders to make the best trades, and play the right people at the right time, and to assist in leading the Red Sox to a World Championship every year. Well at least 2 in a row.

2. To put a team on the field that the fans love. Every effort will be made to bring back Orlando Cabrera, and Dave Roberts.

3. Johnny Pesky will be back in the dugout before October 1, if I am elected on September 29.

4. Red Sox Nation will be a free nation for all who want to participate. Any Red Sox fan with passion will be in. Pink hats too.

5. To create Red Sox World and hotel with 200 rooms with a view over the monster looking down on Fenway built over the Mass Pike. Better than Disneyland for all Red Sox fans. Machinima avatars will recreate every great game in Red Sox history. 

6. Retire number 25.   

7. Eliminate Standing from Standing Room Only, with a Walkstool for all.  

8. Have an Okajima titanium necklace day, where all fans receive the same red and white necklace, with the same magical powers. 

9. Put a new statistic to measure defense into baseball. Reaction and Range.  

10. Replay games by editing each game so you only see the last pitch of every at bat. A complete game will be shown in 30 minutes.

Rick Swanson

For now I call myself The Fan’s Commish soon I hope I can call myself President of RSN.

In this story by Nick Cafardo he brings up Pesky returning to the dugout with Bud Selig. Bud’s last line is “If anyone wants to invoke change with this rule, they should have a discussion with the general managers.” Now is the time for baseball fans to use the power of the internet, to change the rules of the game. Write an email to every GM and asked them to respond to this question.

     ”Would you allow any team icon over the age of 80 the privilege
      of sitting in the dugout for any game?”

We could ask Cashman first. Torre could even have his old friend Don Zimmer back. Boston will promise not to even use a matador move if Zimmer attacks anyone, especially since Pedro is not here to throw is head with a plate on the turf. Red Schoendienst could sit on the Cardinal bench as well. If Bob Feller wants to sit on Cleveland’s he is welcomed. You can ask the GM’s to vote on-line. Maybe we could get this change done effective immediately.

Another change that needs to be done is with the MLB rules committee. Wouldn’t you know that Sandy Alderson is the head of that committee. Baseball needs to implement a definition to a checked swing. On May 5th, with a struggling Johan Santana on the mound in Minnesota, David Ortiz had an eight-pitch at-bat that end by striking out. He appeared to check his swing on a 3-and-2 pitch and began walking to first base when he was called out by third base umpire Jeff Nelson. On the Red Sox radio broadcast  they said it was clearly umpire error on that call.  Ortiz screamed at Nelson, the NESN microphone in the dugout picked up Ortiz calling Nelson’s call “horse-blank.” It was pure manure by another example of umpires gone wild, for the sake of vain. Of course since baseball does not have anything in the Official Rulebook about checked swings, how could you argue any call? Tom Verducci alluded to this quirk in the rules, when he did his one day stand in  as an umpire this spring. Why can’t MLB have the same rule that the NCAA has adopted?

Section 2.0 of the 2007 NCAA Official Baseball rulebook states: A checked swing shall be called a strike if the barrel head of the bat crosses the front edge of home plate, or the batter’s front hip.

Baseball has done some pretty stupid things, but now they have gone too far, kicking Johnny Pesky out of the dugout. I thought they were ignorant last year, when they inducted 17 former “Negro League” players, and left off 94 year old Buck O’Neil last February, and he died in October. Now the Commissioner’s office has sent a stern memo to the Red Sox, threatening them with stiff fines, if they don’t comply with this edict. How does it help the Red Sox, and hurt other teams if Pesky is in the dugout? What if Boston had a petition, and asked every other team in the league, if they had any objections to Johnny being in the dugout? How about if MLB just institutes a 50 year rule. If you are in baseball for 50 years, you can sit in uniform in the dugout, anytime you feel like it. Don Zimmer and Red Schoendienst would also qualify under this rule.

It is time baseball uses common sense when they make a decision. Johnny Pesky is 87 years old, and still likes to put it on his baseball pants “one leg at a time..” Why doesn’t baseball get it, when it comes to the important things in life? Anyone who did not vote for Buck O’Neil should be banned from voting again. The person that signed this memo on Pesky should be tossed out of office. I challenge all fans of baseball to unite! Write to Bud at Bud.Selig@mlb.com Let Johnny Pesky sit in the dugout in 2007! 

I am:

The Fan’s Commish
Rick Swanson

2007 in baseball is going to be known as the year of X. First off is the new Pitch f/x that is taking over where Questec left off. Every park in baseball will have new Pitch f/x operators, that feed information on every pitch thrown in MLB in 2007.

For starters all umpires could be graded on their ball and strike calls, and the information will be accurate, and will be available for all parks, not just the chosen ones that had Questec. Pitch f/x is a term created by Fox, but there is another X factor thrown in. According to Mike Jacob the head of Sportvision that created the Pitch f/x technology. There is the opportunity to transform video gaming. “We could send live pitch data to an Xbox 360 or a simple gaming application on a phone where the user can try to hit live pitches.” That would mean that eventually every fan in America or in Japan could take the live pitches from either Daisuke Matsuzaka or Joel Zumaya and then try to hit them on their own gaming system. With the advent of the Wii gaming system, think of what the future could hold. Eventually the wii joystick will look just like a 34 inch 31 ounce baseball bat. As you stand in your living room and watch a live MLB game, you will be able to take each pitch from the real game, and then try to hit them yourself in your own living room.

Baseball is the one sport where you can put the pitcher on your video monitor, and then watch the wind up and pitch, and then try in real time to see if you can make contact with the gyroball or just swing and miss. Everyone likes to see a 100 mile an hour fastball, but do you think if you stood in living room with a bat in hand, that you really could hit that pitch? MLB is betting that everyone will want to be part of the MLB Game day experience. F/X stands for Fox and Xbox, and if you try hard enough you might be able to hit a pitch just like old “Double X” himself, Jimmie Foxx.

I am:

The Fan’s Commish
Rick Swanson