The horrifying near-death of a Portland Oregon area girl has resulted in perhaps the funniest baseball related headline I’ve ever read. The lead ain’t half bad either:
Ground Swallows Girl As She Plays Baseball
PORTLAND, Ore. — A 9-year-old girl playing baseball on city land Wednesday was suddenly swallowed by a sink hole and was rescued by the children playing with her.
The child’s grandmother said it’s a miracle her granddaughter is alive after she fell through the top of an old septic or cesspool system in a vacant lot owned by the city of Portland.No one knew it was there and the city filled the hole Thursday afternoon. City workers said the hole was anywhere from 16 to 20 feet deep.What seemed like a carefree game of baseball Wednesday turned scary for three children when Paje Wiklund, 9, disappeared under the ground as she was running to first base.
Meanwhile, ESPN The Mag has a nice profile on the gaping sinkhole that may or may not exist inside Manny Ramirez’s head. As usual, the story’s best insight comes from Russell Branyan:
When Manny talks to mere mortal hitters, his advice can be as frustrating as it is enlightening. “When I was playing with him in Cleveland,” says Branyan, “Manny was trying to help me, and he asked, ‘Why do you swing at inside fastballs when you can’t hit them?’ I’m thinking, Because I’m geared up, and by the time I realize it’s an inside fastball, it’s too late to stop. And Manny would say, like it was easy, ‘I don’t swing at that pitch unless I’ve got two strikes. And then I just try to foul it off.’ So, basically, he’s playing a different game.”
One time, Ramirez laid it all out for Branyan, gave him the whole hitting equation. “He told me that he put 70 percent of his weight on his back foot and 40 percent of his weight on his front foot. And even though I knew the numbers didn’t add up, I thought for a second, I’ve got to try that.”
And most importantly, Josh Wilker at Cardboard Gods shines a light on the internet’s newest sensation: Big Lebowski Baseball Cards:
I may well have this wrong, but I believe the project got its start at Achiever Card Blog and Cheese and Beer and then got a boost from the photoshop master at Punk Rock Paint along with other contributions from Tastes Like Dirt and White Sox Cards.
Anyway, if anybody sees an Arthur Digby Sellers card sitting around, please let me know. I’m in the market.
Some seriously eerie, and even uncanny, 
