Jose Bautista Clutch Single

There have been a lot of baseball songs written and produced throughout the history of the sport, but like everything else, great baseball songs are rare, like Jose Bautista Clutch Single. I was just lamenting yesterday how musicians don't seem to write songs about specific ballplayers any more. I was wrong, sort of. Songwriter and producer Alex Cantrall and his partner, Jeff Hoeppner have created an excellent music video and song that is not only compelling to listen to but reflects the era in which is was created, namely using an R&B style. To more fully appreciate this song, it helps to listen to it in light of 'Did You See Jackie Robinson Hit That Ball' or 'Say Hey (The Willie Mays Song).

Pete Rose, Steve Garvey & George Brett Caricatures

 

 

George Foster Caricature

Garret Anderson Caricature

Just for fun.

Baseball Photos on Zimbio

If you're like me, you've searched Google Images for photos of your favorite players past and present. Recently, I discovered the power of Zimbio, an online magazine publisher, which has a nice gallery to view ballplayers as well as other celebrities.

There are different ways to get to the galleries, but the easiest one I've found is by manually typing in the person's name like so into your browser's navigation toolbar:

http://www.zimbio.com/photos/Joey+Votto
http://www.zimbio.com/photos/Prince+Fielder
http://www.zimbio.com/photos/Albert+Pujols

Zimbio immediately tells you above the first photo how many press photos (usually from Getty Images or AP Photos) it has archived of the person. You can also preview the thumbnails to the right, similar to Yahoo's MLB Gallery. The main difference is that Yahoo managed to pull an archive of 80 photos for Joey Votto, whereas Zimbio pulled a 247 photo archive. Zimbio also has a black background, providing better contrast for viewing the photos.

One caveat is that while Google Images pulls earlier images from the entire world wide web, Zimbio only pulls press photos. So if you're looking for that 1964 Topps Willie Mays card, you're better off using Google Images or EBAY. However, if you're somehow interested in following retired players in the press, Zimbio is a nice place to start your search. For example:

http://www.zimbio.com/photos/Willie+Mays
http://www.zimbio.com/photos/Mike+Schmidt
http://www.zimbio.com/photos/Nolan+Ryan