Bryce Harper blah blah blah John Hirschbeck

To be honest, if I tried to write anything about the absolutely galling actions made by John Hirschbeck in yesterday's game, I might be here a while. Instead, I dealt with it how I normally do; with stupid stuff.

Here's what really happened to cause Harper to be ejected.

That's right, I made a "LOL Hirschbeck be old" joke. It was either that, or point out how he refused to side with most of his umpire brethren in 1999, and instead used it as an opportunity to take over as president of the umpires... clan.

If you want some good reads on the ejection, lookie these, if you haven't already.

SBNation.
Hardball.
SI has a bit about this incident, as well as a look at these new thin skinned scamps in blue.

Well, Opening Day went rather well, didn't it?

Sorry for not writing about opening day sooner, but I had a huge hangover. You see, I imbibed way too much HARPER-STRAS-ZIMMY AWESOME SAUCE. (Yeah!) Seriously, that was an awesome day, and anything I write certainly won't do the experience justice. Suffice to say, there were some incredible things at the park, including the awesome straight-from-getting-hitched-appearance by @TClippardsSpecs and @StephaNats (awesome job, you two, even if you are stuck for life with DOUG F*CKING SLATEN references, Stephanie) to getting my kid her first slushie (it was "red flavor," and she loved it).

After I got home, I took a long nap, cause seeing good baseball is exhausting, then popped the game on the TV. What follows is my lazy excuse for a post. GIFS. LOTS OF GIFS. Enjoy?

Brycey got a bit spicy. And then got a shower.

Ho hum. 19-year-old Bryce Harper hit the game winning single last night in the 12th inning to give the Nats the win over the Mets. Just another pimping moment in Bryce's pimping life. And, as you know, pimping is dirty business, so Mikey Mo was there to clean him off.

(As an aside, welcome back, Mikey. After what seemed like 19 straight ground outs to shortstop, he hit two doubles last night. The Beast abides.) Who didn't get the Gatorade shower, though? Sideline Dugout reporter Kristina Akra. After not being able to run fast enough in the past, she bolted to her left as soon as she saw the Gatorade this time. Unfortunately, though, there wasn't much room to her left, and she ran right into a camera guy. Oopsies.

Before the showering, however, was this wonderful scene. "BROSKI! IS JUMPY TIME!"

Tonight has Edwin Jackson on the bump, up against... well, some Met. Too lazy to look at the moment. It's Jackson's... wait, what start number is this for Jackson? Not to knock Edwin, but he sure has become the forgotten guy in this rotation, yeah? I mean, I'm struggling to remember even one of his starts. Maybe that's why this guy has been on seven teams in ten years. He produces, but just doesn't produce any memorable games. Except for that no hitter that he threw in Tampa Bay Detroit Arizona. Of course, that was just a matter of wearing down the other team. Just throw 200 pitches, and they'll get sick of looking at balls and start swinging at anything. Let's do one of those tonight, Edwin!

Ryan Zimemrman kills it, and Bryce Harper... also kills it. Too. As well.

If you didn't see Ryan Zimmerman's colossal shot that just missed hitting the left field concourse by a couple rows, well, you can click here. Or, just look below. In handy, dandy gif form is Zim just destroying some leather-wrapped cork and twine.

As a certain black orange brown (what the fuck color is Goofy?) animated dog would say, "GORSH!" Mike Leake probably wishes he would have stolen some sand to bury his head in instead of those t-shirts, AM I RIGHT?!?!? (Jokes about four-month-old news, folks. Yup, that's what you're getting right here.)

Not to be outdone, however, was Bryce Harper, who destroyed a baseball himself a couple nights ago. Not only was it his first homerun in front of the home field fans at Harrisburg, it was also a walk-off moon shot the likes of which, well, we'll get to that... First, witness the greatness:

Did you see where that ball went? It cleared the batter's eye in dead center field. That batter's eye wall is 400 feet from the plate. And its height? Great googly moogly! A closer look at that wall reveals just how incredible that home run was. I found this picture of it on the interwebs:

Now, what's that thing standing by the wall?

HOLY GODZILLA! Man! Whoa! A quick check of Wikipedia reveals that Godzilla stands 328 feet tall. His head seems to be above the wall, leaving the height of the wall to be from his feet to his neck, or, like, 300 feet tall. Now, if you factor in the height of the batter's eye (300') and the distance the batter's eye is from the plate (400') you get the true distance of how far that ball traveled. Don't worry yourself with the figures, though, as I did the math for you folks. (This is a full service blog, after all.) Are you ready for it?

Bryce Harper hit that ball 7,234,176 feet!!!!!!! That's gotta be, like, some kind of record, right?! Hey, Bryce, if that is a record, just let me know if you want me to get in touch with the folks over at the Guinness Book of World Records to provide them with my data. Then it can be all official like.

Bryce Harper gets to play with Derek Norris.

Well, it appears the Washington Nationals front office really, really likes Bryce Harper. So much so, in fact, that they skipped him forward a level, choosing to bypass the high-A Potomac Nationals, and sent him directly to the AA Harrisburg Senators. (They did allow him to pass go, however, and also allowed him to collect the $200 for it. Which for Bryce, is like... what he throws at bums while in his GIANT-ASS HOOPTY at intersections.) I cannot tell you how much this move favors Bryce. I mean, the Nats think so highly of him, that they are going to let him play with the man-bot himself, Derek Norris! (DeNo and I go way back, of course.) Bryce and DeNo got together a little before the game, and Harper peppered Derek with all kinds of questions. "What does this guy throw?" "Any hot babes in the crowd tonight ask about me?" "Where can I get super cool laser eyes like you?"* "Can I have your autograph please, Mr. Norris?"

*Derek does, indeed, have super cyborg laser eyes that can tell what pitch is coming, its speed, and its location. It's not recognizable to the naked eye, but if you spend enough time scouting stalking DeNo as I do, you can tell the exact moment he uses them, and can snap a picture if you're quick enough. I caught him in the dugout w/Bryce, using his powers last night:

See that look on Bryce's face? That's the "Whoa, shit goddamn, man!" look. He gets it around DeNo, Ryan Zimmerman, and when he's watching CMT's Biggest Redneck Wedding Ever. (What? He's not a redneck? Shiiiittt, did you even look at that link above about his hoopty?)

So, what happened last night? Well, Bryce did... okay (2-3 2 1B, 1 BB) but DeNo put an absolute ass whipping on the opponent, the Erie SeaWolves. (The what? SeaWolves? I ain't never seen any wolves swimming around in the sea, but... fucking whatever, man.) Derek went 3-4 w/2 HR, 1 2b, and a walk. That is called raking, my friends. And Derek raked till he couldn't rake no more. That'll do, DeNo. That'll do.

(There's also another argument going around that the Nationals didn't want Bryce to play for Potomac because of their field conditions. Apparently the outfield is a swamp that has alligators in it that eats outfielder's legs and shit. Or something. All I know is that it doesn't drain very well, and since it's rained quite a bit lately, the field is often unplayable. If this is the scenario that really happened, well then... Bryce Harper turned to his friend from above for some help.

(Hooray, I'm posting old blog gimmicks again! Do you know where the above picture is from? You don't? Well, then, hooray for today! You're truly lucky, I must say! Click here and waste your time away!)

Sorry about that rhyming above. This is what happens when you have a one-year-old that wants you to read her Hand, Hand, Fingers, Thumb a gajillion times in a row. I love her to death, but if I recite "Dum Ditty, Dum Ditty, Dum Dum Dum" a few more times, I'm going to snap the next time I hear a drummer. Some poor kid playing some buckets outside the Navy Yard metro station after a Nats game is going to have a skinny white guy attack him like Dmitri Young going after the last bag of Chips Ahoy! in his house. It won;t be pretty, my friends.

Bryce Harper's secret weapon.

Oh, boy. We all knew Bryce Harper (the number one overall pick by the Washington Nationals this year) was angling for a huge signing. I mean, he did some extraordinary things to be eligible for this draft - He took his GED after his sophomore year in High School and enrolled in Junior College - thus moving up his eligibility. And to add to that, with the deadline approaching to sign Bryce or lose him back to the draft pool looming (8/16 at midnight), Bryce has gone and enrolled in classes again for this coming semester.
I chalked that up to posturing, and had good feelings that the Nationals would sign him, and I still believe they will call his bluff and get it done. I'm just not sure, anymore, that it won't be for an astronomical sum of cash. You see... Miss Chatter's Twitter feed led me to a Bryce Harper signed ball this morning. I Googled for other Bryce signed balls, and sure enough, he signs them all the same way:



A quick search for Luke 1:37 brings up the following quote:

"For nothing is impossible with God."

Oh. I see. Weird, I didn't know he was religious. How did I miss this? I mean, I even searched through some pictures of him and didn't see any signs. OR DID I??? I took a closer look at this picture, and found something weird (I've added an arrow to point your eyeballs in the right direction:


Hmmm... I had the CSI lab zoom and enhance the picture and the results are in:



Dammit. If that Luke 1:37 quote is true, the Nats are over a barrel. .