{"id":181,"date":"2007-10-07T11:36:50","date_gmt":"2007-10-07T16:36:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/velcroblog.com\/?p=181"},"modified":"2007-10-07T17:37:09","modified_gmt":"2007-10-07T22:37:09","slug":"best-and-worst-of-2007","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/velcroblog.com\/?p=181","title":{"rendered":"Best And Worst of 2007"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>How delightful was it to watch the Phillies get swept? Go Rockies! Now, please enjoy my dumb opinions about the year. I&#8217;ve included the winners (and losers) from last year to add some perspective. Let me know what you guys think of my choices.<\/p>\n<p><b>Best All Around Player:<\/b> For me, it was Matt Diaz. His defense improved so much, and I knew that it would if Bobby just showed a little faith in him. And his offense never faltered. I&#8217;m sure the Braves will try to sell him to Japan again this offseason.<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s winner: Heap)<br \/>\n<b>Runner-Up:<\/b> Chipper<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s runner up: Smoltz) <\/p>\n<p><b>Worst All Around Player:<\/b> Mark Redman. No contest.<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s worst: Reitsma)<br \/>\n<b>Runner-Up:<\/b> Chris Woodward. WHAT THE HELL WAS THE POINT?!<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s runner up: Brian Jordan)<\/p>\n<p><b> Best Surprise:<\/b>  Peter Moylan<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s best surprise: Matt Diaz)<\/p>\n<p><b> Worst Surprise:<\/b> Andruw Jones<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s worst surprsie: Tim Hudson)<\/p>\n<p><b> Best Game:<\/b> For me, it&#8217;s a tie between <a href=\"http:\/\/atlanta.braves.mlb.com\/news\/gameday_recap.jsp?ymd=20070905&#038;content_id=2191154&#038;vkey=recap&#038;fext=.jsp&#038;c_id=atl\">coming back to beat the Phillies in the 8th and 9th after we were down by six runs<\/a>, and the last game I went to this season, when Devy got the win and we won in the 11th.<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s best game: <a href=\"http:\/\/atlanta.braves.mlb.com\/news\/gameday_recap.jsp?ymd=20060917&#038;content_id=1667403&#038;vkey=recap&#038;fext=.jsp&#038;c_id=atl\">September 17th<\/a> against the Marlins)<\/p>\n<p><b> Worst Game:<\/b>  Another tie, between all three games of our last homestand against the Mets, who were phenomenally awful at the end of the year, but still held us to like half a run throughout the series. What a joke.<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s worst game: HoRam&#8217;s meltdown in the first game of an important series against the Mets on July 28th. We ended up getting swept that time, too.)<\/p>\n<p><b> Most Energetic:<\/b> Yunel Escobar<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s Winner: Marcus Giles)<\/p>\n<p><b> Least Energetic:<\/b>  Bob Wickman<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s winner: Adam LaRoche)<\/p>\n<p><b> Best Sponsorship:<\/b> Sonic, for using Joe and Chip in a &#8220;commercial&#8221;<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s winner: Rinnai Tankless Water Heaters: The Official Water Heater of the Atlanta Braves!)<\/p>\n<p><b>Most Annoying Commercial:<\/b> That fucking &#8220;Keno&#8221; piece of garbage.<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s worst: &#8220;It was CARRIE!!&#8221;)<\/p>\n<p><b>Most Entertaining Phrase from a Commercial:<\/b> &#8220;Cole slaw,&#8221; as said by Heap in the Sports South promo where they talk about their least favorite foods. I don&#8217;t know why, but I laugh out loud every time I hear him say that.<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s winner: &#8220;separate cat rooms&#8221; from a radio commercial for a pet service)<\/p>\n<p><b>Most Uses of the Word &#8220;Awesome&#8221;:<\/b> Heap<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s winner: Heap)<\/p>\n<p><b>Biggest PR Disaster:<\/b> Wicky. Everyone was all too happy to out him as an asshole after he got canned.<br \/>\n<b>Runner-up:<\/b> Chipper jumping at the chance to go off on Smoltz.<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s disaster: HomeboyGate)<\/p>\n<p><b>Smartest Marketing Ploy:<\/b> The AT&#038;T All Star of the Game. Getting the players to sing karaoke on the jumbotron was a classic move, though I&#8217;d credit Frenchy before the<br \/>\nmarketing department, because I&#8217;m sure it was all his idea.<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s winner: The McMansion Tours)<\/p>\n<p><b>Stupidest Marketing Ploy:<\/b> Jerome Jurenovich in general<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s stupidest: the MC Hammer video)<\/p>\n<p><b>Best Announcer:<\/b> Pete really impressed me even more than usual this year.<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s winner: Skip)<\/p>\n<p><b>Best Broadcast Line (Televised):<\/b> Everything Skip said on his last TBS broadcast.<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s winner: &#8220;You&#8217;ve just gotta go out there and be like, &#8216;Look, Dontrelle'&#8221; -Gant)<\/p>\n<p><b>Best Broadcast Line (Radio):<\/b> &#8220;Now he&#8217;s kicking dirt at Wegner &#8212; twice! Three times! Four! FIVE! SIX!!&#8221; &#8212; Pete, on Lou Pienlla&#8217;s meltdown in Chicago.<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s winner: &#8220;We used to have a fan in here, but I guess Fox took that, too.&#8221; -Skip)<\/p>\n<p><b>Best Miked Player:<\/b> Salty. Every word was priceless.<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s winner: Diaz, for his time traveling baseball player question that no one answered.)<\/p>\n<p><b>Worst Miked Player:<\/b> Heap improved a bit this year, but he was still kind of dull compared to Chuckie, Moylan, Paronto, Willie, and the others who were miked.<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s worst: Heap)<\/p>\n<p><b>Hottest Player<\/b>: Salty by miles. He&#8217;ll be missed.<\/p>\n<p><b>Hottest Wife:<\/b> Yunel&#8217;s. I believe her name is Minerva.<\/p>\n<p><b>Best Screw-Up (?) By the Camera Crew:<\/b> They showed a woman holding up a sign that said: &#8220;CHIPPER, SEND CHILD SUPPORT&#8221; for just a second after a commercial break in the 2nd one night.<\/p>\n<p><b>Best Hobby:<\/b> The Connect Four tournaments<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s winner: Todd Pratt&#8217;s Everquest addiction)<\/p>\n<p><b>Best Fan Club:<\/b> Salty&#8217;s Shakers were the only ones who really grabbed my attention this year.<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s winner: Edgar&#8217;s Eggs)<\/p>\n<p><b>Biggest Fan of Heap:<\/b> His brother Brad. And the <a href=\"http:\/\/sports.espn.go.com\/mlb\/news\/story?id=2977687&#038;lpos=spotlight&#038;lid=tab5pos1\">article about the two of them<\/a> was my favorite of the year.<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s winner: Jeff Torborg)<\/p>\n<p><b>Most Overrated Managing Strategy:<\/b> Any and every use of Pete Orr.<br \/>\n(Last year&#8217;s most overrated: lefty-righty platooning)<\/p>\n<p>And some new categories for 2007:<\/p>\n<p><b>Best Use of Telekinetic Powers<\/b>: Frenchy, for shutting the stadium lights off with his mind after getting thrown out.<\/p>\n<p><b>Most Anti-climatic Record-Breaking Event<\/b>: Bobby breaking the all time ejections record. It happened between innings &#8212; I was there, and nobody noticed.<\/p>\n<p><b>Most Matching Dogs<\/b>: Heap &#038; Frenchy. I think they&#8217;re up to five or six dogs between the two of them. <\/p>\n<p>~~<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;ll be back to post some of the best AP photos of the year later on today. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>How delightful was it to watch the Phillies get swept? Go Rockies! Now, please enjoy my dumb opinions about the year. I&#8217;ve included the winners (and losers) from last year to add some perspective. Let me know what you guys think of my choices. Best All Around Player: For me, it was Matt Diaz. His [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/velcroblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/velcroblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/velcroblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/velcroblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/velcroblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=181"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/velcroblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/velcroblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=181"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/velcroblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=181"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/velcroblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=181"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}