Bits and pieces

A periodic attempt to catch up on recent items and links.

♦ I love this entry by SB Nation’s Grant Brisbee on the 17-inning game between the Red Sox and Orioles on May 6 because it’s so damn literary, comparing the sportswriter’s hyperbole to the epic storyteller.

♦ And this one brief from The Hardball Times’ Greg Simons re: “Calico Joe and home-field advantage” because it’s so analytical.

♦ And this one from ESPN’s Front Row, a site that goes behind the scenes at the sprots network, on how they covered Jered Weaver’s recent no-hitter.

♦ Sports Illustrated reviewed the documentary Knuckleball prior to the Tribecca Film Festival. It’s bound to be coming to a theater near you at some point or, if not, will be available on DVD/BlueRay.

♦ Speaking of movies, The Observer, the student newspaper at Notre Dame and St. Mary’s, offered this list of their top five baseball flics. Titles include Rookie of the Year (1983)? What are they teaching kids in college these days?

♦ So that‘s what’s wrong with the global climate — someone’s been giving it steroids. Scientific American posits that global warming is responsible for an increase in home runs. (Or did they?)

♦ Will Leitch published this profile of Yankees pitcher Hiroki Kuroda in the April 29 edition of New York Magazine. (I can never hear that name without thinking of Rookie Carroca, Lainie Kazan’s husband in My Favorite Year.)

♦ The late Greg Spira donated his baseball library to the Society for American Baseball Research. Not to be morbid, but I’ve been wondering about that for a couple of years. My library consists of more than 2,000 titles (and that’s just books, not journals, magazines, or other baseball-alia) and I’ve been trying to figure out a place for them when the time comes, if not sooner. I’ve considered e-baying them, but it seems like a lot of work for very little money. The local library doesn’t want them and it seems too much work to pack them up and have them shipped to the Baseball Hall of Fame or other institutions (not to mention expensive). I hate to think of them — or any books — winding up in the trash. I gave the Yogi Berra Museum about 100 books about the Yankees for a book sale fund-raiser they held a few months ago, but that still leaves plenty. Of course, when the time does come, I don’t think I’ll care that much.