Tres bien: Andre Dawson elected to the Hall of Fame

[picapp align=”center” wrap=”false” link=”term=Andre+Dawson&iid=7473497″ src=”1/2/4/6/ANDRE_DAWSON_2172.JPG?adImageId=8829023&imageId=7473497″ width=”500″ height=”330″ /] Andre Dawson was elected to the Hall of Fame today, a rich reward for the speedy outfielder. He’s pictured above with Expos teammate Vance Law. Dawson only experienced the playoffs in two of his 21 years in the big leagues, so he didn’t get as much network […]

A tip of the cap to the Big Unit, Randy Johnson

[picapp align=”center” wrap=”false” link=”term=Randy+Johnson&iid=3277461″ src=”3/6/3/9/Randy_Johnson_51_421b.jpg?adImageId=8809165&imageId=3277461″ width=”500″ height=”336″ /] This is how I’ll remember Randy Johnson – snarling, defiant, dominant. His long hair a tangle, his facial hair prickly, his fastball hurtling menacingly toward the plate from that lanky 6′ 11″ frame. I’ll remember him most in a Mariners’ cap as above, for it was in […]

No, thanks. I’ll pass on the chips (Fiesta Bowl 2010)

[picapp align=”left” wrap=”true” link=”term=Boise+State&iid=7455313″ src=”6/1/2/4/Tostitos_Fiesta_Bowl_0155.jpg?adImageId=8797792&imageId=7455313″ width=”234″ height=”317″ /] On my television screen, the Tostitos Fiesta Bowl tonight looked more like the Ugly Uniforms Bowl. As one of my Twitter buddies pointed out, TCU players looked like walking eggplants. And although the pants in this photo appear orange, on my screen the Boise State players looked […]

Farewell to Isaac Bruce, one of the great ones

[picapp align=”right” wrap=”true” link=”term=Isaac+Bruce&iid=7452407″ src=”e/9/8/4/San_Francisco_49ers_b8d2.JPG?adImageId=8781688&imageId=7452407″ width=”234″ height=”324″ /] Isaac Bruce bid farewell to his outstanding NFL career today. He was on the field for one play for the 49ers, who went on to defeat the hapless St. Louis Rams. Bruce spent all but the last two years of his career with the Rams, dating back […]

The NHL Winter Classic starts the new year right

[picapp align=”center” wrap=”false” link=”term=hockey&iid=7443635″ src=”0/7/7/f/Fans_enter_for_ac78.JPG?adImageId=8759859&imageId=7443635″ width=”380″ height=”250″ /] I missed the game, and that’s a shame. The Bruins beat the Flyers 2-1 in the third annual NHL Winter Classic today at Fenway Park in Boston. It’s difficult to find photos of ballcaps at hockey games, at least among the players. I offer the above photo […]

The Rose Bowl – A Midwestern perspective

As a child of the Big Ten Conference, I believed the Rose Bowl was a place of magic, enchantment and, inevitably, frustration and resignation. With piles of snow outside our homes in suburban Cleveland, we’d tune in to the game as the sun was setting in Eastern time. We’d watch in fascination as 100,000 people […]

2009: The year in review

The second calendar year for the Ball Caps Blog is coming to a close, and I’m happy that I’ve sustained it for that long. Regular posting is the key to building blog traffic, the experts say, and my experience with this blog bears that out. In a couple of stretches I tried to post daily […]

Switching caps (again): Mark DeRosa

[picapp align=”left” wrap=”true” link=”term=Mark+DeRosa&iid=5056280″ src=”3/b/e/3/Mark_DeRosa_meets_d307.JPG?adImageId=8722277&imageId=5056280″ width=”234″ height=”305″ /] Mark DeRosa joined a new team today, the San Francisco Giants. As a Giants fan, I’m pleased. Assuming he keeps pace with his performance in recent years, he’ll add some pop to what has been an anemic offense the last year or two. After seven years with […]

A merry Christmas to all!

To all readers of the Ball Caps Blog, a merry Christmas! Our last-minute shopping is pretty much done, although I need to do a final check for stocking stuffers and may need to make a late dash to the drugstore. For our morning errands, I was sporting my 1948 Cleveland Indians cap.

A tip of the cap to 49ers broadcast analyst Gary Plummer

Fans who spend their lives rooting for one team in one town and listening only to the hometown announcers don’t have much of a basis for comparison of the men and women behind the microphones. As a kid in Cleveland, after the Indians’ games I’d catch a few innings when atmospheric conditions were right from […]