Ken Griffey Jr. returns to the Seattle Mariners…

… and there was great rejoicing in the land — especially in the Pacific Northwest. When I first heard the rumblings a few days ago that Ken Griffey Jr. might return to the Mariners, I tried to keep from getting too excited about the possibility. In today’s big-money baseball world, team allegiances are more fading […]

Jeff Kent: Hero or villain?

Jeff Kent announced his retirement from professional baseball today, ending an outstanding career as a member of the Los Angeles Dodgers. Kent has always brought out mixed feelings in me, and a lot of memories were dredged up today as I heard the morning guys on KNBR radio in San Francisco talking about him. I […]

Which cap for Rickey in the Hall of Fame?

Players elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame no longer get to choose which cap they’ll be depicted wearing in the bronze plaque that enshrines them. There’s no question that Jim Rice, who played his entire career for Boston, will be wearing a Red Sox cap. But what about Rickey Henderson? In a 25-year major […]

Baseball cap outlook for 2009: The audacity of hats

Political and fashion lore has it that by not wearing a hat on inauguration day, John F. Kennedy killed the haberdashery industry. From then on, American men stopped wearing hats. While JFK and his fashion-conscious wife certainly influenced American style, I suspect the growing dominance of the automobile in our culture did more to hasten […]

A new cap for the Big Unit

Randy Johnson has signed a one-year contract with the San Francisco Giants, and that’s good news for baseball fans by the bay. Even at 45, The Big Unit has some good games left in that 6’10” frame. The move to the Giants will be a bit of a homecoming for Johnson, who grew up nearby […]

Amid the great outdoors, indoors

In search of a Christmas gift for a relative, my wife and I trekked to the new Bass Pro Shops store in Manteca, Calif., today. The store is, simply put, amazing. Racks and racks of merchandise are on display amid scores of stuffed bears, deer, boars, wolves, buzzards, sheep and pretty much any other critter […]

Let’s keep the stinky socks off the cap, please

The Boston Red Sox have revealed new alternate uniforms and, alas, the dreadful “hanging socks” cap at left. Methinks the Beaneaters should stick with the standard “B” that has served the franchise so well over the years. I suppose it’s OK for fans to wear the socks lid — after all, you can’t have too […]

Keeping my head about me, thanks to a Giants’ batting helmet

While dangling Christmas lights from the tree on our front lawn this morning, I was reminded of how a few years back my giveaway plastic San Francisco Giants batting helmet saved my head. I had to trim a branch from a tree in our backyard in New Jersey, and I stuck the batting helmet on […]

Seattle without the Sonics, and other sad tales of the NBA

Having been born with virtually no talent for basketball, I suppose it’s not a huge surprise that basketball ranks fairly low on my list of favorites. As far as I can recall, I’ve only had one NBA team cap my entire life. That was a nifty green and black Seattle Supersonics cap, but it went […]

Autumn dreams of … spring dreams

The World Series is fading into memory. As the weather turns colder, a baseball fan must turn to the “Hot Stove League” of speculation on who’s going to deal for whom in the coming months. Amazingly, it was the Oakland Athletics who made the first significant move, acquiring slugger Matt Holliday from the Colorado Rockies. […]