Formerly Felines for Anarchistic Green Democracies

A Bostonian at the University of Michigan.


There will also be discussion of the New England Patriots, Miami Dolphins, and Michigan Wolverines. Probably in that order.

Detroit Tigers content now at Roar of the Tigers!



























 
Archives
April 2002 May 2002 June 2002 July 2002 August 2002 September 2002 October 2002 November 2002 December 2002 January 2003 February 2003 March 2003 April 2003 May 2003 June 2003 July 2003 August 2003 September 2003 October 2003 November 2003 December 2003 January 2004 February 2004 March 2004 April 2004 May 2004 June 2004 July 2004 August 2004 September 2004 October 2004 November 2004 December 2004 January 2005 February 2005 March 2005 April 2005 May 2005 June 2005 July 2005 August 2005 September 2005 October 2005 November 2005 December 2005 January 2006 February 2006 March 2006 April 2006 May 2006 June 2006 July 2006 August 2006 September 2006 October 2006 November 2006 December 2006 January 2007 February 2007 March 2007 April 2007 May 2007 June 2007 July 2007 August 2007 September 2007 October 2007 November 2007 March 2008 April 2008 May 2008 June 2008 July 2008 August 2008 September 2008 October 2008 November 2008 January 2009 February 2009 March 2009 April 2009 September 2009













 




Blogging the Detroit Tigers for the Most Valuable Network.












the flickr photostream

Head here to see what I've been shooting lately.


the game sets

Head here to see the shots from a specific baseball or football game (or anything else I've made a set for).



Features


Spelling rant
Yankee Star Wars
A Tigers Comedy of Errors
How bad is Keith Foulke really?
Harry Potter and the Boston Red Sox
Bellhorn vs. Graffanino vs. Lamprey
Critiquing team slogans
Joey Harrington blogs a baseball game
Jason Varitek gets injured
Winter meetings fashion report
Mascot Rant #1
Mascot Rant #2




8 Days of Jewish Baseball
Day 1- Kevin Youkilis
Day 2- Brad Ausmus
Day 3- Al Levine
Day 4- Jason Marquis
Day 5- John Grabow
Day 6- Justin Wayne
Day 7- Shawn Green
Day 8- Gabe Kapler and Theo Epstein

the Story of Chanukah, Red Sox style
Part I: the cruel reign of Steinbrennochus
Part II: rise of the Soxxabees
Part III: the rebellion begins!
Parts IV, V, and VI
Parts VII and VIII


Image hosted by Photobucket.com
Fun with Roster Photos
Note: Comments may not exactly correspond to images, as the images will change when the team puts up new photos. Adds a level of surreality, I think.
Detroit Tigers
Boston Red Sox
New York Yankees
Chicago White Sox
Baltimore Orioles
Boston Red Sox 2006
Boston Red Sox 2007
New York Yankees 2007


Teams of the Cat

Boston
Red Sox
Patriots

Detroit
Lions
Tigers

Miami
Dolphins

University of Michigan
Wolverines (all sports)

this is all


Sports Reads


12eight
Baseball Desert
Baseball Heavy (PawSox)
Basegirl
Bullshit Memorial Stadium
Cursed to First
Empyreal Environs
Firebrand of the AL
GYS Network
Joy of Sox
Livejournal Home of Red Sox Nation
Misery Loves Company (Sox and Mets)
Over the Monster
Papel-blog
Peter on All
Professional, Idiot, and the Tailback
Red Sox Fan in Pinstripe Territory
Respect the Tek
Sass-a-thon
Singapore Sox Fan
Surviving Grady
Twitch124
Yanks Fan vs. Sox Fan


Detroit Tigers and Lions



Roar of the Tigers

Beyond Boxscores
Bless You Boys
the Cheap Seats
Daily Fungo
Detroit Tiger Weblog
Lions Den
Mack Avenue Tigers
Mickey Tettleton Memorial Overpass
Motown Sports (messageboard)
Motown Sports Revival
Northern Michigan Detroit Sports Blog
Out of Bounds
Sweaty Men Endeavors
Take 75 North
Tiger Tales
TigerBlog
Tigers Central
Where have you gone, Johnny Grubb?


I'm a member of DIBS!



College Sports


MGoBlog (Michigan)

Big Ten Hardball
Blog that Yost Built (Michigan)
Blue-Gray Sky (Notre Dame)
Boi from Troy (USC)
Every Day Should be Saturday (Florida, general college sports)
iBlog for Cookies (Michigan)
ParadigmBlog (Michigan)
Rammer Jammer Yellow Hammer (Alabama)
Schembechler Hall (Michigan)
Sunday Morning Quarterback (Southern Miss, mostly general)



2632 (Orioles)
Aaron Gleeman (Twins)
Around the Oval (Ohio State)
Bard's Room (White Sox)
Bat Girl (Twins)
Ben Roethlisberger (personal blog, god help us all)
Bronx Banter (Yankees)
Bronx Block
Buckeye Commentary (Ohio State)
Camden Chat (Orioles)
Enlightened Spartan (Michigan State)
Futility Infielder (Yankees)
Let's Go Tribe (Indians)
NYYFans.com (Yankees forum)
Pinstripe Alley (Yankees)
Replacement Level Yankees
Royals Authority
Royals Review
Tribe Report (Indians)
TwinsGeek



Armchair GM (all)
Athletics Nation
Blog Maverick (Mark Cuban)
Catfish Stew (Athletics)
Deadspin
Ducksnorts (Padres)
Fire Joe Morgan
Gaslamp Ball (Padres)
Goat Riders of the Apocalypse (Cubs)
Idiots Write About Sports (A's, Giants)
Lookout Landing (Mariners)
McCovey Chronicles (Giants)
Metstradamus
Minor League Ball
On the DL (gossip)
Pittsburgh Lumber Co. (Pirates)
Rays Talk
Red Reporter (Reds)
Serious Dismay Sports
Uniwatch (all teams)
USS Mariner (Mariners)



Gilbert Arenas
Curtis Granderson
Tommy Lasorda
Mike Maroth
Pat Neshek
Raymond
Nate Robertson
Curt Schilling
CJ Wilson
Kevin Youkilis



the Brushback
Call of the Green Monster (Red Sox)
Die-hard Cubs Fun
the Dugout, chat room of pro baseball
Korean baseball cartoons (inexplicable)
Soxaholix
Wizznutzz (Wizards..just read it)



Ann Arbor is Overrated
B3ta
Dave Barry
BaseBlogging
'boards
Chromasia
Corey Corcoran
Fried Rice Thoughts
Go Fug Yourself
Goodspeed Update
Grand Mental Station
Quo Vadimus
McSweeney's
pasquinade
PostSecret
Ryan Estrada
Scaryduck
Vitriolica
Whatevs.org
Mike Wieringo


if you are wishing to email the resident feline anarchist, you may do so at
bluecatsredsox@gmail.com


Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 License.


Weblog Commenting and Trackback by HaloScan.com































 
Sunday, September 21, 2008  

Evidence that, no matter how much I try to be a level-headed, even-handed, sane baseball fan, I am still at heart a simple surly Red Sox fan:

This whole Yankee Stadium thing is making me throw up in my mouth a little.

I watched the game, because it is historic and all that and I'm a fan of the Game of Baseball with the caps and everything. But all the ceremony surrounding this, the media sobbing, the whole fucking circus-- ugh. For fuck's sake. Where was the outcry for Tiger Stadium? I know there was attention given to it, of course, but I don't remember it being ANYTHING like this, and Tiger Stadium WAS STILL ORIGINAL TIGER STADIUM, as opposed to this, which is Yankee Stadium Circa Mid '70s.

Tiger Stadium was a National Historic Landmark (and they still knocked it down, woo, Detroit!). Yankee Stadium is not one.

And of course this last EMOTIONALLY CHARGED HALLOWED GAME featured such starting Yankee dignitaries as Johnny Damon (member of the Red Sox team responsible for one of the greatest Yankee collapses in modern memory), Xavier Nady (who's been on the team for three months), and Jose Molina (catching in place of the injured Posada).

Ugggggh.

I know at least part of this, maybe most of it, is just my gut reaction as a Red Sox fan. I won't deny that, I own it, man. And I do understand that this is a big deal... but it is NOT as big a deal as people (maybe read: media) are making it out to be. That this should get more attention than the closing and subsequent (much-delayed) demolition of Tiger Stadium is, honestly, ridiculous.

Labels: , , , , ,


11:42 PM

Saturday, September 20, 2008  

I need to write about the Red Sox and my MANY STRANGE AND OBSESSIVE WORRIES about them soon, but this? This I cannot pass up.

I'm talking about an article by Nicholas Cotsonika in the Detroit Free Press titled Matt Millen says Lions have his back-- and they can win this year. Although I will get into it below, I will summarize it here for the lazy readers: Matt Millen is awful, but has no concept of his own awfulness. It is as though he is so awful at handling a National Football League team that his mind simply refuses to process the full magnitude of his FAIL. The result of this brain hiccup, this disturbance in his gray matter, is a near-delusional outlook on his team, his management of said team, his personnel, and probably many other things as well.

Let's have a look, shall we?

Millen said he believes in Marinelli more than ever before because Marinelli has remained consistent amid adversity. He said he still believes in the coaching staff and players -- and that if the Lions just do what they've been doing, they will win this year.

"Stay the course," Millen said. "It's a little bump. ... It's not like you have to panic. You don't have to make wholesale changes. You don't have to do all that stuff. It's all right there."


He believes in Marinelli because Marinelli has remained consistent amid adversity.

He believes in Marinelli because Marinelli has remained consistent amid adversity.

HE BELIEVES IN MARINELLI BECAUSE MARINELLI HAS REMAINED CONSISTENT AMID ADVERSITY.

Say you have a nail that you have to hammer into a wall. You're holding the nail in place so it doesn't fall out before it's nailed in properly. Your friend ROD MARINELLI is swinging the hammer. He keeps smashing you in the fingers and missing the nail. He does it every single time. Over and over again. And instead of telling him he's DOING IT WRONG, instead of telling him to GO AWAY and finding SOMEONE ELSE to hammer the nail in properly, you PRAISE HIM.

You tell everyone that you believe in his ability to hammer that nail into the wall because despite adversity-- despite his CONSTANT FAILURE TO DO THE TASK ASSIGNED TO HIM, despite his CONSTANT FAILURE TO COME UP WITH THE DESIRED RESULT i.e. the nail in the wall and your hand intact-- he has remained CONSISTENT. He has NOT EVEN TRIED TO HAMMER THE NAIL IN A NEW WAY SO AS TO AVOID BREAKING YOUR PHALANGES.

And you praise him for this!!!

Matt Millen is out of his catdamned mind.

"I said at the beginning of the season, 'Come on out, and you'll like what you see,' " Millen said. "And I think the people who came out (to training camp), they like what they see because they see discipline. They see the approach is right. They're practicing right. All the little things."

What about the fan who says, "That's practice, but these are games"?

"Well, if a fan says that, then they don't understand the game of football, because it can't happen on the field if it doesn't happen here," Millen said.


It's not happening on the field. Quite frankly I don't give a flying diseased rat colon about what's happening in practice for the Lions these days because IT'S NOT HAPPENING ON THE FIELD. I have seen better tackling in HIGH SCHOOL football games. Tackling!! One of the most BASIC and INTEGRAL of the football skills! Obviously Matt Millen and I mean different things when we talk about 'all the little things'.

Does Millen hold himself accountable?

"Look," Millen said. "Rod stands up there and says, 'It's on me'? It's on me. It's me. That's fine. ... The guys who are out here are here for a reason. It's not happenstance. I believe in the guy I hired. I believe in the staff we put together and I believe in the players we have on the field. And if you want to point the finger at any of that stuff, that's on me. I'm fine with that, because I believe in what's out there. Nothing else needs to be said."


If he believes in what's out there, then he believes in a terrible football team that cannot tackle opposing players and glories in finding new and exciting ways to lose games that they seem to have a shot at winning. I BELIEVE!!!

Hasn't it taken too long to build a foundation, let alone build on top of it?

"From since I'm here, sure," Millen said. "Yeah. Obviously. But like I said earlier, I'm the one who hired the guy, and I believe in him 100%. I believe in him more now than I ever did. That guy, he's exactly what you need."

Why?

"Because he's consistent," Millen said. "You guys see that. That's not changing. He is a straight line."


I don't understand this. I just don't. If your team is terrible at playing the game of football, why would you insist that the best thing for everyone is to hold that course? The course you are on is one of losing! You don't want to hold that course! It's like someone once told Millen, "Now sonny boy, don't you ever stray from a path once you're on it," and he took that advice to heart so much that he now could not get off a conveyor belt even if he was unrestrained and the conveyor belt was approaching a circular saw that would remove his balls.

"He will do what he believes is the right thing to do, and what he's doing is the right way. The players we have picked, we picked in the beginning for a reason. The same reason still exists. They still have the same skills and abilities. The staff's in place for the same exact reason. Rod likes to use the term, 'Don't blink.' I never use that term. But you just keep on walking. ...

"I just think what we're doing is the right thing to do, and if they just keep doing what they're supposed to do, we'll be fine."


First of all, what the hell is he saying with the blinking and the walking?

Secondly, saying things like, "if they just keep doing what they're supposed to do, we'll be fine," presupposes that your players are doing the proper things in the first place, and you CANNOT presuppose that with the Detroit Lions.

Millen declined to go into his discussions with Ford. He said he didn't want to put words in Ford's mouth.

"He has high expectations," Millen said. "When you have high expectations, you also get frustrated, too. There's answers you want, too."

Millen said he told Ford basically the same things he said Thursday, just in more detail.

"He asks all the right questions," Millen said. "Let's just leave it at that."
Nicholas Cotsonika/Detroit Free Press


Except for the questions that will lead to the creation of a winning Lions team.

Labels: , , ,


3:08 AM

Wednesday, September 10, 2008  
Ugh, that game was amazing/sucked so much. Getting to see Kazmir pitch live, for one thing-- that was the first time I'd seen him in person. Carlos Pena, whom I still love in every irrational way. The 'MVP' chants every time Pedroia came up, the hysteria when Papi came out on deck to pinch hit in the 7th, the Jason Bay homer... that homer was INCREDIBLE, I thought people were going to start passing out in their seats from all the screaming.

And then Papelbon came in and spent enough time warming up for the sound system guys to play the entirety of 'Shipping up to Boston' and everyone was clapping and singing along and oh maaaaaaan.

And then, of course, the rare blown save, with a homer from DAN JOHNSON: OAKLAND REJECT, of all people, and a double from Dioner Navarro, he of the Molina School of Baserunning. Deflating.

The sky turned a crazy color right before it got dark out and I was pretty much convinced that a tornado was going to descend from the heavens and take Jed Lowrie off to Oz or something.



Alas, Jed did not at any point during the game have to break out his ruby slippers.

Labels: , , ,


12:51 AM

Wednesday, September 03, 2008  

Again? Seriously.... AGAIN??

I was unhappy when this game started. The first time in five years I haven't been at the season opener... it was weird, OK? Weird and wrong-footing and seeing that full stadium but not being in it is just wrong. But life goes on, I thought. You grow up, you move away; at least you're not out there schvitzing to death in the heat and probably getting a horrific sunburn because you forgot to put on sunscreen again.

I expected things to improve, though. Oh, I knew full well that the team is young, it's the first game with a new coach and a new system after several eons of Carr-ship, we're starting a walk-on at QB and the backup is a red-shirt freshman. I knew all that. Intellectually. I still expected... I don't know. Not a blowout, but a victory of some sort.

I really, really need to stop having expectations about this team, unless they are expectations of SHAME and AGONY.

Nothing against Utah. I tip my cap to them while simultaneously cursing out every single one of their players, especially that friggin' kicker. This is a less embarrassing loss than last year's Appalachian State disaster; the Utes may be in the mostly imaginary Mountain West conference, but at least they're actually, you know, Division I.

We have no running game. Like... none. I have no idea how our receivers look after this one game, because the combined Sheridan/Threet QB situation was awful enough to make them a moot point. The offensive line was bad. The defense adjusted in the second half in a very encouraging way, but the atrocious first half can't be ignored. Special teams were pretty good? I guess?

The close score at the end of the game was pretty deceptive. Utah made some terrifically bad mistakes, but Michigan did not look like a Division I football team out there.

It's gonna be a long season, 'though I guess this is maybe the best way to ease me out of the habit of actually going to the games.

ETA: Tatum Bell, after being released by the Lions, stole the luggage of Rudi Johnson, who had been brought in to replace him.

The Lions keep finding new and exciting ways to remind everyone that they are 100% clown shoes.

Labels: , , , , , ,


6:00 PM

 
This page is powered by Blogger.