2015 Blog Highlights

Oh, I know. Nothing on earth grabs interest like a yearly recap post. What an original idea! I'm pretty sure I'm the only blog doing one at the moment.

Hey, wake up!

But I decided that I should really look back and reflect on the year this here blog had. I'm very excited by this year. I think the blog was able to grow and expand in some pretty cool ways. Plus, apparently, people are reading! Especially the posts I'm talking about below. As a way to celebrate this great year, I wanted to check out the most popular posts of the year! (or, at least the most popular posts published in 2015.)

In August, I posted about my trip to the Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY in the post titled "Visiting Cooperstown." (Clever, aren't I?) Apparently people enjoyed seeing what I thought of the place, and some of my favorite sights. Were you one of them?

The post introducing the blog's Snapchat account was also very popular. Check it out by reading "Submitting Pictures is Now a Snap!" It discusses why there blog has a Snapchat account, and how I hope to use it. Have you become the blog's friend yet?

It appears that lots of people wondered, like I did, "Did the Real Jackie Bradley Jr Finally Stand Up?" At the time, Jackie Bradley had started hitting like we hoped he would. I wondered...and still do...if this was the player who was here to stay. What do you think?

After the Red Sox went crazy and signed David Price, I wrote that "I Don't Think the Sox have Changed Their Philosophy." People were all wondering what happened to a team that passed on Jon Lester to go all Yankees and get Price. Nothing happened, as I discussed. It's the same plan as always.

One of my favorite posts was "Miss Vermont Visits Section 36!" Alayna Westcom, Miss Vermont 2015, was nice enough to agree to an interview for the blog. She discussed the Red Sox, her time as Miss Vermont, and her plans for the future. She even sent along some great pictures of her with Section 36. I couldn't have been happier with the visit!

I couldn't be happier that the most popular post of the year was "Miss Massachusetts Visits Section 36!" When Miss Massachusetts 2014, Lauren Kuhn, agreed to be the very first visitor to Section 36, I was thrilled. But, I never guessed how much fun it would be, or that it would open the door to more visitors, like Alayna. I hope you enjoyed reading the post as much as I enjoyed doing it!

So, there you have it. The most popular posts of 2015!

Was your favorite on the list?

2015 Scavenger Hunt

First, yes I know it's a little late this year. Believe it or not, that was intentional. I felt like it was going on too long starting it right after the season ended. Besides, nobody worked on it until the last minute anyway. So, I put it off a bit. My original plan, actually, was to post in on Jan 1, and give you just 36 days to enter. But, just the other day I noticed that I was naming the Hunt after the year it started. So, if I waited until Jan 1, I'd have to call it the 2016 Scavenger Hunt...and there would be no 2015 winner. That might not be weird for anyone other than me, but it's my blog. So, I bring you the 2015 Scavenger Hunt!

I’m sure you remember how it works. If not, I’ll remind you. Below, you’ll find a list of 36 items for you to try and find. When you find an item, take a picture of it and send it along to me. Whoever sends me pictures of the most items wins. Pretty simple, right? We’ll make the end of the hunt be 12:36 PM eastern time on February 5, 2016. This both gives enough time to find the stuff, and fills the time almost right up to pitchers and catchers reporting to Spring Training. Sound like fun? What do you win if you find the most items? Worldwide fame and admiration! I will post the winner’s name (and picture if one is provided) on this very site and hail them as the 2015 Scavenger Hunt Champion! I’m sure that Kristen has found her worldwide fame to be quite an honor this past year. If you actually want a prize you can hold in your hand, I’ll award a pile of Section 36 SWAG including: a scorebook made of Section 36 official scorecards bound together to allow you to score twenty games, a Section 36 bumper sticker, Section 36 2.5" square sticker, and Section 36 2" square magnet! Not too bad, right?  If I come up with something else between now and then, maybe I'll add it on. Ready to get started? Here is this year’s list of items to get pictures of:

1. Pedro Martinez Hall of Fame Plaque

2. Ticket to ALCS game played by the Red Sox

3. Red Sox number 26 jersey

4. Official Program from 2013 World Series

5. “ESPN” magazine with Red Sox player on cover

6. Homemade “I’d Rather Be in Section 36” t-shirt

7. Red Sox-Star Wars collectable

8. Wine bottle featuring Red Sox player

9. Red Sox poker chip

10. Red Sox salsa

11. Red Sox beach towel

12. Mookie Betts baseball card

13. Used official Section 36 scorecard

14. 2013 World Series baseball

15. Cy Young Statue

16. Mike Napoli replica jersey

17. 2014 Red Sox Media Guide

18. Red Sox garden item

19. Autograph of member of 2011 Red Sox

20. Red Sox bikini

21. 2013 World Championship item

22. David Price t-shirt

23. Jim Rice Hall of Fame plaque postcard

24. Red Sox bobblehead

25. Ticket stub from Section 36

26. Red Sox minor league affiliate collectable

27. Fathead of a Red Sox player

28. 36 of something

29. Van Ness St

30. 2013 World Championship banner

31. Red Sox souvenir cup

32. Autobiography of Red Sox player

33. “Fenway Park 100 Seasons” baseball

34. Ted Williams item

35. Female Red Sox fan

36. Male Red Sox fan

A quick clarification. Unless it says otherwise, “Red Sox Player” refers to anyone who ever played for the Sox in a regular season game. That counts even if the player isn’t depicted as a Red Sox player in the picture. So, Jim would be able to use anything from his Phillies Room depicting players like Curt Schilling and Pedro Martinez even if they’re in their Phillies garb.

Now, since I want this to be a scavenger hunt, and not a google search, I’ll need a way to make sure you actually find these items yourself. So, in order to qualify any picture must have any one of these three things in it.

1. You. This might be the easiest way. If you’re in the picture, I can be pretty sure you actually found the item. This has one advantage in that it doesn’t have to be a new picture. If you went to Fenway last summer and took a picture on Lansdowne St, that would work. Or,
2. The Section 36 logo. Just have it showing somewhere in the picture. Or,
3. The address of this blog, “www.section-36.blogspot.com” , written somewhere in the picture. Write it out on a piece of paper, on a sidewalk with chalk, on someone’s leg, whatever. (Just don’t vandalize anything). 

That make sense? So, send in your pictures to me, section36 at gmail dot com (I bet you know which parts to replace with symbols) You can even tweet it to me, or use a Facebook msg. Whatever works for you! (Actually, if you want to snap a pic to section36 to, that's fine too!) It would be nice if you told me which items you thought were in each picture. If there’s a tie between people who have the same number of found items, the tiebreaker will be the person who did it with the fewest number of pictures. If you get a picture of a Female Red Sox fan, wearing a David Price t-shirt, while standing on Van Ness St, it would be 3 items in one picture. That’s a great start, although I’m sure you can do better. One year, Jere had over 20 items in a single photo! (If I need a second tiebreaker, I’ll have a vote to decide the best pictures.) 

I think that covers everything! It’s now up to you to start sending me your pictures. I’ll keep reminding you as the months go by.

Good Luck!

Star Wars and the World Series

I should probably say, rest assured, no spoilers to be found here. (Off topic…how long does a movie need to be out before you no longer need to caution people about potential spoilers?)

There’s a new Star Wars movie out at the moment. Have you heard? Did you notice that it’s doing pretty well at the box office?

Yeah. Understatement of the year.

Just about every day, The Force Awakens breaks a new record as far as ticket sales go. Biggest single day. Biggest Opening Weekend. Biggest second weekend. Fastest to $100 million. Fastest to $1 billion. It goes on and on. The best part is that even though the movie opened in December, these aren’t December records. They’re just records, with no qualifiers. So, even though everyone “knows” movies will make more money in the summer when everyone is home from school and looking for air conditioning, Star Wars has managed to make more money than any summer blockbuster. There has been some talk, apparently, in the movie industry that studios may need to rethink the way they pick release dates. Star Wars is showing that a quality movie promoted properly can perform well no matter when it’s released. Studios can’t hide behind “Well, it was a Christmas release” to account for lagging ticket sales. If it’s a good movie that people want to see, they’ll buy a ticket no matter when it’s showing.

You know what I think of when I hear that? The World Series and the Super Bowl.

Yeah, I’m odd.

For years Major League Baseball has been scheduling World Series games at night. The theory being that more people are home and watching TV at 8:00 as opposed to 3:00. Lately they’ve been playing with dates as well, trying to avoid a Saturday night, or land on a Saturday night, or avoid Thursday night, or whatever. They’ve been adjusting their schedule to fit in with the viewing public’s current habits. Contrast that with the NFL. When do they have their regular season games? Sunday afternoon. A terrible time for TV viewers. Their marquee weekly prime time game? Sunday night. Where sit-coms go to die. Their championship game? Sunday night. Almost late Sunday afternoon. Who’s watching TV just after dinner on Sunday? Nobody. Unless it’s the Super Bowl. That’s just the highest rated program of the year. Like, every year.

So Star Wars and the NFL have shown that if you have something people want to see they’ll go out of their way to see it. 

Why hasn’t baseball figured that out?

Sure The Force Awakens and the NFL are different. There’s been about 30 years of anticipation waiting for the next Star Wars movie in the sequence. The Force Awakens was able to draw on one of the largest existing fan bases a movie has ever had. That was even before the unparalleled Disney marketing team got into the action. So, the movie had a head start. Just like the NFL. The facts that its games were always once a week and played on a rectangular field happen to make it a perfect fit to create a rabid television audience. The fact that their championship happened to be one game and on a date scheduled well in advance allowed people to hold viewing parties to help boost their numbers even more. So, it’s probably unrealistic to think other movies or other sports could match the numbers that Star Wars and the Super Bowl bring in.

But, couldn’t they be close? Closer at least?

What if instead of slapping together any old movie and releasing it in the summer season, studios made good movies, and released them whenever it worked best for them? What if instead of playing World Series games when random non-fans happened to have the TV on, MLB worked on growing more hard core fans that will watch them no matter what? Wasn’t the so-called golden age of baseball in the 50’s? Wasn’t that when the games were played during the day? Remember all the kids (apparently) skipping school to see the games? Or sneaking radios into classrooms? Or not having to sneak them since the class was just playing it for them? Why wouldn’t that happen again?

With the internet, wouldn’t a day game actually enhance the product? People streaming the game at work, talking to their coworker? Instead of sitting alone at night watching in your living room, it would be like a sports bar for every game. Is that a better way to get casual fans involved anyway? To let them know that other people are paying attention?

So, instead of trying to get channel surfers to stop by for a second, get people to surf directly to that channel. Take away all the fluff from broadcasts that only appeal to random watchers. Take away the in-game interviews. Take away the annoying graphics. Stop acting like you need a sideshow in order to get people to watch. Act like you deserve to be watched. Act like the product is a good one. Focus on the game. Focus on growing more fans instead of pandering to casual observers. Then, those fans will follow you anywhere. Even if it’s to a December release. Build a fan foundation. After all, that’s baseball’s most important lesson.

If you build it, they will come.

List of 36: Letter to Santa

Things I wouldn't mind seeing under the tree tomorrow morning.

1. David Price jersey

2. 1912 T202 Jake Stahl/Eddie Cicotte

3. Jim Lonborg autographed photo

4. Shane Victorino autographed 2013 WS baseball

5. Tickets to Opening Day

6. Pedro Martinez SGA HOF plaque

7. Red Sox-Marvel tee

8. 2013 locker room celebration champagne bottle

9. Grady Little SGA Bobble-arm

10. Craig Kimbrel player-tee

11. Tickets to Papi's last game

12. Game used base

13. 1975 Topps Fred Lynn RC

14. 1939 Play Ball Ted Williams RC

15. Darth Vader Red Sox shirt

16. Death Star SGA baseball statue

17. 2004 team signed baseball

18. Pedro Martinez retired number hat

19. Game Used Tazawa jersey

20. Brock Holt #26 away jersey

21. Game used baseball

22. 2013 team signed baseball

23. 1904 Fan Craze Jimmy Collins

24. Pedro Martinez 2004 style away jersey

25. Fenway game used locker room chair

26. Jim Rice 1975 Throwback jersey

27. Tickets to Star Wars Night

28. Piece of Busch Stadium dugout from 2004 WS

29. Mookie Betts player-tee

30. Game used locker room nameplate

31. 2007 team signed baseball

32. Carl Yastrzemski SGA replica statue

33. Xander Bogaerts jersey

34. Panda player-tee

35. "Boston Scored First" tee

36. Rice-Lynn-Evans autographed baseball

What's on your list?

From the Pedro Binder

2000 Fleer Ultra

I’m not an art critic. There’s a reason for that. My mind doesn’t really work that way. Sure, I know what I like. I’ve even tried to checklist the things I really look for in a card. But, sometimes, for some reason, some cards don’t fit. Like trying to figure out why one Monet looks better than another. They’re both of a haystack. They’re both splotchy. But, one just looks better than the other. A real critic probably knows exactly why. Something about the light leading the eye to the implied verticality, or something like that. But, I don’t do that. Sometimes it’s just not something I can put a finger on.

Take this card. I should love it. If I made a literal checklist, I’d be checking most everything off. Full bleed photo? Check. Name/team/position? Check. Small brand logo? Check. Everything tucked out of the way? Check. Action photo? Check.

But, for some reason it doesn’t call to me. 

I could make some guesses. I don’t like Pedro’s face. His arm looks a little weird with the way the slit in his jersey falls. Maybe the blurry background is a little too obvious. 

I don’t really know.

Whatever it is, I don’t love this card. I should. I really should. But I don’t.

Do you?