CI's Mansion Pissing Off Tampa Neighbors

New York Post, July 11, 2009:

When it's finished, Jeter's mansion in Tampa's sleepy Davis Islands community will boast seven bedrooms, nine bathrooms, two three-car garages, an entertainment room, a billiard room and a memorabilia room.

But the enormity of the project has perturbed the community near downtown Tampa, an area made up of apartments and smaller, modest single-family homes. ...

Jeter bought the three lots and combined them to total 1.26 acres. He's building the 31,000- square-foot, two-story mansion as a place to crash during spring training. ...

The Yankee shortstop also plans to erect a 6-foot fence around the giant shorefront home. Zoning officials are planning a hearing on that for next month.

Tampa ordinances limit the height of the fence to 3 feet. But Jeter wants permission for a 3-foot masonry structure topped by a 3-foot-high wrought-iron fence.

Alan Schwarz, New York Times, July 9, 2009:

As baseball's statistical revolution marches on, the last refuge for the baseball aesthete has been the sport's less quantifiable skills: outfielders' arm strength, base-running efficiency and other you-won't-find-that-in-the-box-score esoterica. But debates over the quickest center fielder or the rangiest shortstop are about to graduate from argument to algorithm.

A new camera and software system in its final testing phases will record the exact speed and location of the ball and every player on the field, allowing the most digitized of sports to be overrun anew by hundreds of innovative statistics that will rate players more accurately, almost certainly affect their compensation and perhaps alter how the game itself is played.

Which shortstops reach the hard-hit grounders up the middle? [Not Jeter -- redsock] Which base runners take the fastest path from first base to third? Which right fielders charge the ball quickest and then throw the ball hardest and most accurately? Although the game will continue to answer to forces like wind, glaring sun and the occasional gnat swarm, a good deal of time-honored guesswork will give way to more definite measurements — continuing the trend of baseball front offices trading some traditional game-watching scouts for video and statistical analysts.

Jack Curry, New York Times:

The first baseman loved throwing knuckleballs. That was a problem for Stan Cliburn in his first managing job with the Watertown Pirates in upstate New York in 1988. Almost every day, Cliburn began fielding practice by reminding his first baseman to throw the ball straight.

"I'd catch him throwing that knuckleball around the infield all the time," Cliburn said. "I had to tell him we weren't fooling around."

Tim Wakefield, the frolicking first baseman, tried to entertain teammates before Cliburn marched on the field. but he was perpetually caught fiddling with the pitch. Before long, Cliburn and others learned, Wakefield was not fooling around anymore.

What started as an aimless way to toss a pitch that danced eventually became Wakefield's vocation. He realized that a .189 batting average in his first season at Class A was going to make him an afterthought. By his second season, Wakefield had begun the transformation from a floundering hitter to an apprentice knuckleball pitcher. ...

Baseball Fans Delighted By New Between-Innings Fuck-Cams

Attendance may be down, but the fans at last week's [Nationals] game didn't care -- they were too busy enjoying the stadium's new Fuck-Cam.

"We've been really surprised and delighted by the crowd reaction," said Washington Nationals public relations director Janine Perry, who started the Fuck-Cam program that has since been emulated by every other ballpark in the major leagues, except Miller Park in Milwaukee. "Apparently, people who like watching baseball games also really enjoy watching other people have sex. And not just between innings, either. If the action on the screen is still going when the play on the field resumes, they'll still watch. The Fuck-Cam has been quite a phenomenon."