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A tip of the hat and a stroke of the ’stache are due to Taylor Tankersley, the Florida Marlins reliever who takes May’s Beard of the Month honors.  I could provide some rambling description about how amazing his mustache is, but (as usual) just look at that thing!  The man’s face is art, bro!

My only discomfort with May’s BotM is that I’m left with conflicted feelings about the Marlins.  On the one hand, Scott and I were thrilled that the Marlins used their own website to call attention to a great mustache.  Not only does it set an excellent precedent for facial hair promotion in sports, but it also makes BotM selection much easier for a couple of extremely lazy dudes.  So thanks for that, Joe Frisaro of MLB.com.  On the other hand, the article mentions a very disturbing policy the Marlins have forced on their players: “The Marlins have a facial hair policy. Goatees and ’staches are allowed, if they are well groomed.”  I can see how it would make sense for a team in South Florida to appeal to old New Yorkers by instituting variations on worthless, arbitrary Steinbrenner team rules.  And if that is indeed the Marlins’ intent, at least they took a small step toward reason by allowing goatees.  But Rockiescast remains staunchly opposed to any rules restricting the free growth of facial hair by anyone.  After all, if Eric Gagne had resurfaced with the Marlins instead of the Brewers a couple of years ago, he would have been deprived the greatest accomplishment of his career!

In episode 143, we mentioned that Troy Tulowitzki is growing out his mullet this season for charity and that now fans can get in on the action by purchasing their very own Rockies mullet cap.  In typical Rockiescast fashion though, we didn’t bother to research the details of this effort.  Thankfully, Meredith (and the Rockies website) came through with the details.  For $25, you can support the cause and reserve a mullet hat of your own.  Details and the donation form are available on the Rockies’ website at a fantastically named url: http://www.coloradorockies.com/mullet.

Reserve one today, and tell tasteful hairstyles: “You’re @#*%ing out!”

… to the organization, Kaz Matsui. Kaz agreed to a minor-league deal with the club.

… to the majors, Chris Iannetta. Chris has rediscovered his stroke, hitting .349 with 5 homers since being sent down to the Springs.

… Tulo’s power stroke - four homers in the last 5 games.

… to pitching baseballs, Huston Street. Huston threw a 20-pitch bullpen session, his first pitches since tweaking his groin in a rehab start for Tulsa.

… to the Rockies +.500 record.

… clueless local columnists making nonsensical arguments for why Todd Helton is washed up. More on (or perhaps moron) this during the next cast.

… Rockiescast references to Welcome Back, Kotter - the greatest show in the history of television.

After an epic battle that saw Jayson Werth outlast Nick Markakis for Beard of the Offseason, the first month of the regular season brought with it an unsettling lack of awesome facial hair, as far as we observed. Looking outside of the major league ranks, we found our Beard of the Month winner in an unusual place - in a rented Town & Country traveling the deep south along with Ted and Me on our recent baseball road trip. It was quite a shock to us, as previously clean-shaven friend of the show Andrew Dailey arrived in Atlanta with a mantastic beard, never having mentioned its growth prior to the trip. Just look at the difference in Andy’s appearance in the before and after pictures and you’ll know why we had no choice but to award Drew the April BotM Award.

Andy Dailey - Beardless and Hideous

Drew Dailey - Bearded and Beautiful

For once I can (partially) blame someone else for stupid things I’ve said.  If you listened to Episode 139, you heard me mention that the Rockies had placed Melvin Mora on the disabled list and activated Jason Hammel — despite not planning to have him start immediately.  If you watched last night’s debacle, you might have noticed that Mora had a pinch hit appearance, which is hard to do from the DL.  Of course, it turns out that Mora was never placed on the list at all.

In all of the confusion the weather caused with the Rockies roster plans, the team’s own website seems to have diverged from reality.  Check out coloradorockies.com’s list of transactions for May 12 below.

So I’m going to pin most of the blame for this on MLB Advanced Media, which runs all of the MLB team sites.  Obviously though, I share some of the responsibility for this error, as I made the mistake of assuming that I could trust MLB for accurate info on transactions made within MLB.  At least we don’t have to worry about that Mora shortage!

The Phillies cheat, Charlie Manuel (pictured below) contradicts his own words as well as video evidence as he rattles off nonsensical counter-accusations and excuses, and MLB essentially looks the other way.  There is something very wrong with this picture.

In case you missed this stink that should be much bigger than it is, FSN Rocky Mountain’s cameras — by request of the Rockies coaches — caught Billmeyer, the Phillies’ bullpen coach, using binoculars to look toward home plate during Monday night’s game.  Among Manuel’s excuses is that Billmeyer uses binoculars only to watch his own catcher’s positioning.  The problem with that argument is the facts: the Rockies and FSN only observed Billmeyer using the binoculars during the top of the innings, when the Rockies were in the field and Miguel Olivo was catching.

Using binoculars to steal signs from the other team is explicitly against MLB rules.  So this is an open-and-shut case.  The only logical reason the Phillies would want such a magnified view of the opposing catcher is to steal signs, and the Phillies have offered no alternative explanation.  Instead, Manuel has gone through a laundry list of contradictory statements to deny and excuse his team’s cheating.  At one point, he forcefully denied the accusation, saying his team does not steal signs.  Later he said that his team would steal signs if given the opportunity, but it’s okay because so would any other team.

Manuel also tried to justify the cheating by hypothesizing that — because the Mets have a better record at home than on the road — maybe the Mets do the same thing at Citi Field.  I have to admit he’s got a point there.  Who has ever heard of a sports team that plays better at home than on the road?  There could certainly be no explanation for that other than cheating.  And of course Manuel brought up the infamous incident in the 2007 NLDS when the Phillies convinced themselves that Manuel Corpas was putting a foreign substance on the ball before he pitched it.  What he neglected to mention was how MLB reviewed the incident and found no reason to conclude that Corpas was cheating.

That gets us to the heart of what is so unnerving about this situation.  When the Rockies were accused of cheating based on inconclusive video footage, MLB didn’t hesitate to review the incident.  When the Phillies were caught cheating on videotape, MLB issued them a verbal warning.  It’s not as if this can be regarded as a one time incident that occurred during a couple early innings of one regular season game.  After stealing signs early on in this contest, the Phillies mounted a huge rally at the end of the game to win it.  If you haven’t repressed the memories, you might recall that the Phillies won both of their 2009 NLDS games at Coors Field in an eerily similar fashion.  Make of that what you will, but it certainly calls into question whether there was illegal sign stealing going on there too.  On top of that, the Phillies were previously accused of using a video camera to steal signs, and MLB did nothing.

It’s inexcusable that MLB would ignore repeated and brazen rules violations for certain teams.  When the media ignores 75% of the Big Leagues to shower attention on its darling East Coast teams, it’s obnoxious.  When MLB ignores the rules to allow one of its media darlings to cheat, it threatens the integrity of the entire game.  I had hoped that the powers that be in baseball would have learned from the steroid scandal not to look the other way for the sake of short term gains, but unfortunately that does not appear to be the case.

It’s been an eventful and delicious road trip for Scott and I. So much so that we haven’t had a chance to update the ol’ blog. We’ve got plenty of tales of tasty encounters with boiled peanuts, ribs, pulled pork, crawfish, po’ boys, biscuits and gravy that we’ll share eventually. Right now though, as we speed across southwest Louisiana en route to Houston, we only have time to share an important new mancrush. The hills above Birmingham, Alabama feature a massive statue of Vulcan. Created as a symbol of the city’s steel-making legacy, it is the largest cast iron statue in the world. We’re assuming that title also means that the Vulcan statue features the world’s largest cast-iron ass. It certainly looks that way from up close. Apparently we aren’t the only people who have noticed the rear view. The gift shop sells miniatures of the statue featuring “bobble buns.”

We’re sorry we  couldn’t get this up sooner, but better late than never.  Awesome job Eric, Dave, Burke, and Clay. We declare you the National League Lego Champions of 2007!

The Rockies learned this morning that they lost their president.  Keli McGregor was found dead in a Salt Lake City hotel room at around 9a.m. today, according to the Denver Post.

Rockiescast would like to extend its sincere condolences to Mr. McGregor’s family and the entire Rockies organization.

In our latest episode, in addition to our look ahead to the Nats series we discussed some creative fan support for the Nats in the form of the Nat Rider, a Washington Nationals decorated bicycle that a Nats Fan (one from a group of guys) will ride from a local DC bar to Nationals Park before the game.  If you would like to support some creative fans, have a love of all things remotely Hasselhoff related, or just have sympathy for some poor Nationals fans, go to the Nat Rider Facebook page and become a fan.

In honor of Ubaldo’s awesome no-hitter on Saturday, here are a few no-hitter historical facts:
- In addition to Ubaldo, 15 other pitchers have thrown no-hitters while allowing six or more walks. The record is ten walks in a ten-inning no-hitter thrown by Jim Maloney in 1965, resulting in a win for his Reds against the Cubs.
- Nolan Ryan holds the record with seven no-hitters. His first came in 1973. His final no-hitter came on May 1st, 1991 at the age of 44. That same day, Rickey Henderson broke Lou Brock’s career stolen base record and Rickey officially declared himself the greatest of all time.
- In my opinion, the most impressive no-hitter was thrown in 1991 when Jim Abbott achieved the feat despite being born without a right hand.
- On August 6, 1969, Ken Holtzman tossed a no-hitter for the Cubs without recording a single strikeout.
- In 1969, Bill Stoneman made his 5th career start. It was the Montreal Expos 9th game as a franchise. The Phillies could not hit him.
- Stoneman is one of the pitchers to walk more batters than Ubaldo during a no-hitter, walking seven in a 7-0 victory and no-hitter against the Mets. With the game played in Montreal, it was the first MLB no-hitter thrown outside of the United States.