Posts tagged ‘Spilly’s Beard’

It’s encouraging to see that, with each passing year, the tradition of the playoff beard seems to be catching on in sports besides hockey. As Kylie pointed out in the blog comments recently, even the Denver Post has noticed the trend in the Rockies’ clubhouse.  I was also pleased to see that the Wikipedia entry for Playoff Beard mentions Rockies fans.  And we all know everything on Wikipedia has to be based in objective fact.^{[citation needed]}

The obvious downside of the playoff beard is that previous facial hair growth, no matter how handsome, must be shorn when the playoffs begin in order to start a proper playoff beard from scratch. So, it was with heavy heart that I purged my face of my recent tribute to Ryan Spilborghs‘ award winning Time-Travelling Conquistador beard. Hard as it was to take the razor to my face, I have no regrets.  Playoff glory isn’t free (Rocktober costs a buck-o-five).  And I can always console myself knowing that while my Spilly tribute is gone from my face, it will always live on in photographic record. So, as promised, here is how awesome my face looked for one fleeting moment in time:

Just as a depressing week of Rockies baseball has fans’ spirits sinking, Jackie from Denver has pieced together a music video to remind us of the good times.  And it turns out there have been a lot of good times since June.  The first time I watched the video, I immediately felt a surge of pride and confidence in our precious ball club.  I’m sure a good deal of my reaction has to do with the way Jackie more-or-less bookended the video with showcases of why we love Ryan Spilborghs.  (Hint: it has to do with beards and walk-off grand slams.)

It is with much relief that we present actual visual evidence that Ryan Spilborghs‘ Time-Travelling Conquistador beard of early August actually existed.  This oughta silence all of those Time-Travelling Conquistador deniers out there (mostly Giants and Dodgers fans).

Special thanks go out to Meredith for digging this up for the world to see.  So um…thanks, Meredith!  Her contributions to Rockies society don’t stop there though.  In 2007, Meredith won the Stitch n’ Pitch National Knitting Contest with a Rockies-themed sock pattern.  Word on the street is that everyone counted out Meredith’s pattern until it won 21 of 22, steamrolling the rest of the National League of Sock Patterns.  Her work was subsequently featured in the April 2008 issue of Rockies Magazine.  Some of you might actually have that issue kicking around, as it was the 2007 National League Champions issue.  Take a look for her feature…we’ll wait.

See…pretty impressive, huh?  Out of the kindness of her purple heart, Meredith offers that Rockies sock pattern and assorted other goodies free on her website: www.meredithknitting.com.

Great Scott!  This is unbelievably frustrating.  I’ve spent several hours now combing the Internet for visual evidence that Ryan Spilborghs‘ awesome beard from the early part of August was real.  It seems as though that work of art — which we like to call the Time-Travelling Conquistador – went totally uncaptured by still camera.  Needless to say, this is totally unacceptable.  I suppose we can take comfort in knowing that at least photo evidence of Spilly’s recent walk-off grand slam is all over the web.

Rockiescast is usually reluctant to award Beard of the Month honors to facial hair that can’t be displayed in a pretty little photo on the site.  However, nothing can stand in the way of Spilly’s work taking BotM honors for August.  If you saw it, you already know why.  It was one smooth length of mutton chop/mustache glory.

So this is an open call: If anyone has a photo of the Time-Travelling Conquistador, please send it our way.  Until we have a photo of the real BotM to post, please enjoy this photo essay…

Welcome back,

Our dreams have finally worked out.

Welcome back,

To that same old face that we dream about.

Well we hope it’s for long that you’ll hang around,

Cuz it’s been way too long since you’ve been around.

Boy we really missed ya (Boy we really missed ya)

If you were here we’d kiss ya (If you were here we’d kiss ya)

Well we love you a lot so from Ted and from Scott, welcome back,

Welcome back, Spilly’s Beard, welcome back.

It seems we’ve got dueling theories on the role of Ryan Spilborghs‘ beard in the Rockies’ successes and failures.  Last season, Lauren from Denver astutely pointed out a correlation between the Rockies snapping losing streaks (of which there were plenty) and Spilly shaving his beard.  It seemed to Lauren and to us that Spilly was repeatedly making a tremendous sacrifice for the team.

Now it’s come to our attention (thanks, Morgan!) that I Bleed Purple is asking Spilly to bring the beard back full time in order to recapture the glory of Purple Rocktober.  As a matter of fashion, obviously we couldn’t agree more with Mr. Purple.  That beard is a gift to the world.  But this raises an intriguing question: how will Spilly’s beard affect the Rockies’ performance this year?  Will Rockies fans be feasting in a land of bearded milk and honey as I Bleed Purple suggests (and we all hope), or will the fates demand more personal sacrifice from the Rockies’ handsome outfield?  And when will Elias Sports Bureau get it together and start keeping split stats on bearded/non-bearded performances?  First things first though: Spilly needs to grow a beautiful beard before he can decide to keep or shave it.

Feel free to share your thoughts here (especially if you’re not Scott or me), and stay tuned to Rockies baseball to see how it all unfolds!