I stopped doing "Sick Scoreboard Card" posts because including "sick" in a blog post suddenly started triggering nonstop clickage by the web bots. I don't fully understand why this is or anything about the "bot" world really, but at the time I was trying to honestly evaluate which posts drew the most readers. Seeing any post with "sick" in it automatically surging to the top of the stats made the whole process laughable.
I've since realized that it is impossible to get a handle on your blog readership (because we can't have nice things), and I've stopped caring anymore.
Go ahead, make this post for which I'm dedicating very little effort, my most "read" post of all-time. Knock yourself out. I don't care.
What I do care about is seeing scoreboards on cards.
There aren't many good examples in 2013 Topps. The few that exist don't feature the scoreboard in anything but an incidental way.
A couple of innings worth in the top right corner.
Electric numbers obscured by that annoying baseball player in the front.
Yellow and white blurrage.
This is probably the best example of a semi-well-displayed scoreboard in Series 1. There, behind Pacheco, you can see the White Sox and Tigers are in the 6th, the Rangers and Indians are in the 7th, the Twins and Royals are under way, and the Red Sox and A's have yet to begin. Not an interleague game in the bunch. Just the way I like it.
But none of them are good for any scoreboard detective work.
The only one that I've been able to find where you can tell something about the game in process is the A.J. Pierzynski card.
Thanks to the scoreboard and the video board, I can tell that Alex Rios is up at the plate in the bottom of the first inning and there are two outs. Pierzynski apparently is on deck.
But that's where my fact-finding mission fizzles and dies.
The team names are cropped off the scoreboard, and it's too far away to read anything else off of it that would give any clues. The opponent in the field is wearing one of those nondescript, boring road uniforms that makes for difficult identification. Maybe the Blue Jays? I can't be sure.
So, I'm afraid I can't tell you much else about this game.
Except that it is brought to you by McDonald's Pepsi, Miller Lite, Stanley Tools and Vienna Beef.
Priorities, people. Never mind the score, who pays the bills?
Sorry, I give this otherwise fantastic panoramic stadium shot, only one, out of a possible four, disembodied hand claps.
Comments
Rios is up to bat in the bottom of the first. Alex spent most of the season batting out of the 5 hole. It's the bottom of the first, so we know the Sox have to have a couple players on the base paths for Alex to be at the plate in the bottom of the first. However, the Sox have not scored, so we need a game with no runs in the bottom of the first (at this point). Also, Alex is batting with 11 home runs for the season. Rios hit number 11 on 7/3 against Texas. He hit #12 on 7/8 in a game with the Jays. There are 4 games between those two contests - 2 against the Rangers and 2 against the Blue Jays.
In the two against the Rangers, the Sox went down in order in the bottom of the 1st, so those are eliminated. In the two games against the Blue Jays, Alex got to the plate in the bottom of the first with no runs scored at that point in the game. So how can we be sure it's the 7th and not the 6th?
The game on the 6th was a night game. While the sun would still be in the sky at game time (7:09pm), the shadows are not accurate for a game that starts that late. Also, it was 91 degrees at the start of the game. No way AJ would be wearing that undershirt in that heat. The game on the 7th started at 3:11 with a temperature of 75 degrees.
You may resume your regular blog reading now.
I figured a Sox fan would have to help me out.
*ducks flying wrenches headed my way*