Sal Fasano, the journeyman catcher whose facial hair promted the formation of one of the most passionate fan groups ever, Sal’s Pals, is back in the bigs.

The Indians acquired Fasano from the Atlanta Braves for a player to be named later. The Indians needed a catcher after the club lost starter Victor Martinez, who is out six to eighth weeks following right elbow surgery on June 13.

What can the Indians expect from Fasano? That depends entirely on which Fasano shows up.

Will the Indians get the fu manchu’d Fasano, the version that fans in Philadelphia and Toronto grew to love? If so, expect fireworks and rioting in the streets.

Will Fasano show up with a mustache similar to the one he donned as a member of the New York Yankees? There’s nothing wrong with a good mustache, as Jason Giambi has clearly demonstrated this season. But Fasano’s stache was just a toned down version of his fu manchu. It was like watching Sex and the City reruns on TBS. You still get the jokes and the plot, but even if you haven’t seen that particular episode before, you know you’re missing something (ie., the cursing and the sex).

Or, will Fasano arrive clean-shaven, like he did in Baltimore? I saw Sal during spring training last year. He was training with the Blue Jays and had shaved his face and nothing, and I mean nothing, is sadder than a clean-shaven Fasano.

Just like Sampson got his power from his hair and Papi gets his power from mango salsa, everyone knows Fasano’s strength lies in his whiskers. Hopefully, after 11 years in professional baseball, Fasano has learned that lesson. The fate of the Indians’ season lies in the balance.

Meeeeeeeeeemories….

Light the corners of my miiiiiiiinnnnnndddd…

Misty, watercolor meeeeeeemoriiiiieeeeesss….

Of the way we were… 

Read the rest of this entry »

Today the Arizona Daily Star has a lovely little feature on Bill Hohn, who has umpired major-league baseball games for 18 seasons and is now rehabbing in Tucson after injuries stalled his career.

From the Daily Star:

In the last two years, he has had three surgeries to repair herniated disks in his lower back and the sciatic nerve in his left hip. Hohn, a 52-year-old native of Butler, Pa., missed most of 2007.

During his comeback, he has spent the last seven days on a rehabilitation stint at Tucson Sidewinders games. He is expected to return to the major leagues Friday in Atlanta.

Hohn’s is a feel good story. But his is a look bad face. Behold:

I don’t know what is going on here. It’s more than a mustache, but less than a Fu Manchu. And apparently this is nothing new:

I suppose he has good reason grow the ’stache. After all, umps need to look tough. If I was an ump, I’d want to look like as much of a hard ass as possible. But somebody needs to tell Hohn that the the secret to a successful Fu Manchu is uniformity. The hairs above the lip and along the sides of the mouth need to be the same length. This party on top (lip) and business on the sides look is not good.

Pay attention, Bill. This is how it’s done:

Ahhh. Now that’s some truly fortunate facial hair.

The facial hair situation for the White Sox has gotten even worse since last month. At least this time it’s UFH for a good cause!

Nick Swisher gets a dye job on his UFH from Jeremy Campus, who has cancer, to raise awareness about breast cancer for Mother’s Day, which is this coming Sunday.

(Let’s hope for his sake that he got Ma Swisher some flowers instead of, say, a slightly used blow-up doll.)

They say laws are like sausages: you never want to see them being made.

Allow me to add a third item to that list: mustaches.

Granted, there is no facial hairstyle that rivals the mustache for pure machismo or sex appeal (see: Selleck, Brimley, Daulerio). But while a fully-formed mustache is a thing of beauty, a mustache in the works is a scary and unnerving phenomenon.

Take Eric Byrnes new ’stache, for example. It is truly Unfortunate Facial Hair.

As you can see, the mustache is still in development and is rather awkward. Simply put, this fruit is not yet ripe.

Why would anybody do this to his face?

“I have not shaved since we started peeling off those wins,” Byrnes said. “And, coincidentally, I started hitting, so put the two of them together and the mustache isn’t going anywhere. As long as we keep winning or I keep getting hits, this mustache is staying.”

Ok, that’s legit. As Crash Davis would say, “you have to respect the streak.” But let me submit that the proper way to grow a mustache is to first grow a beard and then shave off all of one’s facial hair, excepting the hair above the upper lip. Ladies love the five o’clock shadow. And the full beard is a look that says, “I’m ready for the playoffs, even in April.”

What Byrnes has done – growing only the mustache and shaving the rest of his face hair – is just wrong. Fans shouldn’t have to endure this in-between period. We’ll be ready to embrace the ’stache when it is really and truly ready for prime time, but we shouldn’t have to see how the sausage is made.

Red Sox set-up man Manny Delcarmen, sporting a newly lengthened goatee, seems to be kicking it old school:

Almost “ancient school,” you might say:

Update below

Some time last year, during the first few weeks of the season, I marveled at the White Sox rotation and their strong start. At first, I figured it was the natural course of things, this very rotation had been the cornerstone for the White Sox World Championship in 2005. But then I realized a common trend with the starters, something that helped me piece the puzzle of the natural mystique of UFH.

Fast-forward one year and with four games, and a 2-2 record, the White Sox pitching staff have once again defied the boundaries of what is UFH. On this occasion however, it isn’t the starters, it’s the relievers.

The UmpBump staffers jumped at the sight of one Boone Logan and quickly inquired as to why I hadn’t exposed this culprit of UFHness; but as I told them, Logan was always on a sea-saw between the minors and the big leagues, so though I knew he was an arm in the ChiSox pen, I rarely saw him pitch.

But then, I saw it.

At first, Logan’s chin-fro comes across as some kind of weird rite of passage he’s imposed on himself now that he’s a full-time major leaguer (this is how he looks in his official MLB headshot), and I shrugged it off as a typical violation of UFH section (3) code (2): Chin hair cannot, under any circumstance, exceed 1 (one) inch in length.

But then, as I saw Bobby Jenks notch his first two saves of the season, I became convinced there is a UFH conspiracy in the White Sox relief corps.

It’s obvious there’s some kind of hierarchy at work here. Jenks being the closer, he gets to sport the golden chin-fro, and Logan being the noob only gets the traditional job. So far, I haven’t been witness to any other White Sox relievers committing this UFH crime, but rest assured, I’ll hunt them down if they do.

Update: Trusty loyal reader melissa pointed out int he comments that one Nick Swisher has also been spotted sporting golden chin hairs, and now we have the evidence. It appears Swisher first committed a minor UFH offense by simply gilding his soul patch, but evidently, he couldn’t keep himself from indulging in complete UFH debauchery.

Behold:

We must put a stop to these hideous UFH crimes!

Reed Johnson has got him some gnarly facial hair. It truly puts the “goat” back in “goatee.” Behold:

It’s like even he can’t believe how horrible he looks.

Yes, Reed, that facial hair does make you look fat.

What do you think he’s doing with his tongue there?

more at twiigs.com…

Yesterday, the Phillies signed 3B Pedro Feliz. But they got far more than just a gold glove fielder. The Phillies got a player who dabbles in unfortunate facial hair the way Charlie Sheen dabbles in Vegas hookers. The way Amy Winehouse dabbles in coke. The way Britney dabbles in crazy.Truth be told, I haven’t spent a ton of time watching Feliz, since he played for the Giants, a team that has always been in a different time zone and lately has been far from contention. But with yesterday’s trade, I had new reason to gaze upon the visage that is Feliz. And lo, what I did see!

First, on Philadelphia Inquirer baseball writer Todd Zolecki’s blog, I got a glipse of Feliz rocking the chin strap.

Then, I Googled a nice pic of Feliz with what looks to be a still-in-progress chin strap. I’ve seen 13-year-olds with fuller beards.

Then, I took to Flickr, where I discovered a photo of Feliz with a soul strip, a look he no doubt borrowed from one Doug Davis.

Finally, here he is with a couple of female fans, rocking a combination of barely-there mustache and chin fuzz. The chin fuzz says, “got a tin can I can munch on?” while the almost-stache says, “Hi, my name is McLovin and I’d like to buy some beer.”

The reaction to Feliz’s signing in Philly was a collective “meh.” But I suspect he’ll grow on the city of brotherly shove. And even if he doesn’t grow on them, I know something will grow on him.Welcome to the team, Pedro. The UFH team.

1. Jim Rice is the 21st player to win over 70% of votes in the Hall of Fame balloting but fall short of the 75% needed for election. The other 20 players have all ended up in Cooperstown. (Bugs and Cranks has a great rant on the caprice of BBWAA members and the mysterious rise—and occasional fall—of HOF-eligible players’ vote totals.) Rice has the support of this year’s only inductee, Goose Gossage: “I think Jim Rice does belong in the Hall of Fame. No hitter scared me, but Jim Rice came the closest.” As for Nick’s contention that Rice has no place in the Hall, I clearly disagree. But Nick’s post has convinced me that Dwight Evans belongs in Cooperstown as well, something I was on the fence about previously. Come on, Veterans Comittee!

2. What with all the Roger Clemens coverage, the NFL playoffs, and this little election-thingy going on right now, you might have missed this story, but the new Yankee Stadium is going to cost New York taxpayers a pretty penny—including $70 million for free VIP valet parking. Even more irksome to New Yorkers, while the poobahs will get 40 years of parking courtesy of the taxpayers, Joe Yankeefan will still have to pay out of his own pocket. That’s preposterous. However, I must throw cold water on the notion that fans are being gouged by a rate increase from $14 to $17 this year, and again to $19 at the new stadium in 2009, and up to $35 bucks by 2014. Most of the parking at Fenway is already at least $30. Yankee fans, suck it up.

3. After a successful workout for several teams in LA and offers from “three or four” clubs, Gabe Kapler has chosen to play for the Brewers next year. He’ll get 800k. Kapler managed Boston’s Single A affiliate last year to an uninspiring record of 58-81.

“Gabe brings versatility and athleticism to the outfield position,” said Brewers GM Doug Melvin. “He has always been a great teammate and possesses the determination to bounce back and become a valuable player to our club.”

This also elevates the already impressive hotness quotient of the Milwaukee Brewers, who field such eye candy as dreamy-eyed third baseman Ryan Braun and cutie-patootie Prince Fielder.

4. Also in the former-Red-Sox-making-a-comeback category, MLBTradeRumors reports that at least the Diamondbacks will be watching as Keith Foulke throws later this month. As for the idea that Foulke “may have special interest in” the Red Sox, I can guarantee right now that the Red Sox will not have any interest, special or otherwise, in Keith Foulke, who is (perhaps unfairly) less remembered for being part of the 2004 championship team than for being the perennially injured and ineffective closer of ‘05 and ‘06, speaking dismissively of Red Sox fans as “Johnny from Burger King” types that meant nothing to him, licking his World Series ring with groupies, and for (allegedly) sleeping with one of the Red Sox ball girls, (allegedly) in the clubhouse no less, and (allegedly) getting caught in flagrante delicto by Dawn Timlin, who (allegedly) promptly told Mrs. Foulke, who (most definitely) demanded a divorce.

5. Just to go back to the Hall of Fame for a minute, I would like to personally apologize to Goose Gossage. No, I don’t have a Hall of Fame vote. But I do have an Unfortunate Facial Hair vote. And there is absolutely no excuse for me to have overlooked Goose’s contributions in the field of facial hair when I wrote this retrospective of the fu manchu. Clearly, Gossage had a historic impact on the place of the distinctive moustache in baseball lore, and I was remiss not to formally recognize this sooner. I’m sure Goose will be as thrilled to be included in our UFH category as he is to be elected into Cooperstown. “It was very emotional I’ll tell you, off the charts. I can’t describe the feeling.” Yes, Goose, I’m sure. Only the lucky and the few get such recognition. But are you sure you really can’t describe how it felt? “A shock wave went through my body like an anvil just fell on my head.” On second thought, I think maybe calling it indescribable was fine.