These Cleats Are Made For Walking: A New Contender

Jun10 by Jordan Shusterman

Don’t have a ton of time for today’s walk-total mockery, but I have to point out a certain Yankee who is following in Kepp’s footsteps.

The New York Yankees recently called up third baseman David Adams from Triple-A. He was sporting a solid .897 OPS there before being called up, but Adams has begun has major league career with zero walks through his first 71 plate appearances.

He’ll have to work on that. In other news, our hero Jeff Keppinger didn’t manage a walk for the second consecutive week, keeping his total at two through 201 plate appearances.

Continue reading →

These Cleats Are Made For Walking: Two Month Update

May27 by Jordan Shusterman

We’re a little under two months into the 2013 regular season. Last week, we mourned the loss of White Sox second baseman Jeff Keppinger’s epic streak towards OBP disaster. And while his wRC+ remains at a staggeringly low 19, we can’t marvel at his incompetence quite as much anymore. However, he does remain the only qualified hitter in baseball with only two walks. And he’s up to 172 plate appearances.

Continue reading →

BONUS .GIF: AWESOME KOJI

May23 by jakemintz

YOU GO GIRL

These Cleats Are Made For Walking: RIP Jeff Keppinger

May20 by Jordan Shusterman

Well, I suppose it was inevitable but that doesn’t make it any easier. Ever since I noticed Jeffrey Scott Keppinger’s walkless existence around 50 plate appearances in, I had made it my duty to spread his impatience across the interwebz. And in the blink of an eye, it was over.

Continue reading →

These Cleats Are Made For Walking: Can Somebody Notice This ?!

May13 by Jordan Shusterman

Okay, here we are again. It’s the seventh Monday morning of the 2013 season and oh my god Jeffrey Scott Keppinger has still not walked through ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY FIVE PLATE APPEARANCES.

There are so many ridiculous things about this that are not being talked about nearly enough.

Continue reading →

These Cleats Are Made For Walking: One Lonely White Sock

May6 by Jordan Shusterman

Happy Monday. I was really hoping that this far into the season I’d be able to open the FanGraphs leaderboards and see that no qualified hitters had yet to walk but

….oh hello there Jeff Keppinger. What’s that ? YOU HAVEN’T WALKED THROUGH YOUR FIRST 99 PLATE APPEARANCES ?!

*sigh* Meanwhile, Welington Castillo, Endy Chavez, Salvador Perez, Erick Aybar, Colin Cowgill and Luis Cruz all have one walk each, combining for a stellar 6 walks over 424 plate appearances.

Jesus Montero, people, take a pitch.

These Cleats Are Made For Walking: Update Número Dos

Apr29 by Jordan Shusterman

We’re about a month into the season now, and it’s Monday morning. So let’s check in again.

Through a total of 688 plate appearances and 193 games played, Welington Castillo, Rajai Davis, Jeff Keppinger, Endy Chavez, A.J. Pollock, Salvador Perez, Andres Torres, Juan Pierre, Rick Ankiel and Luis Cruz have combined for a mind-numbingly awful SEVEN WALKS.

See ya in a week.

Walk-Up Music, Part 2: The AL Central

Jan9 by Jordan Shusterman

While there are a seemingly unlimited number of ways to experience the game of baseball through social media from the comfort of your own home, there are a few things that you can only truly get by attending a game. One of these, is the walk-up music chosen by the players of the home team. I’ve recently been exposed to the fact that many of the walk-up songs for specific players are available online on each team’s respective site. This is fantastic news for those of us who aren’t so lucky as to visit every MLB park and hear each player’s music. Here at CFB I’m gonna take a look at some of the highlights of this rather awful collection of music that MLB players have decided represent them/pump them up/introduce them best.

(You can find the collection of music by going to a team’s website and looking under the “FANS” tab for a section called “Ballpark Music” or something similar to it.)

Chicago White Sox:

Poor twisted you, Jesse Crain. Metallica certainly has its place in the world of walk-up music. It’s made many more appearances than I’ve actually listed here.

Beckham is the only one I’ve seen so far with FIVE different songs, and it must be a nightmare for the guy running stadium sound.

PA Announcer: “now batting, number fifteen, Gordonnnnn Beckhammmmmm”

Sound dude: “oh crap here we go uhhh CHICKEN FRIED wait what why would you even”

I’m picturing a movie poster with a blown up version of that picture of Paul Konerko with the epic title, “PAUL KONERKO: HARVESTER OF SORROW” starring Paul Konerko, Kenny Williams, and probably Ozzie.

Cleveland Indians:

The Indians site did not include many here, so I didn’t have too many good ones to choose from but the idea of jolly ol’ Matt Albers calmly telling someone to “sleep now in the fire” is wonderfully disturbing.

More Metallica. In this case though, The Devil’s Dance is most likely The Unintentional Walk.

Am I the only one who thinks he kind of looks like Phineas from “Phineas and Ferb”…? Okay…just checking…

Detroit Tigers:

something about Kate Upton

Yeah, Phil Coke would TOTALLY listen to Nickelback. Not even remotely surprised.

Strange choice, as Dirks hasn’t really spent much time on the DL. Maybe he “gets off” on Victor Martinez’ pain which is most of the reason he is still in the lineup maybe I guess I don’t know I am running out of bad jokes :(

Kansas City Royals: