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Now available for preorder:
The San Francisco Panorama.
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- - - - MODEL ROSTER OF 1. Charles Lee Ray, 2B, Child's Play The famed Lakeshore Strangler may be stuck in a Good Guy doll for all of eternity, but that hasn't taken away his tenacity or competitiveness. Always a great interview (even though little of it gets by the censors; think Ozzie Guillen without the accent), Ray's sharp wit and explosive nature haven't softened with his recent marriage and parenthood. 2. Leprechaun, SS, Leprechaun The second half of the shortest double-play combination in major league history is a spark plug raised from the mean streets of (in order) Ireland, New York, Las Vegas, space, and the 'hood. This swift mythological creature was laughed off by other players when he walked into his first tryout, seeing as few professional players are 2 feet tall. But due to his 10-foot vertical leap, even his odd contractual demand for a specialized groundskeeper to comb the field for four-leaf clovers didn't scare GMs away. 3. Leatherface, CF, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre While he doesn't have the prototypical build of a center fielder, Leatherface's main quality is the amount of ground he can cover, since he never stops running. Never. 4. Michael Myers, DH, Halloween The only thing holding back this great power-hitting prospect from making the jump into the upper echelon of players is his unwillingness to run. Ever. Thus, the team loses his bat during interleague games, as he's not a viable option at first base. 5. Freddy Krueger, 1B, A Nightmare on Elm Street Despite not wearing a glove, the "son of a hundred maniacs" was once a heavily recruited center fielder. But after realizing his extreme arm extension was only available in nightmares, scouts began to sour. Luckily for him—and for the children of Springwood, Ohio—Rawlings specially tailored a glove to fit over his knifed claw. With his ability to goad runners into taking larger leads, and his comical yet extremely foul-mouthed responses to opposing fans' heckles (mostly regarding his "gay-ass" sweater), Krueger is a natural at first base. 6. Jason Voorhees, C, Friday the 13th An average hitter, his real value is as a defensive specialist and true student of the game. Forced into catching duties at a young age because he was unwilling to share his mask, Voorhees has been studying hitters' tendencies for decades. Most take his constant silence as stupidity, but he's actually quite introspective, always contemplating ways to call better games behind the plate. While his pitch selection has lowered many ERAs, pitchers mainly love him for being a good teammate and never allowing batters to charge the mound, as he decapitates them before they get a chance. 7. Jigsaw, LF, Saw Since he's bedridden with a constant IV drip, you wouldn't expect Jigsaw to be much of a ballplayer. But thanks to a rule change (in exchange for his promise not to set any traps for opposing left fielders), Jigsaw is free to sit in the dugout while his speedy remote-controlled clownish puppet takes the field. Oh, to be a fly on the wall during his midgame philosophical arguments with the coach! 8. Sweeney Todd, RF, Sweeney Todd The Demon Barber of Fleet Street is the one weak link on the team. Slow in the field and weak at the plate, he's kept around mainly because of his delightful accent and occasional bursts into song. Plus, with him on the payroll, the team cuts out the costly haircut section of the budget. 9. Patrick Bateman, 3B, American Psycho Placed at the bottom of the order less as a knock on his skill than as an ego-bruising gesture (Bateman plays better with a chip on his shoulder), the Harvard graduate is an amateur sabermetrician, often calculating out loud during games his batting average and the number of fantasy baseball points he's earned. The only downside is that he constantly plays his music too loud in the clubhouse, drowning out Sweeney Todd's emotional musical soliloquies. Starting Rotation Pinhead, Hellraiser The leather-clad leader of the Cenobites is also the leader of the rotation, teaching others with constructive criticism, productive practices, and advice drawn from years (many, many years) of personal experience. Oh, and torture. Mostly torture. I'd say 95 percent torture and 5 percent of that other crap. Norman Bates, Psycho Bates, the consummate professional, has worn many different dresses (literally) during his long career. He relies mostly on deceptive delivery rather than power, rarely striking out batters. His only weakness is occasionally having his attention diverted by attractive young ladies in the crowd who continually ask him why he looks nothing like Vince Vaughn. Tom Ripley, The Talented Mr. Ripley Another pro who has succeeded by using deception over raw talent, his crafty nature is evident off the field, where he expertly sidesteps the issue of his ambiguous sexuality without having to resort to marrying a former Playboy Playmate like Mike Piazza. The Tall Man, Phantasm His off-speed knife-jutting-out-of-a-silver-ball is the best pitch in all of baseball. Closer Otis P. Driftwood, The Devil's Rejects While he is mostly known for his odd choice of entrance music (the entire 9 minutes and 8 seconds of "Free Bird"), the main attraction when Otis comes out is seeing which peeled-face mask he's going to wear that evening. Though his innings generally run longer than those of most closers, this isn't because he's allowing base runners, but because he spends a long time between pitches delivering Charlie Manson-esque rants to himself à la Mark "the Bird" Fidrych. Coach Hannibal Lecter, Silence of the Lambs Lecter possesses a combination of Tony La Russa's mental capacity for the game and Bobby Cox's perfectly still sitting style, but his main asset is his ability to deal with the extreme variety of personalities on the team. Unfortunately, Lecter occasionally passes the time by using his psychiatric knowledge to cloud his players' minds, often starting lengthy feuds that result in murder. But that's all right. Half the team is immortal anyhow. - - - - Got a question for our fantasy baseball expert? - - - -
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