Brent Mayne getting the facts wrong and getting all the attention

If you hadnā€™t heard, one-time catcher and current blogger Brent Mayne has had quite a day on the Internet.  Everyoneā€™s a-Twitter about the catcher who was pretty much unknown outside hardcore baseball circles.

The story goes like this (now pay attention because the details are important in this story.  Baseball fans wonā€™t let you get away with anything).  Mayne went out on a limb and admitted that when JT Snow came up for his very first at-bat in the majors, Mayne told him what pitch was coming.  Mayne tells us that after he told Snow that a ā€œfastball outsideā€ was on its way, he smoked a double to left.

What controversial thing to say.  And good for him for coming clean, right?

Except it didnā€™t happen.

Mayne should know better (and probably does) than to get one by baseball fans.  It didnā€™t take long before someone posted the boxscore of JT Snowā€™s first game.  How strange that Snow was 0 for 5 in his appearance. 

So either:

A)  Mayne is clueless about the all-encompassing expansiveness of the Internet.  Heā€™s a former ballplayer just talking about the old days and didnā€™t realize that he JUST MIGHT be fact-checked.

or

B) Just the oppositeā€¦ Mayne is shrewd businessman who knows how to drive traffic to his website which in turn will increase sales of his books and other products.

Iā€™ll just give him the benefit of the doubt and say itā€™s (A) though Iā€™m jealous of all his web traffic for a stupid story that wasnā€™t true.

To be fair, Mayne has issued a correction/retraction.  The article rambles and is all over the place (youā€™ve read my stuff so you know what Iā€™m talking about).  JT Snow was ā€œplaying for the Yanksā€ and he knows for sure it was ā€œtowards the end of the seasonā€.  Heā€™s even ā€œsure it was JTā€. 

Heā€™s not so sure about the double thing, though.  Might have been an out or something. 

Iā€™m ready to let this thing die.  Iā€™ve given it more room on this blog than it probably deserves. 

Ballplayers and websites

I ran across this article on Dugout Central entitled The Art of Catching by none other than former catcher Brent Mayne.  The byline at the bottom included a link to brentmayne.com. Go figure.  Yeah, he plugging a book but the site is rife with come cool stuff including his take on Mark McGwireā€™s latest admission on steroids.  He also has a podcast with some interviews (Iā€™m planning on listening to the one with Rich Amaral). 

Iā€™m a little leery when it comes to MLB ballplayers and blogs or websites.  Somehow, I get the idea they are either ghost-written or under heavy monitoring.  Mayneā€™s however seems on the level.  First, heā€™s retired and probably can say what he wants.  Second, his writing style and content appears ā€œunofficialā€ looking (i.e. he writes like he might speak).  Third, heā€™s selling a book and makes no bones about it.  But instead of putting a quick template website up and forgetting about it (Iā€™ve seen this countless times even by writers), heā€™s actually updating it.  Kudos.

Speaking of ballplayers and websites, Willie Mays is having some issues with a website.  A domain name, in particular.  According to domainnamewire.com, Mays is filing to get williemays.com under his control.  Currently, the domain name is owned by a company called Global Access which resides in the Isle of Man.  The website is purely a money making venture for GA as it includes links to ticket outlets (this probably goes without saying but I encourage anyone who goes there to NOT buy tickets from those links).

Mays has asked the World Intellectual Property Organization to arbitrate the matter on his behalf.