Dead Snow, Live Links

It’s a relatively slow Monday on the baseball front. A lot of games were rained out at the end of last week and no one has said anything so blatantly stupid that The Common Man needs to comment on it. Instead, The Common Man takes the lazy way out. After a one-sentence movie review, TCM dumps some links.

Last night, while waiting for The Uncommon Wife to finish with some work so they could finally watch Lost, The Common Man streamed the Norwegian horror-comedy Dead Snow on Netflix. The review: Dead Snow gleefully works out the remaining angst Norwegians feel about their occupation during WWII by pitting Nazi Zombies (or Zombie Nazis) against young people in a secluded cabin in the mountains; fans of gore, snowmobile-related dismembering, and general hilarity will appreciate this celluloid therapy session, as the humor lands consistently despite the subtitles.

As a special bonus, here is what The Common Man tweeted during the film, a new feature of TCM.com he calls Mystery Science Tweeter 3000 (Snark in 140 characters or less):

Should I make a movie about zombies or Nazis? Why not both? Hurray for Dead Snow! The best Nazi Zombie movie Norway has to offer.

Which is more correct Zombie Nazis or Nazi Zombies?

70 years later, the Norwegians are finally fighting the Nazi occupation.

This movie must have been so cathartic for Norwegians.

What did @Ebertchicago think of Dead Snow?

Lesson learned: Never sneak up on a guy when he's hacking the shit out of a platoon of Nazi Zombies (or Zombie Nazis, which do they prefer?)

Good God, how many Zombie Nazis are there in Norway? Can't frickin walk to the bathroom without tripping over one.

Zombie Nazis: All they want is their gold. They're like Zombie Pirates that way. And Leprechauns.

Look, TCM doesn't want to question the logic of a movie that is based on the premise that Zombie Nazis walk among us...

but who hides the zombie gold in a cabin in the Norwegian woods anyway? Why didn't the zombies just keep it? TCM is confused.

Now, on to the linky goodness:

TCM is embarrassed he didn’t know that yesterday was Kirby Puckett’s 50th birthday. Like Friend of the Blog, Bill at The Daily Something, The Common Man’s favorite player of all time is undoubtedly Puckett, despite the unfortunateness that plagued his final years. Bill has a terrific, and fair, retrospective of Kirby’s career up. Shocking question: Has it really been 15 years since Puckett played his final game?

Lar at Wezen-ball has a repost up today from last year’s Pi-Day festivities. It’s fun to see, but not nearly as interesting as his long, engaging, and impressive history of the batting helmet. Not even The Common Man knew that batting helmets were so interesting.

Historian Adrian Burgos Jr. guest-posted on JoePos’s essential blog last week on some context behind Torii Hunter’s idiotic statements last week. Burgos writes that “there is a long history of black Latinos experiencing racism and discrimination in U.S. professional baseball,” and reminds us that Minnie Minoso, Vic Power, Martin Dihigo, and the first Ozzie Virgil endured great injustice in their effort to just play baseball. But the experiences of black Latinos has been largely invisible in the history of baseball’s race relations, largely because their history doesn’t easily fit into the larger narrative of Americans’ struggle for racial equality and we, as a people, are less familiar with it. As Burgos reminds us, “The national pastime has become predominantly a middle-class sport. And that is a discussion from which Latinos ought not to be shut out of.”

Unlike Aaron Gleeman, The Common Man is bullish on both the signings of Denard Span (5 years, $16 million + $9 million option) and Nick Blackburn (4 years, $14 million + $8 million option). Span’s contract figures to be a terrific deal for the Twins, and even may end up being a highly tradable commodity if the team comes up with some additional impact outfielders down the line (five years is a long time). Blackburn’s deal is a little less team-friendly, as he is averaging just slightly more money than Span and pitchers have a higher collapse rate than hitters. Still, Blackburn has been incredibly consistent over the last two years, and even at $6-8 million he’ll be below market for an average pitcher. Barring a ridiculous collapse, Blackburn figures to earn his money. Again, if the Twins continue to develop mid-rotation starters, and Blackburn holds his value, this is an entirely dealable player and contract when the team is looking to upgrade elsewhere. And anything the team can do to demonstrate to Joe Mauer that it's looking to compete for the long term, and encourage him to sign up, is good in TCM's book.

And finally, The Common Man considers himself a huge baseball and Twins fan, and will eventually need to go in for a bit of knee surgery at some point in the future. All of which is why TCM is so disappointed he didn’t think of this first. To think, while he was under, the doctors could help TCM contribute to Joe Nathan’s recovery and success. Kudos to John McDonald of Very Well Then for thinking of the team first. (h/t to Howard Sinker)