Over the past few days, Marilyn has been participating in a photo challenge on her Serendipity blog… “Five Photos, Five Stories,” which she was asked to participate in by the first name in photo prompts, Cee’s Photography Blog. I decided to give it a shot this week as an excuse to show off a few of my non-squirrel photos that might otherwise not end up on my blog. The rules are simple…
1) Post a photo (or more!) each day for five consecutive days.
2) Attach a story to the photo. It can be fiction, non-fiction, poetry, or nothing more than a short paragraph. It’s entirely up to you.
3) Nominate another blogger to carry on the challenge. Your nominee is free to accept or decline the invitation. This is supposed to be fun. It is not a command performance!
Don’t worry…. I’m not going to put the guilt trip on anyone by nominating them… you are perfectly free to latch on to this idea or not.
For the final day of the challenge, I thought long and hard about what I wanted to make my last topic about, and it occurred to me that I’d considered doing a post before on the photos I’ve taken of statues…
This is a photo I took back in September 2010 of a bust on display at PNC Park in Pittsburgh of former Pirates team president Carl Barger. I get the idea of impressionist art, but that doesn’t always play out very well when we’re talking about sculptures of real people. This is one of the saddest busts I have ever seen. Poor Carl. He left Pittsburgh to take over the same job with the expansion Florida Marlins in 1992, and promptly dropped dead of a heart attack…. no doubt because he saw this awful likeness of himself.
Now that’s better… Pirates Hall of Fame outfielder Willie “Pops” Stargell, preparing to take out that father and son who are posing in the path of his mighty swing. Any real baseball fan would know that lefties love the ball low and inside…
Here’s a curious statue outside of Target Field of former Minnesota Twins owner Carl Pohlad and his wife Eloise. Carl made his fortune by foreclosing family farms during the Great Depression. As owner of the Twins, Pohlad first tried to sell the team to a North Carolina businessman who would have moved the team to Charlotte… then was first in line to accept a proposed $150,000,000 contraction payment from Major League Baseball that would have eliminated the franchise had MLB gone through with the plan. That was the best idea Bud Selig had to restore competitive balance to the league at the time… axe all of the small market teams. So why did they build a statue of Pohlad outside of a ballpark that wouldn’t even exist had he had his way? Hey, to paraphrase Reggie Jackson, they don’t build statues of nobodies!
Minnesotans sure love their owners! Not far from the Pohlads is this monument to Calvin Griffith, who brought the Washington Senators to Minnesota in 1961… becoming the first of many baseball owners to bail the hell out of the nation’s capital. First in war, first in peace, and now last in the American League Central.
There are a lot of tiger statues around the perimeter of Comerica Park in Detroit. Given the neighborhood the ballpark is in, I’m pretty sure they’re there for protection.
There are also a number of bizarre statues inside the ballpark….
There is really no other description for what is going on with Hank Greenberg’s bat than it is obviously ejaculating baseballs.
Al Kaline Krazy Glued to the wall. Seriously, WTF?
Ever wondered what Willie Horton’s ass looked like? Now you know…
And finally, to wrap up this five part photo prompt series, here is former Kansas City Royals owner Ewing Kauffman and his lovely wife Muriel bidding adieu to everyone who put up with my pictures and long-winded storytelling all week!
Either they are saying goodbye to you all, or they are welcoming the alien ships to our planet…
Evil Squirrel's Nest 
Five thoughts:
1. I thought that first guy was an Egyptian mummy who died of leprosy.
2. What? No Stan the Man?
3. Pops! Although it’s weird looking at his stance from a static pose.
4. I love that white tiger (of course). I’d wager that’s probably the coolest thing in all of Detroit.
5. The only statues around here are generals on horses, as far as I know. I last visited a major league ballpark at least 15 years ago. Cactus Jack Helton was probably still Cupcake Manning’s caddy at the time and we all know if there’s ever a statue at Coor’s, ol’ Grandad is first in line….
Taking pictures is one of those touristy things, and I’ve only brought my camera with me once to Busch… and since I didn’t go in the gate where Stan’s statue presides over, I’ve never taken a picture of it.
Didn’t they give Britches a horse when he retired? I think another man on his mount statue is in order… Denver should get the pleasure that comes with viewing rainbow balls…
Hey, Squirrel!
As a lifetime beisbol fan, I really like your selection of baseball statues and accompanying sentiments. Not the usual tourista stuff from Pilgrims who wouldn’t know that Casey Stengel once was a pretty fair outfielder.
Hank Greenberg’s bat really is producing ribbies — not the current grammatically corrected ones.
Is there a statue of the Georgia Peach in his Klan attire?
Take 2 and go to right.
Thanks! I think the Cobb statue is punching a one armed man in the face… artistic violence at its finest. In these days of crazy modern baseball statistics, there will come a day when ribbies are as old fashioned as Hank Greenberg…. sigh!
I feel sorry for Mr. Barger too…it looks a little like Freddy Kruger…sometimes the wort art has a sad taste :o)
You’re right, that would be what a bust of Freddy would look like. I think they had the fourth grade art class put that one together…
Your descriptions of these statues are great. Thank you for laughs!
You are quite welcome! I like finding the humor in everything!
I’m headed back up to Oriole Park in June, I won’t be able to look at the statues there the same way again.
(I think I was supposed to try to convince you to come visit Bawlmer and have a blogger meetup with me, Mark and whoever else. Consider this an attempt at such a thing.)
Baltimore probably one of, if not the closest park to me I haven’t been to yet, but I stopped my baseball caravan last year because (1) Too many doctor’s bills and home repairs the last year and a half, and (2) The drives are getting too long since I’m too stubborn to fly. I’m definitely going nowhere other than KC this year….. but maybe next year I’ll be more adventurous again! 🙂
OMG! You had me laughing so hard I was crying. I loved your commentary!
Thanks! Glad you enjoyed my statue humor!
Are you sure that first guy died of a heart attack and not some hideous skin disease?
You would never know from looking at how he will now always be remembered! What a way to go…
Where’s all the pigeons? Shouldn’t there be some with all the statues? Or were they on holiday? 😉
Pigeons tend to stay away from ballparks… too many errant fly balls that might take them out!
But now that you mention it, there does seem to be a calling card on the wall in the first photo of the horrific bust….
I never thought about fly balls! Of course I’ve only been to one ball park and that was many years ago. As for that first horrific bust….well……enough said. 😉
Interesting… I find myself liking the odd modern art sculptures around here more and more. 😉
There’s some really bad art out there! I keep waiting for my squirrels to build something out of all the empty corncobs and pinecones in my backyard, but no, they don’t seem to be artistically inclined…
One of the little tree-rats in our neighborhood keeps digging up the plants I put in around the base of the mailbox. If I catch him he just may become a piece of art, of the permanent installation variety.
If only my ass looked that good….
We should all have such a finely sculpted ass….
OMG OMG. The first bust of Barger looks like a leper with a scrofula problem. Hideous. And poor Hank Greenberg. He deserves better. These are some of most appalling and hilarious statues I’ve ever seen. I can cope with the huge, looming tiger … I know taste is subjective, but maybe not quite THIS subjective 🙂
Great post. And painfully funny.
Given the reaction to my collection of weird sculpture, I’m a bit disappointed I never went through with this idea before now. Thanks again for the most excellent prompt! I had a lot of fun perusing my photo archives, and I think I even managed to make each post different from the others in its own way.
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What a fun post! Eloise with her cute little purse and pearls looks so out of place and uncomfortable.
BASEBALL! There is nothing like a game at the park with the big leagues! A perfect day anywhere as far as I’m concerned. But it is seagulls you’ll see at ball parks. Loads of seagulls (at least at the Giants and Rivercats games)
We don’t have many seagulls this far inland. Given how chilly it was at a couple of those games I took the pictures at above, I’m surprised I didn’t run into a little penguin…
Oh Carl, Satan accepted our invitation for tea. Isn’t that thrilling?
LOL… at first glance, I thought you said Carl Sagan! I was wondering what the cosmos had to do with my ugly statues! 😉
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HaHaHa! Everything is connected! “cue spooky sci fi music!