CRICKET UPDATE
Vaseline stirs up a row at Trent Bridge
(Thanks to Joe in Japan)
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July 31, 2011
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"...behind the stumps."
Might as well be reported in Erdu.
Posted by: Cheesewiz | July 31, 2011 at 12:03 PM
Montpelier?
Posted by: Coconuts | July 31, 2011 at 12:11 PM
Wow. Those were all English words but, strung together like that, they hold no meaning for me.
Posted by: ScottMGS | July 31, 2011 at 12:31 PM
...using it on his bat to manipulate the Hot-Spot...
Whew! I didn't know cricket could be so graphic. Chirp.
Posted by: MikeyVA | July 31, 2011 at 12:45 PM
I'm with you, Scott. Give me a game I can understand, like Quidditch.
Posted by: Betsy | July 31, 2011 at 12:47 PM
...Players feel Hot-Spot...
Wonder how Hot SPot feels about that? Seems Hot Spot is getting a lot of attention...
Posted by: MikeyVA | July 31, 2011 at 12:57 PM
I'm trying to figure out what they did with the jelly beans four years ago. The first problem I see is they're trying to play with an oar. They need a good Louisville Slugger.
Posted by: nursecindy | July 31, 2011 at 12:59 PM
Indian coworker finally gave up trying to explain his beloved cricket to us benighted Americans. That oar thingy is called a bat though.
Posted by: coscolo | July 31, 2011 at 02:09 PM
I'm with Scott. They're using the same language, but whatinthehell are they saying?
Posted by: Hammond Rye | July 31, 2011 at 02:20 PM
Is this the Twilight Zone? Cause I didn't understand a word, an it's Ostentiously english...
If this is, where is the nearest exit?
(Prays he can find and climb aboard the Yank's Geezer bus.)
Posted by: funny man | July 31, 2011 at 02:29 PM
PS i didn't know crickets liked--or hated--Vaseline,
based on whatever the article is trying to tell us.
It'd be a lot easier if they went back to jelly beans,
or used pine tar.
Posted by: funny man | July 31, 2011 at 02:31 PM
*Google's ostentiously finds out it's spelled ostentatiously and still doesn't now what it means* How pretentious.
Posted by: nursecindy | July 31, 2011 at 02:34 PM
Why, how unsportsman-like. I think. ???
I did like the jellybeans incident.
Reminds me of the time when we kids were having a camp-out and my friend Randy slept on his stomach. Well, Joe took some jellybeans and...
Maybe I'd better not tell the rest of that except that is ends with "mowed 'em down like tin cans."
Posted by: Steve | July 31, 2011 at 02:39 PM
Believe it or not, all of this is about the instant replay system used to determine whether bat made contact with ball, a question that I can't ever remember mattering in baseball, but apparently comes up all the time in cricket.
Then again, I have little hope of us truly understanding a game where (and this actually happened today in an international match) a team is allowed, even expected under certain circumstances, to overrule the umpires if they've received an "unfair" benefit from an umpire's decision.
Posted by: KJP | July 31, 2011 at 03:25 PM
Wikipedia clarifies it some. Here is the dispute in Baseball terms. In Cricket, no matter how you foul the ball, if it is caught, you're out. Even if the ball just glances off your bat on the way to the catcher, if he catches, it's an out.
In this case, Laxman [Indian guy] didn't swing, and the catcher caught the ball. Laxman claimed his bat never touched the ball. The catcher claimed it did.
Hot-Spot is an infrared camera used for instant replays to decide these kind of cases. Here, the camera showed that Laxman didn't touch it.
The English captain then accused Laxman of putting Vaseline on hit bat in order to prevent the camera from properly recording the edge of it. The idea would be to make bad hits look like near misses. But Laxman didn't use any Vaseline. The English guy apparently made the whole thing up, which I guess is indeed unsportsman-like.
Posted by: Elon | July 31, 2011 at 03:39 PM
The jelly bean incident happened when an English fielder was eating jelly beans during the game, and the Indian batter claimed the fielder threw some of them at him. That was ruled inconclusive, though there were a few suspicious jellybeans on the ground by the batter's box. The catcher claimed he dropped them there during a snack break, and he did not mean the batter any harm.
Posted by: Elon | July 31, 2011 at 03:46 PM
Thanks Elon. I thought they rubbed the jelly beans on the bat.
Posted by: nursecindy | July 31, 2011 at 03:53 PM
Wonder if the batter ever charges the mound..er...the dude throwing the ball. I wonder if Gaylord Perry coached over there...Heads for the geezer bus.
Posted by: EyeGore | July 31, 2011 at 03:53 PM
Elon...Seldom has anyone answered more of my mental blog questions so succinctly. Thanks for including the jelly beans.
I'm going to go take a nap.
Posted by: Betsy | July 31, 2011 at 03:53 PM
Ostensibly.
Montpelier.
Posted by: SW | July 31, 2011 at 04:36 PM
"Vaseline on the outside edge".
"Bats" have edges in India?
Posted by: hogsatemysister | July 31, 2011 at 04:42 PM
Hogs, it's a flat bat at that. Stick that in your wicket.
Posted by: Loudmouth | July 31, 2011 at 05:12 PM
Right, hogs. Think of holding a 2 x 4. The side nearer you is the inside edge, the side away from you the outside edge. Got it so far?
The stumps are the three posts behind the batter (sorry, batsman) with two bails (sticks) balanced on top between them. If the ball gets past the batter and knocks the bail off the stump, he's out. If you hit the ball and run (there are two batsmen at any time at opposite ends, thus two bowlers - pitchers) and the fielder throws it to the wicket keeper (catcher) before the runner gets there and knocks the bail off, you're out.
Tomorrow's lesson: leg before wicket.
Posted by: Jeff Meyerson | July 31, 2011 at 07:34 PM
Vaseline is for when your wicket is sticky.
Posted by: Loudmouth | July 31, 2011 at 07:46 PM
Thanks Jeff and Loudmouth. I have actually used a cricket bat (to kill a big Nu Zillan spider). And when I worked for a newspaper in Singapore, the expat Brit Business Editor tried to explain cricket to me, and I tried to explain baseball to him. After 18 months, we each gave up...
Posted by: hogsatemysister | July 31, 2011 at 08:39 PM
Kindly ask Mrs. Blog to translate that article.
Thank you.
Posted by: Emmett Flatus | August 01, 2011 at 10:03 AM
Elon and Jeff, thanks so much for explaining. NOW, I couldn't care less...
Posted by: eil | August 01, 2011 at 03:33 PM
All the cricket info you need.
Posted by: Ralph | August 01, 2011 at 03:49 PM