Nathan's Personal Blog

Welcome back to "Intrusive Thoughts" the series where I just pour my intrusive thoughts onto a blog in an attempt to get them out of my own head. Today I will be discussing briefly why I think high school actually prepares people BETTER than college does for the real world. I really only have one main point here, so this won't be a very long blog, but here we go.  I know that technically the actual classes that we take in college are supposed to prepare us to work in whatever industry our major aligns with. In that sense, yes, college gives us more information to help with living in the real world than high school does. However, once we get out of college, most of us are going to be bound to eight-hour work days with about two weeks (at least to start) of vacation per year. In college, we're taking maybe three or four classes per day, and they last maybe an hour and a half typically? There is SO much more free time in college than in the real world. We can watch movie...

This is a very niche thing to blog about, since international baseball is not very popular and has struggled to gain any kind of momentum for some reason, or a number of reasons to be more accurate. I'm not here to talk about that though, I'm here to ask what the heck is going on with the 2023 World Baseball Classic (WBC)?  The WBC is sort of baseball's attempt at a World Cup-type tournament, except it has not been as successful and it is not as historic. The first one was in 2006, and in four tournaments, Japan has won two with the Dominican Republic and the United States each winning one. There was supposed to be a tournament in 2021, but COVID hit, so now it is in 2023. As such, lots of news about who will play and who the coaches will be is coming out now.  The players aren't anything that shocking, Mike Trout is in for the U.S., Trevor Story is in, and I'm sure other stars will likely declare their interest soon. What I'm curious about is why on Earth so ma...

Ummm...apparently the Little League World Series (LLWS) has restructured the way their bracket will be set up this summer and I sort of hate it, so let's discuss. First of all, this is being written from the perspective of someone who grew up idolizing the teams in the late-2000s LLWS and dreaming about hitting a walk-off homerun like the kid for Warner Robbins in 2007. To me, the New England region will always be maroon, black, and white, the West will always be UCLA-blue and gold, and the Southeast will always be gold and red.  I know that was not always the case, and I know it is not the case right now. In fact, one of my most vivid memories of the LLWS was Nick Pratto hitting a walk-off single for the yellow and green West region to win the world championship in 2011. I also know that there was a time (until 2001 to be precise) that there were only four regions per bracket rather than eight U.S. and eight international teams. For reference, the regions I am used to are: U.S. Ne...

Okay we have some baseball uniform news!  The MLB has just announced the uniforms that will be worn in the 2022 Field of Dreams game on Thursday between the Red and the Cubs and there is a lot to break down! This is the MLB's version of the NHL's Winter Classic in a way. The uniforms are throwbacks and the concept behind the game is to bring it back to a simpler time before guys were turning down $400 million contracts and throwing 95+ miles-per-hour. As always, huge shoutout to the guys at sportslogos.net (especially Chris Creamer) for the news and graphics.  The first thing that really jumps out to me is that both of these jerseys are white! Okay, well technically, the Cubs' jersey is cream, or ivory, or off-white (depending what you want to call it). Both jerseys are basically white though, which is probably the first time in a while that this will happen. I do not quite get why  this is the case, as other-colored jerseys have existed for a while, even if that other c...

 This is a new series of articles I will be writing called "Intrusive Thoughts". The concept is simple. As someone who struggles with intrusive thoughts, I will just be writing blogs about the intrusive thoughts I have to hopefully get them somewhat out of my head. I am not an expert on any of these topics, so do not take my thoughts too seriously or personally, as they are often driven my emotion and not logic if they are being included in this series. The first article is this one, and it is about the American school system, a common grievance of mine.  I have a number of issues with the American school system, but my main grievance right now is how the school system combines with social media and "fame" or success right now. Fame brings financial success, those two things go together. While money is not equal to happiness by any means, and at times can even deter it, some amount of money is needed in this world and this society to survive and then, thrive. We als...

 Alright, I should have written and posted this blog days ago, but I didn't and now I am. I totally forgot that the NHL was doing another Reverse Retro series this season. Recently, a leak has come out showing what the Canucks jersey is going to look like, and it seems to be pretty legit, although not entirely confirmed just yet. Here's a look at the jersey if you haven't seen it already.  I've seen people giving pretty mixed reactions to the jersey so far. I really like it. I think it is relatively simple and nice looking, but it also captures the spirit of the project. The whole point of the Reverse Retro series is to take an old jersey and recreate it with today's colors, or flip the colors on the original uniform if the team still uses the same colors. Here is a look at the 1962 Canucks, which is what this jersey is based on:  As shown in the picture, it is likely that there will be a number on the upper left chest, although I think it would be more beneficial t...

 OKAY!!! WE HAVE BIG UNIFORM NEWS!! Greg Wyshynski of ESPN has reported that after the 2023/2024 season, Adidas will no longer be the manufacturer and designer of NHL uniforms. Right now I think most people are expecting Nike to take over when that change happens, and if you have read any of my recent MLB blogs, you already know how I feel about that. For now though, I want to think about what that might mean for the identities and designs we might see.  BREAKING NEWS: @adidas will not return as the NHL’s official supplier of uniforms and apparel when their contract expires after the 2023-24 season, multiple sources confirmed to ESPN. My exclusive story: https://t.co/Im0EYbyPz6 — Greg Wyshynski (@wyshynski) July 28, 2022  For some teams, like the Red Wings, Rangers, and Canadiens, this will probably do absolutely nothing. Those teams have so much history and have had their jerseys the same way for so long that I doubt whoever takes over will change much. Teams like the B...