The Definitive Clip-n-Save Doghouse Riley Guide To People We Like

AS always, apologies that I don't generally get to comments right away.

When I redid the layout I discovered that The New Blogger, And This Time We Mean It! now allowed the posting of more than one picture. Then I discovered that it apparently allowed something approaching an infinite number of pictures. At roughly the same time I discovered that the three-column layout I'd appropriated did not include a separate background color for the far-left column (I should have known the far-left would get the shaft) as I wished, nor could I readily fix the CSS to create one, being that I don't know shit about CSS and I was trying to fix lots of other stuff. Part of that was creating the baseball masthead I wanted.

I should have sensed that storm clouds were gathering. I couldn't get a decent font/color combo to put Bats Left Throws Right over the masthead as a graphic (long story), and the available Blogger control method proved worthless. So I created a title graphic for the left-hand column, and I already had the "Contact Riley" one, which included my new picture. But that was two black squares sitting in a sea of #788778, and they rapidly scrolled from view on the off chance that anybody read more than two paragraphs of my stuff. So I brought back the much-beloved internet tradition of The Old Prospector who, I don't think I've explained this before, actually looks quite a bit like me. This opened the floodgates of a damn-near incontinent picture posting; at some point I hit on captioning things as though they were little personal slices of the Life O' Riley. And I had a bunch of pics of people I admire, mostly left over from wishing them Happy Birthday, and I started adding those without first establishing how they'd be worked into the "narrative".

So around this time I began to realize that this stuff slowed the loading of the page, athough--at least on my machines--the content loads first, so I wasn't too concerned, but it did stop me for a moment. And stopping me for a moment is like getting a sloth to slow down. So I never came up with any way to label those pics, except the obvious one, "I like this guy, and hope some of his accomplishments reflect on my miserable self". Which brings us all up to date.

Now, if you're still here, The List, beginning with the masthead, left to right (which reminds me, yes, all these guys bat left/ throw right. No switch hitters):

Ted Williams, The Splendid Splinter.
Arky Vaughan, second-best hitting shortstop in the Hall (after Honus Wagner)
Ernest Judson "Boojum" Wilson, career .351 hitter
"Shoeless Joe" Jackson, career .356 average, third-highest ever
Tris Speaker, 3514 hits, .345 career average
Edwin "Duke" Snider, at one time the best centerfielder in New York, even though the other two were Mickey Mantle and Willie Mays.  career .295, 407 home runs
"Shoeless Joe" again, because he belongs in the Hall and because I thought that earlier picture was Eddie "Cocky" Collins
John Henry "Pop" Lloyd, greatest shortstop in Negro League history, career .337 average
Mel Ott, .304, 511 home runs
Ty Cobb, greatest ballplayer in history, probably no more racist than his contemporaries (he supported the integration of the major leagues), and, besides, he pretty much hated everybody. Highest career batting average (.366); career hits, runs, games, and stolen base marks all stood for more than fifty years.

[Late in his life a reporter asked Cobb what he thought he'd hit in the major leagues today. "Probably .320, .325," he said. "Is that because of night baseball, the travel, the lively ball?" the reporter asked. "Hell no," said Cobb. "It's because I'm 73 years old."]

Larry Doby, first African-American to play in the American League
Yogi Berra. Sorry, I don't know any stories about him.

Left column, top to bottom: rotating picture, currently Route 666 sign, from before the name was changed due to Bronze Age spiritual concerns; Donald Crisp; Ernest Torrence; 30's trunk murderess Winnie Ruth Judd; Stinky; Larry; Hooverville, Seattle; Bloggy buddy Lowflyin Lolana and friend; buoyant AV Idol Sora Aoi; fake cowboy; real racist; Asashōryū Akinori, the 68th yokozuna, throws Chiyotaikai; the great Jim Hurtubise, Terre Haute Action Track; Lowell George; Patsy Cline; Thomas Wright "Fats" Waller; Jorge Luis Borges; yes, Richard Thompson; James Thurber, speaking of autobiographies; Ian Dury; Doug Kenney; Marcel Duchamp; Emo Phillips; Jean "Django" Reinhardt; Bessie Smith; Dorothea Lange; Vladimir Nabokov with Roy Orbison's shades; Peter Sellers as himself, Captain Beefheart (Don van Vliet); Dan Hicks; Bill Hicks, no relation; Patty Smith; Richard Pryor; John Lydon; unidentified meercat.