Remember when the Beatles said Everybody had a hard year, Everybody had a good time…and them some other stuff about wet dreams, etc.? You were probably too young. God knows I was, but I have heard that song, and I think that lyric pretty well sums up those of us who grinded it out on the blogging circuit in 2009. Guess we’ll have to wait until 2010 to quit our day jobs, comrades (kudos to those who actually did quit their day jobs).

To close out 2009, I asked a few of my fellow members of the sports and pop culture blogging intelligentsia to send me their best post from 2009. I’m proud to say that I at least retweeted most of these when they first went live, and had a chance to go back and re-read. This list revisits Barry Bonds, Brett Favre, cartoon characters who juiced, and the seemingly insurmountable number of Harry Potter-lookalikes in the sporting world.

Kind of makes the Huffington Post Year in Review look like remedial English, amirite?

I didn’t pick a best post myself, but my favorite post - or should I say community organizing effort - by another blogger came from Yardbarker’s Alana G back in late November, who through her site campaigned MTV Jams to air a Tiger Woods video playlist. I never did follow up, and ask if they played my submission (Usher - Confessions, Part II), did I?

Check out the rest of the links below. I hope this leaves you feeling good, looking towards the future.

Big League Stew (Jan. 16, 2009) With your help, we can bring Barry Bonds back to baseball

Gunaxin (Jan. 21, 2009 ) 2010 Winter Olympics Ice Hockey Preview

Major League Jerk (April 3, 2009) The WonderPets Teach Joe Flacco How to Avoid Double Coverage.

P.S.A.M.P (April 10, 2009) Everyone’s Getting Playoff Beards For The Penguins

Bugs & Cranks (April 27, 2009) The Wizard Of Copping A Feel: Ozzie Smith & Alyssa Milano’s Boob

Pippen Ain’t Easy (April 28, 2009) KG: Got the Ring, Still No Class

Sports Rubbish (June 14, 2009) Harry Potter Look-A-Likes In The Sports World

Midwest Sports Fans (June 14, 2009) What I Learned During the Most Bizarre Week of My Life

Paneech.com (June 19, 2009) Top Ten Cartoon Characters That Juiced

My Sports Rumors (June 23, 2009) Transformers - Revenge of the MLB Fallen

Yep Yep (June 25, 2009) Before They Were Music Stars

Zoner Sports (June 30, 2009) “The Real All-Time Home Run List”

Babes Love Baseball (July 16, 2009) Voodoo Sabermetrics: Milton Bradley

Joe Sports Fan (July 20, 2009) The United States has a National Slow-Pitch Adult Softball Team.

Global Sports Fraternity (August 5, 2009) Mets Trap

Hugging Harold Reynolds (Sep. 17, 2009) D.C BUREAU EXCLUSIVE Special Investigative Report: Mark Grace = Life Coach

Fansided (October 1, 2009) A Beer For Every NFL Team

The Viking Age (Oct. 2, 2009)  Smack Talk Friday: Burning [Brett Favre’s] Jersey? Really?

Epic Carnival (Oct. 8, 2009) The 25 best Sports Illustrated swimsuit videos of all-time

7th Inning Stache (Dec. 1, 2009) Barry Bonds MLB HOF Mustache

NESW Sports (Dec. 8, 2009) Luc Longley Craves Attention, Shrimp

Guyism (Dec. 2009) Couple making porn to pay for their wedding

….


If I missed you, leave a link to your best post from 2009 in the comments. Happy New Year folks!

Taking this opportunity to wish everyone good tidings, and comfort and all that jazz. Hear one of my favorite Christmas tunes from the Kinks below, but first…

For the young and impressionable and those looking to write among you, wanted to announce that I’m looking to add contributors to Steady Burn in the new year. Even wrote up a fancy job description for it:

Position: Steady Burn Contributing Blogger

Requirements: Cursory knowledge of the English, and the ability to quasi-piece its wordage into sentences, w/o pissing people off too hard; good writing skills. Additionally, should have a strong knowledge of social media, particularly how to navigate and promote content using social news sites (Digg, Reddit, Stumble Upon, etc.). Additionally, moderate (…to obsessively heavy) usage of Twitter and Facebook a must. A strong rapport with other sports and entertainment bloggers a plus. Oh, and if you morally or otherwise object to using the Wordpress platform, stop reading now.

Responsibilities: Contribute 3-5 blog posts (300-500 words) per week to the site. Topics to vary from sports, pop culture and entertainment, music, film <<< ya know, sh#t people are engrossed by. Writer is responsible for researching and developing their own posts - there will be no assignments whatsoever. Person will also be expected to share and syndicate their own content via their social networks.

Compensation: A share of the proceeds from ad revenue (I’m not joking)

About the Website:

Steady Burn is a site dedicated to sports, pop culture and rock n’ roll. I started Steady Burn in late 2007 as a personal blogspot sports blog, and it has since grown into a visible entity in different sports and entertainment social media communities online. Initially focused on fringe sports culture (roller derby, kickball, etc.), in recent times, we’ve grown to encompass a wider range of topics - pop culture, web culture/social media, entertainment, music, bacon, white collar boxing, etc.

Steady Burn has been linked to by leading online websites including SI.com, Yahoo! Sports and Yahoo! Music, ESPN.com, USAtoday.com, as well as sourced in traditional media outlets (Arkansas Press-Democrat, Chicago Tribune).

I’ve worked vigilantly the past 18-months to increase the visibility of the site, and am interested in working with enthusiast individuals who want to help continue to do so through helping to generate more content on Steady Burn.

Apply: If you want this, if you really want this, you call me on Monday and we’ll talk…ok, email me and we’ll talk: mikeehayes@gmail.com


On applying, if I know you or you’re referred by a close confidant, you won’t actually have to apply (like this gentleman). Just email me that you want in, and it will be made so.

Happy Holidays! Enjoy the yuletide stylings of The Kinks performing ‘Father Christmas’.

Like his Washington Wizards teammate and blogging kinsman Gilbert Arenas before him, Brendan Haywood has decided to retire from the blog game. When he started out blogging for Yardbarker earlier this year Haywood, the self-proclaimed Bad Guy, hoped to openly express his opinions w/o having to worry about people calling up the organization and inquiring as to why exactly he wants to buy Backstreet Boys records for Elin Woods? Well, as Victor Mancini would say, Hope is just a stage of your life (or blogging career) that ends - and can be seemingly be expedited when you support Mike Vick.

Haywood goes out on his Yardbarker blog saying…

I’ve had a great time blogging, interacting with the fans and letting yal know my points of view on different dicey topics but with the way this season has gone –at this point, I don’t want anything written about me that’s not basketball related. When you’re winning and you’re on top, you can really speak your mind and put your thoughts out there. When you’re losing and trying to stay afloat, you’ve got to know when it’s time to be seen and not heard.

I know some of my blog topics have been controversial but I just felt like writing a boring blog about how I went to the gym and got a certain amount of shots up just wouldn’t cut it. I tried to keep yal on the cutting edge and really let yal know what’s going on in my mind and it was hard to do at times. It was hard because a lot of times when you make comments, people really blow them out of proportion and interpret them in a lot of different ways than you originally meant them. Gilbert Arenas told me that it would be like that when I first started blogging but I guess I had to see for myself. I was amazed at how people cold really misinterpret my words!

Haywood won’t be concluding his blogging career on the heels of his own Blogger of the Year award like predecessor, Agent Zero. He did get 234 comments (not all negative too) on that Elin Woods post though. And speaking of comments, those who left comments on his retirement announcement post are mostly sad to see him go - there’s only six comments, but that’s six more than I’d probably get if I retired from blogging. Even Buster Douglas stopped by with some kind words for Haywood:

Dag, just when I was going to ask you for four Cavs floor seats!!!

Take care Brendan, now who’s going to fight with Chantelle’s?

Truly understand that people are going overboard.

I agree with not just blogging about your sport, because you want to show people who you really are.

Thanks for keeping it real!

Just another case of blogging bringing 7-footers and former Heavyweight champions together as brothers.

The legacy that is Washington Wizards blogging moves on to rookie JaVale McGee, who says the point of this blog secretly is to dare anyone with a Ps3 to a challenge on Call of Duty Modern Warefare 2.

This is turning into quite the lineage you created, eh Gilbert?

Big day for us here at Steady Burn as I’m pleased to announce the addition of a new writer to the mix. He’s based out of Jacksonville, FL and goes by the name S. Evans. Why the quasi-anonymity with the moniker? To protect familial ties to the Bob Evans homestyle cuisine fortune is my guess. Frankly, I thought his name was Sean (it’s not) for about six months now, so I’m paying it no nevermind. Here’s some background information courtesy of the masked man himself…

Hailing from a lil place called Jacksonville, Fl, the name is S. Evans

The vitals:

• Creator of the center of excellence that is No Guts, No Glory. I’m sure you’ve heard of it. You haven’t? Boy are you lost.

• I’m a Libra, if that helps.

• Known to be a smooth operator so you have nothing to worry about. You’re in good hands.

• Mike doesn’t even know my name, so you know that I will fit in nicely around here.

Above all, I vow to keep the burn steady. Whatever that means.

Hope this is as good for you as it will be for me.

Managed to link to a Sade video, put me on blast for not knowing his name, as well as reaffirm the fact that so few people get the name Steady Burn (it has nothing to do with smoking weed, and everything to do with basketball playing time) - this guy’s a wildcat. Enjoy the additional posting from S.E., a.k.a. the Southern Gentleman, friends.

I actually saw this first on Pitchfork, and it happened to catch my eye because I happen to be reading the book Our Band Could Be Your Life at this time.

Thoughts and condolences go out to Gerard Cosloy, whose Austin, TX house burned down early this morning.

Gerard is indeed a sports blogger who runs Can’t Stop The Bleeding. He posted a photo of the rubble of his former home on his site today, along with the quote: “This was a hell of a way to get out of hoovering the living room.”

Gerard told the Austin American-Statesmen, “There are a lot of people who have a lot less than I do who deal with a lot worse, but this is pretty bad.”

More so than an establish sports blogger, Cosloy is an indie rock legend. He’s worked with such influential bands as Sonic Youth, Big Black, Dinosaur Jr, Pavement, and Yo La Tengo. He started the rock label Homestead Records, putting out early work by Sonic Youth, Dinosaur Jr, and is the co-owner of Matador Records.

I just got done reading about how he got F’d over by Dinosaur Jr in the mid-80s in Our Band Could Be Your Life. Plus, I think he’s a Mets fan. Wow, I feel bad for this dude.

Shoot Gerard some encouragement (he’s @cstbtweet or @gerardcosloy on twitter) if you have a minute.

This weekend, I’m making my long awaited return to Fenway Park - a place I haven’t been in over 10 years.

As a young lad, going to Fenway was a yearly ritual. I’m pretty sure my first game was during the 1990 season - the Roger Clemens era, yes, but also the Mike Greenwell and Jack Clark era. That was the season the Red Sox set the record for grounding into the most double plays (174). Now the Sox are better known for records like selling out every seat since 2003.

I’ll never forget that first game though. On the way in, taking the Green Line T from Framingham, MA, my Uncle Ronnie informed me that when someone on the opposing team strikes out you bound out of your seat and yell “Sit Down!” as menacingly and berating as possible. With my hat already nearly pulled fully over my eyes and a glove that may or may not have had velcro capabilities, my uncle probably thought it was more likely that I’d be asleep by the fourth inning.

Well, unless his true intentions were to create the most jawing 6-year old in New England that night, he should have never gave me those instructions. I’m pretty sure the game went into extra innings, and the Redx Sox pitchers K’d the opposition a few times during warm-ups too (how else could I have told no-less than 35 batters to “Sit down!!” - which is what I approximate).


I’m sure there’s backyard whiffle ball or youth league soccer glory from the late-80s documented on a beta-max in the attic, but I can’t really recall that. I remember vividly however giving the Red Sox opponents - let’s call them the Blue Jays (remember how annoying the early-90s Blue Jays were?) - the business though.

In honor of my sure-to-be triumphant return to Fenway…as well as punk little kids everywhere, I’m once again putting the sports blogger intelligentsia to task, and asking bloggers far and wide to send me a brief anecdote on:

My Earliest Sports Memory

I’ll post the best on Friday in A.M. (email: mikeehayes@gmail.com)

While you channel nostalgia check out photos of kids goofing off at sports events or engaged on the little tyke field of battle…

Starting today I’m going to be contributing to Spewf.com.

What is spewf exactly? Did you see last night’s How I Met Your Mother when they were talking about Canadian sexniques? (Ex. The reverse Rick Moranis). Well, I couldn’t say for sure, but spewf sure sounds like it could be one. And How I Met Your Mother is a lot funnier than people give it credit for.

(Actually I don’t even know how you pronounce spewf ( like spoof? spughff? )

The blog is owned and operated by my good buddy Kevin. Kevin is predominantly and affectionately known around the sports blogosphere as Kevin the intern, intern from the hallowed halls of Busted Coverage. (Also, more GrandmasterB design handiwork on the Spewf header.)

Check out my first post today on the Gorgeous Rock Ladies of SXSW, featuring the likes of Alexei Perry from Handsome Furs (my complements to her seamstress)…

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