"Closers are performers in the full sense of the word," Eric Freeman writes over at the A/V Club, "and their entrance music is nearly as much a part of their personas as a filthy slider or 97-mph fastball." Although closers are largely bullshit, Freeman's argument is not. After ably outlining what he sees as the key principles of closer entrance music selection -- pump up the crowd (naturally), establish a brand (vital), know your source (it is a fool who does not), sound isn't the whole story (which is to say, semantics count), don't pander (looking right at you, Papelbon), leave the metal womb (so important) -- Freeman zeroes in some notable successes an failures. "Giants closer Brian Wilson is a mix of fratty confidence, Tim And Eric weirdness, and the affectations of professional wrestling," he says, and so "House Of Pain’s 'Jump Around' is the perfect fit, standing for slightly goofy white-boy swagger and pure unfettered excitement." Well, yeah, actually, that's totally right. What about John Axford's choice of Refused's "New Noise"? "When the song plays at Miller Park and Dennis Lyxzen yells, 'We dance to all the wrong songs,' it’s a response to rote baseball personalities as much as a method of pumping up the crowd," in an act that "declares itself a tonic for a moribund genre." Jonathan Papelbon's use of "Shipping Up to Boston"? "It's shameless and embarrassing."
Enjoy this piece, friends. Also enjoy this .gif of Josh Hamilton running into a lady and the lady being kind of like, well hello there (.gif via Bill Baer at Getting Blanked), which is unrelated -- and yet awesome.
KS
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