Well, Let's Try This Thing ...

Hi, everybody. It has been almost two years since I started JoeBlogs, and let me just say it was the best career decision I’ve ever made. The second-best career decision I ever made, incidentally, was quitting as a stockboy at Kroger. Wow, I was a really, really, really bad bagger.*

*Oh, the many eggs I crushed with milk cartons!

In any case, the response to JoeBlogs has been amazing, and you have allowed me to do what I believe is some of my best and most rewarding work. Thank you for that. It’s such a gift to be able to wake up any morning and say, “Hey, I should write about that unbelievably bad blocking-the-plate call in the White-Sox Rangers game last night,”* or “I should write about Spencer Strider getting his 300th strikeout in just his 35th start**,” or “I should write again about what a bad song ‘Centerfield’ is, just for Jason Kander***.”

*It truly is one of the worst calls I’ve ever seen.

**Strider is only the second pitcher in MLB history to get 300 Ks in his first 35 starts. The other is Dwight Gooden. There is a fairly obvious difference, though. Gooden pitched 248 innings in those 35 starts — 302 Ks in 248 innings is amazing even now, but it was basically impossible when batters struck out so much less often. Strider, meanwhile, has pitched only 191 2/3 innings in his 35 starts — 301 Ks in 192 innings is bonkers, absolutely bonkers, but in today’s strikeout-rich world, it doesn’t feel quite as revolutionary as Gooden’s career start.

***Kander knows what he did.

Gooden broke in with a bang. (Jerry Wachter /Sports Illustrated via Getty Images)

Running my own thing here has been, er, interesting. Let’s just say that while there are undoubtedly exceptions — none immediately come to mind, but I’m sure there are exceptions — journalists have no business sense. It’s probably why we became journalists. I am a particularly poor business person. I come by it honestly; remember, I failed out of accounting in college. To this day, I can’t explain the whole debit/credit thing.

We’ve done great anyway, despite my lack of business sense. That’s entirely because of you Brilliant Readers. And now, I’d like to ask for your help in growing this place so that I can keep spewing nonsense for you for years to come.

As you probably know, you keep JoeBlogs going. There is no advertising here, no sponsors, no marketing people, no promotions staff. It’s just me developing and writing stuff and our ill-fated editor, Larry, hopelessly trying to fix all the typos and blunders. The only way we grow, really, is through word of mouth.

Well, Substack — the newsletter company I work with — has a new feature along those lines, and we’re one of the first to get to use it: It’s called “Subscriber referrals.” I don’t know if it’s actually called that, but stay with me.

Here’s how it works: I’m hoping that if you like JoeBlogs, you will invite friends to subscribe and become a part of the community. Here’s a button for doing that.

And the deal is you will get credit for every new subscriber who you bring in to join our little band.

What does that mean? Well, we’re going to give away some fun JoeBlogs prizes to people who bring in subscribers. And the way I’m thinking about it — you can help me choose the prizes. Right now, I have them set up like so:

• If you get 3 referrals, you get three months of JoeBlogs for free.

• If you get 5 referrals, you get a Brilliant Reader Challenge — any challenge you want, I’ll give it a try.

• If you get 25 referrals (whew!), you get a big prize, which is still up for debate, but right now, I’m thinking you can get your own story here on JoeBlogs. So I’ll write about your greatest moment in sports or why you love baseball or, well, whatever you like.

But these are just the starting prizes — I don’t entirely know how this will work. I want to let you as readers decide what the prizes should be. Would you want an invitation to a Zoom call conversation? Would you want a question answered on the PosCast? Would you want a beautifully designed PDF version of one of our series here, such as Ten Who Missed? Would you want JoeBlogs merch? Would you want to play me (and undoubtedly beat me) in chess? Tell me in the comments if you have ideas.

Like I say, this whole referral thing is brand-new. It’s an experiment. It might be a complete bust. Or, who knows, you might like it. The cool part is that Substack will keep up with your referrals and will, like, send you an email when you win one of the prizes. Plus, there’s a leaderboard! Who doesn’t love a leaderboard?

If you’re interested in learning more (and don’t we all want to learn?) you can check out Substack’s FAQ.

Thanks for everything, really. I’d love it if you would take part and help us grow, of course. But, hey, first and foremost, I appreciate you for reading.

Here’s the refer button one more time. Thanks again, everybody!