Major League Baseball and the Major League Baseball Players Association are helping with the Hurricane Sandy relief effort by donating money to the Red Cross, Feeding America, and the Salvation Army. Between the two organizations, they’re donating $1 million.

You don’t have to come up with that much, but if just 10 of you baseball fans donate $100,000 apiece, you’ll match that amount!

They’re not turning away smaller donations either. You can see MLB’s website about hurricane relief and get links to the organization they’re supporting.

For two seasons now, Major League Baseball has been running this Fan Cave concept where a few big fans have to move in to their facility in New York where they are required to watch every major league baseball game. They’re also required to share their thoughts and feelings about the games through blog posts and social media. Occasionally, Bronson Arroyo shows up to sing about outerwear.

It sounds like some progressive type of therapy or possibly a persuasion technique dreamed up by Dick Cheney, but it’s actually a job that you have to apply for. You can apply now on MLB.com. Even if you’re shy, you probably don’t really need to worry. Speaking for myself, at least, I’ve seen a couple good things come out of the Fan Cave but none of them involved any actual Fan Cave residents.

The application requires your general demographic information, a short essay, a few writing samples, and a resume. Oh, and a photo. They don’t want people who look like they actually live in a cave.

The Cincinnati Reds had more players nominated for a Gold Globe this year than any other team, but at the end of the televised announcement show, they went home with none.

The Reds’ candidates were:

• Pitcher Bronson Arroyo – In Arroyo’s case, I’m going to say it was an honor just to be nominated. He’s got some good defense, but the best?
• First Baseman Joey Votto – Not really a surprise here, either. Dude missed two months with that knee surgery.
• Second Baseman Brandon Phillips – This is the biggest surprise of the night, I guess. Darwin Barney of the Cubs had a pretty good year, but come on, Brandon Phillips is the best there is. It is a vote, though, and Phillips rubs some folks the wrong way.
• Shortstop Zack Cozart – Robbed. Totally. The victim of the inertia that Gold Gloves pick up as a player’s years of service grow.
• Center Fielder Drew Stubbs – Stubbs is probably better in the field than the actual winner, Andrew McCutchen, but if you had to choose between the two players, you’re not picking Stubbs. McCutchen is the MLB darling right now.
• Right Fielder Jay Bruce – I don’t know the work of Atlanta’s Jason Heyward to say whether Bruce should have gotten this one. Bruce has a helluva arm, but as a player he’s really defined as an offensive force, when he’s on.

What does it mean when your team has more guys nominated than any other team but not a single one of them brings home the award? I think it has to be that, while each guy might not be the absolute superstar, as a unit these guys are the best. And I think we’ve seen that for ourselves.

And frankly, I think I prefer it. It seems like when you’ve got one guy who wins a Gold Glove at the end of the season, a lot of times it’s like a consolation prize, a single ray of hope that you focus on building around for next year. It’s actually nice not to be in that situation for a change.

Not that all six of them getting the award wouldn’t have been nice, too.

Here’s the complete list of winners, FYI:

It became official in the second game of the series: Angel Pagan stole a base, thereby requiring Taco Bell to make good on its promise to give everyone in America a taco, which was the basis for its “Steal a Base, Steal a Taco” campaign.

Today’s the day: if you would like to brave the madhouse for your $0.89 value, show up at a participating location between 2 p.m. and 6 p.m. Don’t forget to read the salsa packets.

It took 10 innings in last night’s final game, but the San Francisco Giants swept the Detroit Tigers in the World Series. So that’s it for baseball for another year.

I didn’t watch a single bit of the series this year. In fact, I’ve barely seen an inning since the Reds were eliminated what feels like a couple months ago. I’d like to say it was some righteous protest or something, but really, I just got busy and didn’t really care.

Supposedly, we ought to be happy the Giants won, since that helps to justify the Reds’ first-round exit, but we all know the Giants weren’t any kind of unstoppable force. They had less to do with the Reds’ losing than a dozen papercuts plus one decapitating blow that was losing Johnny Cueto. The energy the team showed briefly after that was apparently just a headless chicken running around.

But now is not the time for that. Now is the time to celebrate the successes and give some awards. Plus, wonder what the heck the team will do with 2 more years with Dusty “Medically Questionable” Baker while Bryan “Pitcher Whisperer” Price is interviewing to lead the Marlins.