Pic of the Week

Yadier Molina reacts to the final out of the 2011 season.

I'll let that photo, the final Pic of the Week for 2011, speak for itself.

I'll talk, instead, about the whole PotW concept. As I said when I introduced the Sunday theme, I wanted an outlet for some of the photos the Free Press gets through the Associated Press that we simply can't get into the paper.

Another motivation was to make it easier for me to both have a Sunday post and time to compose the print column for Monday. I generally picked the photo on Friday, set the post up to publish in the wee hours of Sunday, and that gave me Saturday and Sunday morning to focus my thoughts on the column.

It worked. I wasn't always thrilled by my choices for photos in a given week, but on the whole the format did what I wanted it to do, and I expect I'll return to it in 2012.

Thirty-one weeks, some of which got multiple pics. Here they are. Which is my favorite? That probably depends on the day, but I'm particularly fond of the one of Branyan Pena and the praying mantis.

Monday's print column will be the last for the year, but the notion of a Sunday theme will remain. Next week I'll launch the Sunday Funnies -- amusing stories, some of which may actually be true, gleaned from my collection of baseball literature.