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We'll continue the season with our blog-type columns. Whenever the mood strikes, be it stats night on Monday, the middle of a West Coast game on Wednesday night, or maybe even a Friday morning before I leave for work, I'll come here and post entries. Sometimes it will be a paragraph or two, sometimes longer. I'll make sure I put a date on everything so you can easily tell what's new from what you may have already read. So feel free to come to this page often, or continue checking in once a week as the stats update, to check out and catch up on the latest entries in what I hope to be a season long blog. If anyone else has anything to contribute, I'll be more than happy to post it here, with all credit given to the author of course. And if we get one of our infamous 20+ reply e-mail threads going, I may also opt to copy that into this space as well so it's saved for all posterity. June 30th, 2010 I'm feeling that familiar tug again this morning, and my keyboard's ready to go, but for the love of all that is holy will somebody please turn off those damn horns... Now that the United States soccer team has "gone-a" home after a loss to the fine nation of the same name, let's wrap up this World Cup thing with a few more moments of inanity shall we? For starters we're now in what's deemed the "knockout" phase of the tournament. Essentially it's become a 16-team NCAA basketball bracket, but you'd think the folks who gave you such great terms like "pitch" (for field), "caps" (for games played) and "booking" (for a penalty involving cards from the UNO deck) would come up with something better than "Knockout Round"? That sounds more like something you'd see in the Golden Gloves or on a game show like Jeopardy. We're back with the Jeopardy knockout round, where it no longer matters how smart you are, just whether or not you can avoid a right hook from a left-handed bookworm. Contestants put down your buzzers and don your gloves... I haven't checked my knockout brackets yet but is there a chance that Paraguay and Uruguay can meet in the final match? Then everyone could pick up their vuvuzelas and honk out some Otis Redding. "Sitting on the dock of the Guays, watching stoppage time tick away...". Uruguay? You're a what? What did you call me? Ah, so now I see where the "knockout" part might come in... I also have to come clean here (we're not just talking about the sheets), and admit that I was secretly rooting for Algeria in that final Group Round match. Why would I do that? Well it's quite simple. My last name is Legere, my father's name is Al. Al Legere and Algeria kinda sound alike don't they? So who wouldn't be rooting for family? Meanwhile, while we're talking about my heritage how about that French team turning into the 1977 Yankees with all kinds of in-fighting and finger pointing? Wow, that's the most fight we've seen from anything French since France invaded Algeria in 1830. Hmm, Algeria was it? I've got to go check the family tree. I'm wondering if there was a great-great-grandfather also named Al back in the early 19th century too... Next topic, penalty kicks. Whose idea was this? The game is tied, everyone's tired, so let's decide the winner based on which team can avoid hitting the crossbar? Does the goalie really have a prayer here? At least in hockey when they go to a shootout you've got the "big goalie, small net" effect which leads to a lot of saves, not to mention the hockey goalie's got a long stick and a glove to boot. What's the soccer goalie to do? He's 5 foot-something, buck-seventy-nine soaking wet and the net is big enough to hold the entire population of Johannesburg. He's basically guessing "left or right" and if he's wrong hoping to hear the thwack of ball meeting wood. It's like deciding the outcome of a tied basketball game with a free throw shooting contest. Well I guess it's still all a heck of a lot better and fairer then the "drawing of lots" they were threatening to use to break 2nd and 3rd place ties in the Group Round. Can you see it? Everyone's sitting down somewhere around mid-field with a bunch of square cards and plastic markers. The referee calls out "N, 39", a sweeper calls out "Le Bingo" and finally France has won a game... Replay anyone? Didn't think so. Whole lot of controversy going on with disallowed and missed goals and offsides that were really on. So much so that you could argue it's cost some countries, notably England and Mexico, their respective games. Not that I'm going to weep for either of those two nations (although I might cry for you Argentina), but there aren't too many Jim Joyces in this competition are there? Referees are not talking about missed calls nor are they being held to task to do so. The head of FIFA, which is actually the name of the organization running the World Cup and not a french poodle, has backed the silence of the refs and adamantly refuses to address the use of instant replay to get these calls right. Paraphrasing the head poodle, a very full of himself Sepp Blatter (which makes him a "full Blatter" I presume), this is a world stage, countries battling countries as it has been throughout time. Why would we want to use some kind of advanced technology to bring our sport into the 21st century? Did they have video during World War One? Right. OK, pipe down there Seppy boy and don't get your Blatter in an uproar. Could you imagine if they had instant replay at the Battle of Verdun? Upon further review it's been shown that the French squad left their trench early and were obviously offsides, entering No Man's Land well before the ball(istics) arrived. That's really going to cost them much needed field position... Looking at the statistics from the first round I see that the leader in goals, a guy from Spain named David Villa (no relation to Pancho or Bob) has found the net four times, but much to my amazement the leader in "clean sheets" only has three. Must be lots of great parties going on at the team hotels then! Other esoteric stats, courtesy of we're-really-not-a-french-poodle.com include the leader in "fouls suffered", a guy named Honda has 17. If you asked me I would've guessed Toyota... They also list on the site the current leaders in "Distance Covered" and "Top Speed". I kid you not! This game is so obviously not about scoring but it's nice to see you can get credit and deserved recognition for running around a lot too. The top speed leader, and I can't tell you how they measure this at all, is Mexico's Javier Hernandez, who's reached 32.15 km/h, or almost 20 MPH. If I had to venture a guess I'd say he's had some experience running away from the baddies in Juarez. A North Korean named Yong-Hak has traveled 36,220 metres all told and is our clubhouse leader at the moment in that category. Translated for us ugly Americans who refuse to deal in metrics that would be the equivalent of 22 and a half miles. OK, Yong-Hak, keep up the pace and don't yack, you're almost to Heartbreak Hill... Given the way his team played in the tournament I'm guessing he's going to be covering a lot more ground than that trying to avoid the wrath of the Supreme Leader, ill Kim Jong, once he returns home. Let's close with some congratulations to one of our own. It was Cardoza's penalty kick that avoided the cross bar even though the goalie was on the other side of the pitch after leaning the wrong way and won the game for his team in the first round of knockouts. I hadn't heard from Don in awhile and was wondering what he was up to. Apparently he moved to Paraguay, changed his name to Oscar and can actually kick with that fake leg! Way to go Donnie Futbol! Whenever you finally get eliminated and return home can you bring each of us back a vuvuzela? I have a feeling they'll come in real handy on Draft Day when we attempt to drown out all the Kevin Kelly din we usually have to put up with. June 28th, 2010 I've got a personal story to relate as today's News & Notes entry that Red Sox fans and fathers of toddlers are sure to love and everyone else should get a real nice chuckle from... Setting up the background, Intentional Walt is in Hartford this week on business and arrived early over the weekend so we had him over for dinner on Sunday. Walt arrives at The Commish's Office and we put on the Red Sox - San Fran Giants game at 4PM. Trish, a.k.a. Mrs. Commish, starts prepping dinner so we've got my two-year old son Ryan, the heir to Commishdom in the living room with us. {brief tangent into Monty Python alert!} One day son all of this can be yours! What? The curtains? {end of Monty Python tangent, we now return you to your regularly scheduled program} We're both keeping an eye on him while watching the game and he's playing with his toys, generally behaving as well as can be expected from a toddler, and much better than Carlos Zambrano I might add. Cut to the game, top of the 1st inning and David Ortiz comes to bat against The Freak and takes one deep to right and into the Pacific Ocean for a "Splash Down". We have Ryan watch the replay and he gets excited because he saw the ball land then float in the water and thought that was funny. We tell him that the batter's name is "Big Papi" and he chuckles too. A few minutes later he looks up from his train table, calls out to Walt and I and says "Big Papi". So we're psyched thinking he was talking about the home run and the game. We go "yeah, Big Papi" and he shakes his head "no Daddy" and says what sounded like "Big Papi" again. Obviously he's not talking about Ortiz so Walt tries to understand, "Big puppy?", he asks. Again, a demure "no" and once again Ryan says "Big... and something that sounds like Papi". We collectively shrug and everyone goes back what they were doing. We're watching Lincecum get knocked around and Ryan's pushing Thomas the Tank Engine through a mountain tunnel. Minutes later he shouts it again, but this time Ryan runs in front of me and turns around to face the TV with his back to me. Those of you with kids close to this age, and others with older kids who are not so good at repressing memories may have already figured this out but in case you haven't our story continues... Once again we hear "Big Papi/Puppy", I wriggle my nose as there's a slight scent wafting in the air that's certainly not our dinner, and suddenly all is clear, my sinuses included. He's not saying Big Papi, he's saying Big POOPIE! As in, Daddy I just s**t my pants and please change me because while it's hard enough sitting down to watch the Red Sox in a Mets household, I certainly can't do so with this mushy lump in my rump! So bottom line, two stinkers here, Tim Lincecum's start and my son's diaper. Happy belated Father's Day, eh? True story, as Walt is my witness... June 25th, 2010 With "Toy Story 3" topping the box office charts (I take it kids aren't so hot for the Shrek anymore?), I thought we'd take a look at the more "animated" side of baseball. Starting in Pittsburgh where they've just fired and then re-hired a pierogi. Yes, I can explain... You know how in Milwaukee they have the between-innings entertainment where guys dressed up as cartoon sausages race along the foul lines? Well, same thing except in Pittsburgh, where's there a big Polish population, they entertain the locals by racing in pierogi costumes. One of the racers-slash-guy-who-wears-the-costume had a thing or two to say about the Pirates management and posted such on his Facebook page and was promptly fired, or whatever one does with a pierogi once they're finished with it. Guess you could say this guy was in hot water, which of course would make him a boiled pierogi (the preferred fare in PA) and not as good for your health as say the baked variety, which of course is currently popular in California now that medicinal marijuana is enjoying a comeback. So why was this particular popular Pittsburgh polish pastry-playing person so positively pissed? What was so bad that he got his flaky crust all in an uproar? Well, long story short, it's come out that the Pirates recently signed both their manager and GM to long term extensions, did not announce those signings at the time, then promptly went on a twelve game losing streak. Only when the fans demanded a sacrifice (hold the Knight Who Say Ni jokes!) was it made public knowledge that the contracts were extended and sorry folks but we can't fire anyone at this time. Oops! Can you imagine what would've happened in New York had they done that with Minaya and Manuel then entered June in fourth place in the NL East instead of their present position atop the Wild Card standings? Forget about the pierogi, you'd be dealing with a riled up bagel, one hot under the collar knish, a really bitchy bialy and a potenitally homicidal babka right now! Hey, great race idea! Get me somebody in marketing at Citi Field on Line One... Well, lo and behold, our story concludes when we find out that the Pirates did not properly fire this pierogi according to the standard rules and practices for pink slipping a pastry and the Pierogi Racing Union or someone (I'm not a betting man but I'm guessing Scott Boras is involved here somewhere) threatened the Bucs with legal action so they re-hired back the baked dumpling, well at least the guy in the costume that is, last week. No word on whether or not he got the same deal as the manager and GM though. For those of you interested in finding out more about these entertaining and sometimes controversial (we all remember Randall Simon right?) races, I've including some informative links below. Click here for more on the aforementioned Great Pierogi Race in Pittsburgh Back to "Toy Story" next where I'll whip off a quick Top Ten in honor of the third installment of this Pixar classic. From the home office at Sunnyside Day Care I bring you: Top 10 Baseball Players Who Could've Been Toy Story Characters I couldn't find a good one for Slinky Dog, although I'm sure I could've stretched Fred McGriff (a.k.a. The Crime Dog) out Chad Zerbe-style if we desperately needed to get to ten names. Oh and the Gary Matthews guy is the original one, the father that played in Philadelphia, not his son recently of the Angels and Mets. I'd rather have the green plastic soldiers that Sarge commands instead of Junior Matthews, at least the plastic playthings have a better chance of getting a hit! Finally, tell all the kids, I think I've found Nemo! There's a story going around, not sure how true it is, it could be a fish tale, but those in the know about the new Marlins ballpark (no not the horns again I promise!) have leaked out that there are plans to build a large aquarium into the stadium's infrastructure. Basically a fish tank in the wall behind home plate! Others say it better than I do on this one so check out the link below for the comedy but let me just add my own to the bottom of the list and say that if rumored-to-be-the-next Florida manager Bobby Valentine gets ejected from a game then re-appears in the dugout with a long beard, a crown and a trident, then this "Poseidon" (ad)venture is well worth it! Click here for the latest in aquarium-baseball fusion architecture June 23rd, 2010 Long time no speak, how's everyone doing? Happy belated Father's Day to everyone where it applies... It's been a quiet week on the baseball scene with not a lot of News & Notes-worthy stuff going on. Wait, I take back that "quiet" reference as there was that ill advised giveaway in Florida wherein the Marlins brain trust (an oxymoron if ever there was one) decided it would be a good idea to bring World Cup fever to their park and handed out free vuvuzelas at one of their recent games against interleague rival Tampa Bay. It's goes without saying, because if I said it out loud you wouldn't be able to here me over the cacaphony of the buzzing horns, that this was an epic fail of a promotion. Everyone blowing their horns and causing such a commotion that the players couldn't hear each other calling for fly balls and the managers and the umpires couldn't verbally communicate lineup changes. Wow! All that noise and the park's only a quarter of the way full? Imagine if they actually had real people attend these games? Few more random thoughts on the horn and then we put this topic to rest. First off, these things are so annoying that if anyone was tooting one in front of me I'd be sorely tempted to take the thing away from them, plant it upside down and go all "Abner Louima" on them. If that reference escapes you, feel free to look it up or just ask Kevin as I'm sure he's smiling and vigorously nodding his head up and down in the "yes" gesture right now. On a somewhat more pleasant note, I believe they are about to re-release a Dr. Seuss classic with a World Cup theme, and changing the title to "Horton Hears A Vu". Of course, once Horton hears the din, he promptly stomps the green eggs and ham out of it. "A person's a person, no matter how small, but enough with f***ing horns, I'm sick of it all!" Even a leading edge singer like Lady Gaga can't be too impressed with these things, although if you want my opinion I think she knows her way around a vuvuzela if you know what I mean? Not that there's anything wrong with that! More on him in a minute... Apparently there's not too many New Yorkers impressed with Lady G as she had quite a whirlwind of negative publicity on the baseball front after visits to both of The City's ballparks recently. I guess she won't be remaking the song "Ain't Misbehavin'" anytime soon, eh? Although she does have a new controversial video out for her latest hit "Alejandro" (think Madonna's "Like A Prayer", been there, seen that, yawn), that unfortunately for us baseball folks is not about the former Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher, but does contain a veiled "Pena" reference or two from what I hear. Summarizing the "Gagacious" antics, she invites herself into the Yankee clubhouse after a game, wearing a button-up Yankee jersey (that's not buttoned mind you) with just her bra on underneath it and nothing below but bikini bottoms. Needless to say, rumor has it Ramiro Pena swelled, and not with pride either... Cut to cross-town and she's at Citi Field giving the finger to Mets fans and somehow finding a way to sit in Jerry Seinfeld's field box while he wasn't there, touching off a still running tabloid feud with the comedian. A spat in which he calls her all kinds of names, well everything except her real name, which he can't seem to remember. Here's some help Jerry, even though she acts like one, her given last name doesn't rhyme with "Helen Hunt". And don't get me wrong, it's not that we don't appreciate "The Finger" here in Flushing, it's just a case of, hey where were you when we needed that finger a few years back when the bullpen couldn't hold 5 run leads? Would've been nice to have a celebrity flipping birds all over the place then for a little exposure! Wait, I just used "exposure" in a sentence about Lady Gaga. OK, back to the Yankees clubhouse scene where we need to check on the state of poor Ramiro's Pena... In other musically related baseball news, the red hot White Sox have called up former Cuban national team infielder Dayan Viciedo from the minors to man the (red) hot corner. Please try not to grunt too hard once you realize my "(red) = player from a communist nation" play on words there. I also hope he's well liked by the team's over-the-airwaves announcers, Ed Farmer and Darin Jackson (WSCR 670 AM "The Score") because as you learned on the wireless back in '82, Viciedo Killed The Radio Star... No music-themed News & Notes entry, especially in the minor-league stars paragraph, would be complete without mentioning the hot start (not red hot, just plain Africa hot) that catcher Carlos Santana has had since joining the Indians. He's currently batting .355 with 2 HRs and 8 RBIs since being summoned from AAA two weeks ago and has such a huge cult following in Cleveland that he's thinking of releasing a "greatest hits" album much like his guitar playing namesake. Here's a sneak peek at some of the songs that are currently being worked on in the studio. The lead track of course is titled "Black Magic Catcher". This is followed by a fine duet that crosses cultural lines with fellow rookie and Mets first-baseman Ike Davis named "Oye Vey Como Va". All proceeds from the anticipated first single "Correia, Correia" will go to the Petco Park Earthquake victims. That is the poor folks sitting in the upper decks when the park started shaking that "soiled their linens" when they realized their potential predicament. This song also includes a surprise heavy metal sample from recently deceased Ronnie James Dio's "Last In Line" where he sings "you can release yourself but the only way to go is down". Other songs include "Hold On", a fun tribute to pickoff moves, "Smoot(h)", a track that's kicking it old school, real old in fact, as in turn-of-the-century St. Louis Cardinals outfielder Doc Smoot old and a special guest appearance on drums by our own Brian "Les Frere" Legere on "Evil Empire Ways", in which Santana disses the Yankees free agent spending and starts a potential feud with Jay-Z that promises to wipe Seinfeld and Lady Gaga right off the back and front pages of The New York Post. Finally, click here for this minor league promotion from last week that surely got a Whole Lotta Love. I'll let the link do the talking but be sure to page down to get the whole picture (and video for those that aren't blocked), including one awesome jersey! June 16th, 2010 Is everyone enjoying the World Cup soccer games? This is the time of year, well time of "every four years" actually, that we're supposed to catch soccer fever here in the U.S. Personally, I'd rather watch paint dry; or as George Carlin once opined, it's about as exciting as observing flies fornicating. Soccer Fever? No thanks, I'd prefer dengue fever. Hey they're playing this gig in Africa aren't they? Honestly, I couldn't tell the difference between a soccer net and a mosquito net or a tse-tse fly from a nil-nil tie but for some reason there's this strange "tug" that's impelling me to pay attention and write a column about it so here goes... So I'm trying to come up to speed on who the great players are in this game and I'm browsing the statistical leaders thus far for the tournament and what do I find? Well aside from the expected stats like Goals, Assists and even Yellow Cards (more on those later) there's a leader list for a stat called "Clean Sheets". WTF? Do they have referees checking the hotels in the morning? Does anyone know what this is? I'm completely baffled and genuinely intrigued now so next stop Wikipedia... Where I discover that "...in team sports, a shutout, or a clean sheet in association football, refers to a game in which one team prevents the opposing team from scoring." OK, that clears things up a bit. So Clean Sheet means no scoring? Of course it does! If the guy "scored" then the sheets would certainly be dirty, at least when viewed under that CSI blue light thingy. Well there you go... Soccer is a boring game to some, there are not a lot of shots on goal and these "rushes" up the field seem to be in slo-mo compared to similar sports like basketball or hockey but fans of the sport tell me that the game of futbol is all about the positioning. Which now that I think about it might explain the clean sheets. Honestly, if I want to watch 1 - 0 games I've got plenty of those already going on in major league baseball, pretty much any game at Petco Park in San Diego (now with bonus earthquake for folks who make it to the 8th inning! F*** the Croix De Candlestick, I want an Earthquake Biscuit). Heck I could stick the Diamondbacks and Dodgers (remember those virtually scoreless extra inning affairs last month?) and Ubaldo Jimenez' ERA into Group D right now and I'm sure two of them would slip through to round two on goal differential... Now let's discuss those yellow cards. So apparently the rule is that if you get into an argument with the ref he doesn't yell back at you (are you listening here MLB umps?) but instead just pulls one of these things out of his pocket, holds it up in the air and then if I can borrow an expression from my favorite hockey movie, you "feel shame". Do this twice and you get to trade in your two yellows for a red card and some kind of continuing suspension. Collect three red cards and I believe you get a free breakfast at Denny's. Well since you won't be playing any games in the near future the least they can do is feed you. What I really want to see is the following sequence. Player makes a midfield sliding tackle of a questionable nature and is called for a foul. Before the ensuing penalty kick gets set up he starts jawing at the referee who, standing there stone-faced, pulls the yellow card out of his hip pocket and holds it aloft for all the crowd to see. As the crowd "oohs" and "aahs" to the public shaming, the player goes all Lou Piniella and starts kicking turf on the ref's fancy white shoes and yanking out corner flags and tossing them into the stands. Naturally the ref plays the red card to much ballyhooed crowd reaction and then here's where we break from tradition... Instead of slinking off the pitch (a fancy soccer word for "field") in acceptance of his penalty, said player reaches into his uniform pocket and pulls out a card of his own! What's this? As the crowd collectively gasps, player reveals and holds up the dreaded "Wild Card Draw Four" card, announces that he's changing the color to "Green" and sorry referee dude but this game of UNO is so on as all you've got in your pocket are yellow and red cards! Now before we go any further it's time to address these things called "vuvuzelas". What are these you ask? No it's not something the hotel maids often find wrapped up in the clean sheets but rather it's a type of long horn that fans use on the African continent that produces a honking and buzzing noise which makes those ThunderStix at the Anaheim Angels game sound like a live recording of Marcel Marceau's greatest hits. They actually look alot like those horns they use in the cough drop commercial, you know the one where they shout "Ri-col-a!" and boy do they make quite a ruckus, drowning out the always rowdy soccer crowds in the process. Apparently it's also become a sore spot for those watching the games on TV to the point where folks are now watching the World Cup with the TV volume on "mute". Which is actually how I watch all home Yankee games now that Suzyn Waldeman and John Sterling have made me long for the compelling philosophical stylings and histronics of Frank Messer, Bill White and Phil Rizzuto. But it's not the auditory issues that bother me, I'm actually intrigued by the name they gave these things. Horn, schmorn, this sounds more like a reproductive organ! Reminds me of that Seinfeld episode where Jerry couldn't remember the woman's name but knew that it rhymed with a sexual body part. Vuvuzela? Isabella! Speaking of reproductive organs, you know how everyone lines up to block the corner kick and holds their groins for protection? Are you telling me no one is wearing a jockstrap? Need I remind you this is the World CUP? Or as comedian Bob Nelson used to say "...it ain't no Dixie cup, it ain't no coffee mug, and you certainly don't want to be drinking anything out of it..." And you comic historians can certainly fill in the rest... Well how about taking it a step further and equip the players with blindfolds and a cigarette so they have no way of knowing if a ball is going to hit them in the face? Guess we'd need to replace guys who are good "headers" (and keep the sheets clean) with some folks with long noses to redirect any of those "face shots" that might occur. It's Durante for the Italians with an own-goal off his proboscus! Oh the shame, oh the agony, oh will somebody please get him a tissue... And finally, we started with him so let's end with him. If I may once again paraphrase the late George Carlin, one of the greatest comedians of all time, not to mention the narrator for the Thomas The Tank Engine series, soccer is not a sport, because Slovenians are good at it! Special thanks to Brian, Walt and Doug for providing the inspiration for some of the material here and enough with the other football already, we now return you to your regularly scheduled interleague baseball programming... June 10th, 2010 Yesterday we spoke about multiple Mike Stantons through the years but how about this little selfsame game they've got going in Anaheim where the Angels have themselves yet another reliever named Francisco Rodriguez. Holy dopplegangers Batman, there's reciprocity in Halo City! Arte Moreno's got a cloning machine! Well not quite, as the official statistics have these two guys about 3 inches, 20 pounds and the distance between their home countries of Venezuela and Mexico apart. As of the last time I checked, this version (K-Rod 2.0?) hasn't allowed a run all season. Granted it's been less than a dozen innings pitched but still impressive nonetheless. For the conspiracy theorists amongst us, can we be certain which one they actually traded to the Mets? After all, the guy closing for the Mets, (K-Rod 1.0 presumably) hasn't exactly been the same strike-throwing shut down 9th inning specialist we saw in Los Angeles now has he? And he wears goggles, which makes a long distance retinal scan kind of hard to do. Just saying... While we've got our sights focused on Citi Field, cutting along similar lines, is there any chance we can cap the number of Felicianos on the Mets to two? First we've got left handed middle reliever Pedro, who's done a fine job in the bullpen this season. Now the Mets have called up center fielder Jesus Feliciano from AAA Buffalo where he was having a good first part of the season. The say third times a charm right? Well be careful what you wish for Mets fans. My fear here is that Jose Feliciano shows up in Flushing and demands to sing the National Anthem or something. OK Jose, we'll let you sing a song but it's got to be the "Chico And The Man" theme song ("Look-ing good!") and before you ask there's absolutely no way you're driving the team bus! Unless we need to get K-Rod's DNA sample to the lab, or better yet, Ollie Perez needs someone to drop him off at his doctor's appointment... June 9th, 2010 I am
Try, try, try to understand
To quote little Carol Anne from the movie "Poltergeist", "they're here!"... It's been quite the week thus far in major league baseball with Bryce Harper's coming out party (also know as the major league draft) on Monday and the debut Tuesday of two much hyped (or maybe "too" much hyped?) potential superstars as Stephen Strasburg took the mound for the Nationals and Mike Stanton roamed right field for the Marlins. Oh yeah, and this future first ballot Hall of Famer named Griffey recently retired too, we should talk about him sometime in the near future if we get a chance, don't ya think? First Strasburg's debut which I've summed up through lyrics in the opening stanzas of this entry. Superman, Magic Man, or quite simply just The Man. Wow, wow and wow! Despite all the hype and pressure this kid goes out and does what he did in his first game? You know the stats by now, but just in case your view of them is blocked by that rock you're living under check these out: 7 IP, 2 ER, 4 H, 0 BB, 14 K and the all important W He threw 94 pitches and the last pitch was clocked at a mere 99 miles an hour! Maybe I should've included Sammy Hagar's "I Can't Drive 55" in the opening as well? Adhering to strict pitch count limits manager Jim Riggleman lifted the rookie after the 7th and I was half expecting Lucifer to show up at the end of the high five line in the dugout to claim Strasburg's soul. Alas that did not occur; unless the Devil's in Mr. Jones (Pirates first baseman and two-time Strasburg K victim Garett Jones), but if former major league infielder Fausto Cruz gets named to the Washington coaching staff sometime in the next five days then I'll know my suspicions are well founded. The devil went down to D.C., he was looking for a soul to steal
Also impressive (but I won't dare say "equally impressive") in his major league debut last night, Florida Marlins outfielder Mike Stanton, a much needed pure power prospect in the post-PED era, went an impressive 3-for-5 at the plate with two runs scored, even keeping a potential game winning rally alive in the 9th with a two-out single as the Fish threatened Phillies closer Brad Lidge. Yes I know what you're thinking, we've just finally gotten rid of the "other" Mike Stanton, the reliever who's amongst the career leaders in games pitched, and here comes another one right on his heels? If this guy has the same career longevity as the first one, we're signed up for almost forty consecutive years of Mike Stanton-ness, or just a touch under six years if you're a doberman pinscher. Actually, research shows that there was yet another Mike Stanton who pitched mainly for Cleveland and Seattle in the early 80s, before the aged reliever we all know (and some love) began his stint in the majors. Throw this one at the left end of the chain and we're looking at half a century of virtually uninterrupted Mike Stanton presence. Just one more year for the dog mind you, but still quite a long time. Almost as long as those Ken Griffey guys played. Speaking of... What's that? Oh sorry folks, my producer is telling me that we're all out of time! Please join us next week when we'll have the Griffeys back on our show to discuss their playing days and explore this unconfirmed rumor that's been going around recently about Junior calling it a career... June 8th, 2010 The Major League Baseball draft is certainly not "must see TV" but since all the major networks are showing re-runs and the NBA Finals and Stanley Cup were having travel days I decided to sit down and watch the proceedings with pen and paper in hand. Thus I present to you the first (dare I say "annual"?) live baseball draft blog. It's a real draft mind you not a mock draft, but of course there's plenty of mocking going on in the commentary. We'll go pick by pick and give you my first comic impressions of each selection. I'll also let you know now that I stopped after the 32nd pick, turned off the television, read a few more chapters in my "Percy Jackson and The Olympians" book (highly recommended for those of you who liked the Harry Potter series) and went to bed... 1. Bryce Harper (WAS) - The consensus first pick on everyone's draft board and arguably the best power hitting prospect in years. Have you seen they way this guy wears his eye black? If not, do a Google image search and tell me he doesn't immediately bring up memories of The WWF's Ultimate Warrior! Did the Warrior have a kid back in '93 and could this be him? Nah, probably not with all those steroids in his system at the time. June 7th, 2010 I just heard that Ken Griffey Jr., upset with the lack of attention his recent retirement received, actually tried to un-retire but that Bud Selig refused to reverse the call! Or am I confusing that with another news story? Poor guy picked the most inopportune time to hang up the spikes didn't he? The same day he announces his retirement as arguably one of the best centerfielders in the game's history, Armando Galaragga goes out and throws his almost-perfect-game. The next day of course, instead of The Kid's retirement celebration, the back page sports headlines all scream about some incompetent umpire and unless Junior had undergone an impromptu gender change and become Joyce Griffey overnight he certainly wasn't going to be leading the trend list at Twitter or Google search. Cut to Friday after all the noise has died down now that Galaragga, Leyland, Selig and said umpire have made their peace and you think all heads would now turn to Griffey but what happens? We find out about the death of actress Rue McLanahan that also closed the infamous "these things come in threes" circle created the previous week when actors Dennis Hopper and Gary Coleman died. Sorry Kid, but news that Betty White is the last surviving Golden Girl trumps anyone's baseball retirement, no matter how good his career was. After all, did you ever play in the same outfield as Estelle Getty and Bea Arthur? That's a whole lot better company than Jeffrey Leonard and Jay Buhner for sure. Surely once the mourning of Shooter, Arnold Drummond and Blanche Devereaux passed and the weekend started, the focus would turn to Junior's outstanding career, right? Alas, more famous people felt the need to pass away as all-time great UCLA basketball coach John Wooden went all wooden at the ripe old age of 99, discovering that you can't play box and one once rigor mortis sets in, unless that box is a coffin and you're the one in it of course. Griff, I know you played in a few All Star games with the Wizard of Oz(zie Smith), but the Wizard of Westwood wins this jump ball too. I know what you're thinking, damn Los Angeles with all their TV and sports stars, eh? With the NBA Finals Game 2 also set to be played in the City of Angels on Sunday was there any chance a dull game would fly under the radar and allow your light to shine before the weekend was out? Sunday night. Los Angeles. Universal Studios' Gibson Amphitheatre, MTV Movie Awards. What can I say? Scarlett Johansson and Sandra Bullock hook up for an on-stage lesbian kiss. And I'm supposed to be aware of anything else that happens after that for the rest of the night? Griffey who? And I still don't know what the final score of the basketball game was! Excuse me, but if there's a full blooded male anywhere in America, Mariners, Celtics, Lakers fan or none of the above, that wasn't walking around in a daze and with a limp for the rest of Sunday after that lip lock then please raise your, er, ahem, hand. Kid, we promise we'll get back to you at some point soon and give this retirement the proper attention it deserves. But right now we may need to forget about the pomp as you've become a victim of circumstance. Maybe we can fit you in right after they cap that oil leaky thing in the Gulf, OK? Yeah, there's a good parallel, capping the well and you being famous for wearing your baseball cap backwards. Let's hope Larry King makes the connection. Meanwhile, just kick back and take a nap, we'll wake you up when we're ready... Finally, catching up on old business, my faithful "ED"-itor has informed me that I missed a couple of famous Joyces in my previous post, most notably: How could I leave out Trixie! Shaking my head in disbelief! "Bang zoom to the moon" for me... June 3rd, 2010 With apologies to Ken Griffey, I think we all know what today's topic is going to be about. So without further ado let's all pick up our Louisville Sluggers and meet over near the fence by the deceased horse... Rank these famous "Joyces" in order of popularity: Of course we all know who Homer Simpson (and Doug) would rank first (mmmm... donuts) and to answer your other question yes that was William Zabka, of Karate Kid fame, in that 1985 movie! I have to admit my instincts were screaming for James Spader but alas, the dude from Cobra Kai it is. Brian, sorry I couldn't get Crissy Snow in there anywhere but yes, I think we'd all agree that there's no "Ginger or Maryann" debate here and Crissy ranks higher than Janet, who of course still beats out Mrs. Roper, unless of course, you're into that sort of thing? Come-a knock on my door... Seriously though, you've got to give umpire Joyce some serious credit for so publicly admitting his mistake here and nice to see Galaragga and Leyland handle the matter with class as well. Believe it or not I'm also going to give my namesake, the real Commish, Mr. Selig some kudos here too for not bowing to the public pressure to overturn the call. If you're one of those folks that believes the call should've been overturned then allow me to introduce myself, "Hi, my name is Pandora and I have this box I'd like to show you..." I think Joyce is scheduled to be the home plate umpire for the next game and I read somewhere that Leyland is going to have the recently wronged pitcher bring out the line-up card. I'm sure what we'll see is some sort of conciliatory handshake but wouldn't it be better if this wasn't Major League Baseball but rather Vince McMahon's WWE instead? Devon, get the tables! Now before we all go out and attempt to claim Galaragga next week, remember this is Armando, not Andres, and you need an injured pitcher to replace on your roster not a first baseman. Of course, if you've got one of those injured pitchers I'm sure you're looking at someone else and not the guy who pitched the first 28-out "perfect" game in major league history... June 2nd, 2010 Isn't it about time we gave the Phillies their binoculars back? I mean, have you seen this offense lately? Well you're not alone, no one has. Since being "caught" stealing signs and forced to fly blind, the Phils haven't had much luck scoring runs. After all, how fair is it to ask these guys to bat when they don't even know what the pitcher is going to throw? I read a stat today that in their last 81 innings (through Monday's game) the Phils have scored in just 6 of them. To put that in perspective, the National League's lowest scoring team, the Petco Padres, scored in 6 out of the 8 innings they batted in Monday night's Memorial Day blowout of the Mets. Those same Mets mind you, who just recently shut out Philadelphia for an entire three game series. Even when they got a brilliantly pitched gem of a game, Halladay's recent perfecto, the Phillies only scored one run, making the poor guy sweat to the very end. He had to be perfect to win the game! Adding insult to injury, let's go back a few weeks ago when the team lost back-to-back games to two knuckleballers, namely Tim Wakefield and the legend that is R.A. Dickey. At the time, it seemed like a good idea for teams to go trolling through their Rolodexes, cross keyword searching on "knuckler", "floater", and "butterfly with hiccups" and lining up guys for their next starts against the defending National League chumps. I know ex-Mets pitching coach Charlie Hough certainly had his eye on the phone and you'd have to think that someone in the Braves front office screamed "Get Me Niekro on Line One, stat!" Unfortunately for the employment prospects of Steve Sparks, Tom Candiotti, Wilbur Wood, Eri Yoshida, Doug Mirabelli and even the ghost of Hoyt Wilhelm, Philadelphia went on to show that they couldn't hit pitching of any kind be it knuckleballs, changeups, fastballs, curveballs or even a forkball. Matter of fact, if anyone needs a fork for their ball, just pull it out of the nearest Phillie, they're done! While we're on the subject of unhittable pitchers, I'll close out this entry with the embedded video below. Hopefully you all can view it; it's certainly "safe for work", assuming you've got headphones and about eight minutes of free time. If you have any problems check near the top of your browser for error messages regarding "blocked content" and act accordingly. Forget about Philadelphia, I'm pretty sure even the league's leading hitting team the Yankees couldn't knock this reliever out of the box. One, two, three strikes you're out...
June 1st, 2010 Hope everyone had a great long holiday weekend! For some of you, especially the Phillies fans, your holiday weekend turned into a Halladay weekend after the good doctor pitched the 2nd perfect game of the season, and the third in the last two, blanking the Marlins, no runs, no hits, no errors, nothing, nada, zilch. Or perhaps you're not a Phillies fan, but a Cardinals fan instead? Well then your holiday weekend turned into a nice Holliday weekend as your left fielder named Matt went 9-for-18 in the games played from Friday through Monday. No word on what kind of a weekend Washington Redskins defensive lineman Vonnie Holliday or Philadelphia 76ers guard Jrue Holiday had but I'd imagine it involved some grilling and lots of good music... Back to Doc Halladay's perfecto for a moment. Reached for comment immediately after the game, Grandma Braden sent her congratulations to Roy, said the real Doc Holliday was a great guy but the OK Corral was a dive, always smelled like manure and speaking of horse sh*t, as far as she was concerned she still thinks A-Rod should "stick it"! With two perfect games already thrown thus far this season, a no-hitter, 10 - 1 start and a sub-microscopic ERA from Ubaldo Jimenez and guys like the Cards Jamie Garcia and the Reds Mike Leake, throwing quality start after quality start and flashing sub-3.00's despite little to no minor league experience, it looks like pitchers are the new royalty and with apologies to Prince, they're partying like it's 1968! If that wasn't enough of a hint for you, we've even got a reliever with the name of "Oh Man!", Orioles latest closer Will Ohman, who's pitched almost 20 innings without giving up a single run. What's up with this? I surely expected a bit of an offensive drop-off as the "Steroids Error" comes in for a safe landing, but to have things turn around this quickly? Are you telling me that all this time there was just one Florida online pharmacy, a syndicate in San Francisco and a Canadian doctor supplying all the good drugs? Are the pitchers the only ones with the connections to the black market for "greenies"? So what happens now? With this early season pitching dominance seemingly not the statistical anomaly that it first appeared to be, I can only imagine things getting worse for the hitters as we enter the dreaded "dog days" of summer. For any team that hasn't been out in front of this resurgent pitching trend (I'm looking at you Omar!) and doesn't have one of these "Young Guns" (sorry Lou Diamond Phillips and Emilio Estevez don't count) on their staff then perhaps they need to take the 1968 reference literally and immediately start working out some "Old Pistols" of their own. I'm sure Bob Gibson (22-9, 1.12 in '68) would love to dust off the glove and a few hitters and show Ubaldo a thing or two from his era (not to mention his ERA). Who needs free agent Jarrod Washburn when you could just bring Ray Washburn (14 - 8, 2.26) out of retirement? The Mets need another Latino pitcher to wipe away the bad taste of Ollie from their mouths? Well say hola to Juan Marichal (26 - 9, 2.43). Just make sure you've got Barajas or Blanco catching and not Johnny Roseboro. And of course, who couldn't use Fergie Jenkins (20 - 15, 2.63)? Remember this guy was born in Ontario and surely wouldn't need any clandestine border crossing to hook up with Dr. Galea. Hey, this Dr. Galea wasn't the guy in those Bud Lite commercials was he? No sorry, that was Dr. Galakowitz. Back in 1995 (yes that was 15 years ago folks!) it may have been OK to impersonate a doctor at the airport to get your hands on a few free beers, but no one's doing that anymore, especially when those bottles have turned to vials and the MGD is now HGH. As for the hitters and what they can do from here on out to combat this recent turn of events? Two words: Vitamin. Water. My current favorite is the "XXX" flavor (no relation to Vin Diesel or Ron Jeremy) which is a mashup of acai, blueberry and pomegranate flavors. Also don't make matters any worse by beating up and mauling your team's best hitters in a home plate celebration! Poor Kendry Morales, turned the walk-off homer into a limp-off homer, or even a "carry off the field in a stretcher" homer. Guy hits a game winning blast, everyone gathers at home plate and then a scene from "The Warriors" breaks out? You win the game and become the Baseball Furies? Seriously? And we're surprised this is the first time something of this sort has happened? From now on might I suggest something safer like say, everyone stays in the dugout, grabs their iPhones and Blackberrys (not one of the flavors in "XXX" by the way) and waits patiently for the batter to return from his home run trot. Then after he updates his Facebook status with "I just hit a walk-off homer!", everyone replies "way to go dude" via Twitter or something.
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