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So I'm standing by the water cooler at work having a conversation. (No really I was) Then what do you know, this guy in a Texas Rangers uniform (yes the baseball team not the Chuck Norris cop-like guys) comes sweeping in and tosses the water cooler clear across the break room in a fit of rage! At first I thought it was just someone filming an infomercial for the Paul O'Neill School of Dugout Destruction but I was sadly mistaken, this guy was serious! So now my suit is all wet, and I head home at lunch to do a little laundry only to find that my dryer in all busted up! The neighbor claims she saw some Hispanic dude in a baseball outfit kicking things all over my laundry room! Funny, I never knew the gardener was a Pirates fan, and when did I give him a key?… Anyway, I've had about enough for one day so I call in sick for the rest of the afternoon, plop down on the sofa and fire up The Commish's Office karaoke machine. I select a tune by the guy who sang Islands In The Stream with Dolly's Partons and sing along to the tune of "The Gambler" … On a warm summer's evening
So I took time a-starin',
He said, son, it doesn't matter
You've got to know when to hold him
After that I was tempted to go with some lounge music and fire up some Dean Martin in a tribute to Oliver Perez. I was even going to go as far as calling up Dougie Q on the old cell phone to see if he wanted to trades verses on "Ain't That A Kick In The Head". But then I realized that all of Koo Koo (Fran &) Ollie's damage took place not in the head (as in "navy speak for bathroom"), but in the laundry room. And I really wasn't feeling up to the vocal gyrations necessary to get through Don Henley's "Dirty Laundry" (Kick 'em when they're up! Kick 'em when they're down!) so I scrapped the whole idea and went up to make a salad for lunch. I was all out of iced cabbage, for you see this Korean kid from down the block had borrowed my last few leaves for his Little League game that afternoon. I had to make due with some celery instead. And did you know that the Wilmington Blue Rocks (a Class A minor league team of the Red Sox) has a Mr. Celery mascot who appears at games whenever the Rocks score? Seriously, I kid you not, Mr. Celery. (thanks to Joe Mastrangelo, soon to be re-nicknamed Philly Joe, for this must-have information and Joe I seriously hope you didn't go to a high scoring affair) So as I'm chopping up Mr. Celery, it was at this point that I realized I had a blister on my cutting hand. Which reminded me of Josh Beckett, who like myself, was in dire need of treatment for his blister problem. That logically brought me around to thoughts of Moises Alou, who has devised an effective way to ward off his blisters, which brings me back to the head. No wait, it wasn't the head, it was Oliver Perez, in the laundry room (with the candlestick). By this time I had pretty much lost my appetite so I just ordered a pizza… Reading the newspaper while eating my pizza I see that the Dodgers star reliever is out for the year after having season ending surgery. So Gagne is gone, eh? (He's from Canada, so I can use the "eh", eh?) Then scanning the rest of the transaction wire I see that the Cincinnati Reds have placed outfielder Kenny Kelly on the 15-day DL. Oh my god! They've killed Kenny! Those bastards. I then had to go back and re-read this to make sure my eyes weren't deceiving me, as I originally thought that Kevin Kelly has gone on the disabled list. Which of course, would give me the opportunity to reserve him and pick up a new co-owner. After scanning the free agent list and entertaining offers of calling up Mark "Racing Swine" Robinson or Ian "Don't Call Me Jack" Morris, I realized my mistake… Congratulations go out to Marc D'Allesandro. No he still hasn't really slept with Anna Benson, but he did pop his Darryl Strawberry this week, making his first ever trade as a solo owner and turning our Tradeless Three into just a Deal-less Duo. But I see Ray Boyce (not to be confused with Met reliever Royce Ring) has come alive with an offer to trade anyone on his team so that leaves just Rats Milewski as the lone holdout (as usual). Come on Dennis, just make me an offer, I know you want Chien-Ming Wang on your pitching staff… George Steinbrenner seems to have named his "heir apparent", and it's his son-in-law Steve Swindal who will someday take over control of the New York Yankees. Gee, a guy named "swindle" running the Yankees? So what exactly will have changed?… Let's all bid a fond "don't let the door hit you on the way out" to John Rocker, who has asked for and been granted his release from the independent Atlantic League Long Island Ducks so that he may "consider his future options". Options? Mr. Rocker, you have options? Yeah, like maybe raising pigeons with Mike Tyson in Arizona perhaps… And finally a reminder that Monday is the 4th of July and most of us will have better things to do than thinking about making our weekly transactions. Well, I will be doing stats on Monday night (albeit a little later than usual I assume), so all you owners of players currently enrolled in the Paul O'Neill School of Dugout Destruction be sure to get me your moves in before Monday. Maybe Sunday night while you're doing laundry (assuming of course that Mr. Perez has left your appliances intact!)… That's all for now, for those of you who've been asking, I'll have all the details on the All Star Break and Dump Day transactions in next week's column. Yes, that's right, less than two weeks until you can start dropping all that dead weight from your roster (but alas I still can't reserve Kevin) 'til next week…
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