Baseball Commentator Babelfish

"Always gives you a quality at-bat" = "Sucks at baseball"
"Never complains about his role" = "Sucks at baseball"
"Willing to get his uniform dirty" = "Sucks at baseball"
"Great clubhouse guy" = "Sucks at baseball"
"Just a winning player" = "Sucks at baseball"
"Gamer" = "Sucks at baseball"
"Doesn't care where he hits in the order" = "Sucks at baseball"
"Scrappy" = "White"

Sign of the Apocalypse

That this fucking insane story about the T-shirt buried in Yankee Stadium is being discussed on talk radio, on ESPN.com’s front page and pretty much everywhere. I expect nothing from the New York Post, but the rest of you should be ashamed.

Shocking: An Idiotic ESPN Article

Everyone is awfully quick to pronounce the Yankees dead now that ARod is gone, just like they were quick to claim the season was over in early May. But Jeff Pearlman is way, way off-base in his comparison of the 2007 Yankees losing ARod to the 1981 Yankees losing Reggie Jackson.

Reggie Jackson was a 5-time World Champion who had earned iconic status in New York. ARod is a limelight-dreading psycho who has never played in a World Series.

The 2008 Yankees will also have significantly more talent that the 1982 Yankees did, even if Posada, Pettitte and Rivera all walk.

It's just another attention grab from an ESPN writer looking to cash in on the naivete of Yankees-haters who are over-eager to bury the enemy.

I Hate TBS

Seriously, TBS? 6:30/5:30 Central start time? For realsies? And tomorrow's game starts at 5:00?? People with any kind of commute will miss half or more of the game.

I never thought I could miss ESPN so much.

Also, all of your play-by-play men are horrible, and Frank Thomas seems illiterate in the studio.

Chicago is a Homer Town, Vol. I

That Chicago is a town full of homers who turn a blind eye to any possible negativity related to their sports teams is well known. Apparently, this idiotic optimism also extends to their broadcasters (Hawk and DJ don't count...they're not broadcasters. That title implies some degree of professionalism.)

This morning on WGN Radio, Cubs announcer Pat Hughes analyzed the N.L. Central race. In doing so, he declared that the Cubs and Cardinals "both have explosive lineups." The Cubs are 8th in the National League (a shitty league, by the by) with 607 runs scored, 120 runs behind league-leading Philly. The Cardinals are 13th with 576. Feel the electricity! XXXplosive!

Then, he pronounced that the Cubs, Cardinals and Brewers are all "very good teams."

The Cubs are 68-64, good for the 12th best record in baseball. The Brewers are 66-67. The Cardinals are 64-66. A historic race between three all-time greats, indeed. Some might even call it legendary.

USA Today is on a Roll

In light of their recent published drivel about the Red Sox marrying the Statue of Liberty and raising little patriots together, you might think the multi-colored lady that is USA Today would take a few days off from printing sheer idiocy about the sport of baseball. You might be wrong.

With no trace of irony or dissent, today's bright red sports section features an article about the excitement of the current Wild Card races, and, for good measure, adds a sidebar about how proud Bud Selig is of the Wild Card:

"Well, I'm very proud with what's going on now. Here we are, down to the last five weeks of the season, and we're going to have wild-card races that are legendary."

Yes, Bud, there's so much of which to be proud. The six divisions and Wild Card races are going swimmingly. Nothing to see here. Move along. In related news, the U.S. occupation of Iraq is problem-free and we have been widely accepted as liberators.

The only thing legendary about the pennant races this year is the sheer number of dreadful teams in contention. Teams that have no business anywhere within sniffing distance of the post-season.

To wit: The San Diego Padres lead the N.L. Wild Card chase by three games, despite not having one great (or even very good) hitter in their lineup. The Cincinnati Reds, at 60-70, are only 6.5 games out of first place. Last year's disgrace of a World Series champion, the St. Louis Cardinals, are again locked in a tight race despite being on pace for even less than the 83 wins they managed a season ago.

And those legendary Wild Card races Selig is getting so erect for (sorry for the mental image)? An overachieving Seattle team and a flawed Yankees squad fighting it out down the stretch doesn't really seem the stuff of legends. Neither does the Padres and Phillies trying to figure out who sucks less.

The Wild Card definitely has its advantages, one of which is that a lot more fans have a lot more hope later in the season. But for Selig to pretend that it's flawless is silly, self-serving hype. The new playoff system, combined with the commissioner's push for parity, has resulted in one entire league not having a great team for the last five years. The National League is so bad right now that it's an embarrassment to baseball. Who cares if crappy teams are in contention for the playoffs? Who wants to see a Reds-Dodgers best-of-five anyway?

If the old divisional system were still in place, the Red Sox would still be running away with the A.L. East, but the Angels and Mariners would be locked in a tight race for the West, with something actually at stake because the loser would go home.

Every word out of Bud Selig's mouth is intended to make us think he's done a great job. He hasn't.

Congratulations, America, You Can Have Them

Last week, USA Today came out with an asinine article claiming that the Boston Red Sox have usurped the Yankees as "America's Team" because they outdraw New York on the road. Now, the logic behind this claim has been widely discredited elsewhere. Fuzzy math, and all that.

But the very premise of the article is inherently flawed. It's a strawman argument, because the Yankees were never, ever considered "America's Team." The Atlanta Braves call themselves by that moniker, because they were on the Superstation before cable TV became popular. But in reality, no baseball team is universally loved enough to merit that nickname. Especially the Yankees.

The Yankees have as many, or more, fans than any other team, due to their location, success and tradition. However, they are also far and away the most hated franchise in sports, drawing disgust, ire and jealousy everywhere from Queens to the Bible Belt. No team that roundly hated can rightly call themselves America's anything.

Now, sportswriting is a difficult and tedious profession, and finding new things to write about daily or weekly can be a challenge. As a result, newspapers and sportscasts are filled with stories about nothing that prove nothing. This is one of those stories.

That being said, if people want to crown the Red Sox America's Team, I say we'll yield the throne happily and willingly.

For, let's not forget, this is an America that made Wild Hogs the number one movie at the box office. An America that (kind of) elected George W. Bush not once, but twice. An America that waits with baited breath to see which luminaries will appear on season three of Dancing With the Stars. An America that currently houses one out of every 32 adults in prison. An America that loves NASCAR. An America that allows Arrested Development and Veronica Mars to wither away into early cancellation while Two and a Half Men and NCIS enjoy long, fruitful lives. An America that impeaches presidents for lying about blow jobs but not for lying about the basis for war. An America that enjoys the musical stylings of Maroon 5, Fall Out Boy and Fergie. An America that allowed Crash to be named Best Picture. An America that is quickly becoming a vast wasteland of urban sprawl, Ruby Tuesday's and Linens 'n' Things. An America that, for some inexplicable reason, enjoys the NFL more than Major League Baseball. An America that has featured a professional wrestler and action star as governors. An America that wants to build a wall to keep brown people from other countries out. An America that sustained the worst ever attack on its own soil and then allowed the perpetrators to go free. An America that thinks Jay Leno is funny. An America that...um, let's just say that I could go on for a while.

So Boston Red Sox, meet America. America, this is the BoSox. You guys are fucking perfect for each other.

Did They Learn This From a Pie Chart?

Much, much more on this to come next week.

A Little Gem of Idiocy

During Monday night's Angels-Yankees game, Anaheim play-by-play man Steve Physioc mentioned that Derek Jeter was the only Yankees shortstop to ever win a Gold Glove. Noting the recent passing of Phil Rizzuto, Physioc felt obliged to point out that Scooter was great defensively, but just not quite as good as Jeter.

He failed to say that the only reason Rizzuto never won a Gold Glove is that the Gold Glove awards were established in 1957, the year after Scooter retired.

Physioc also listed other Yankees shortstops, like Frank Crosetti, who were good defenders, but not at the level of Captain Intangibles, the best Yankees defensive shortstop ever. "He's truly a master," Physioc said of Jetes.

Now, I tend to defend Jeter's defensive skills, but COME ON.

Great Moments in Sports Radio

On the Dan Patrick Show, ESPN Radio, approx: 1:33 EST. Mr. Rick Reilly has the floor: "These baseball people love their walk stats, Dan. Me, I think it's so boring I'd rather watch hairlines recede."

Click.

Chicago's 670 The Score, the Mike Murphy Show, Todd from Waukegan: "I'll tell you my beef, Murph. It's all these professional athletes who...Like Vlad Guerrero, who won the home-run derby last night, and they're interviewing him, and this guy doesn't speak a word of English. It's all in Spanish!"

Click.

Can someone please pass me my Baja Men CD?

Really, Peter? Really?

We all know that Peter Gammons loves to riff on extracurricular topics (and really, the single worst side effect of the rise of blogs is the horror of innocent readers being subjected to the musical tastes and daily-living details of the likes of Gammons, Will Carroll and Buster Olney), but he's outdone himself today.

The venerable, award-winning, revolutionary baseball writer has penned a column about....baseball players' love for the iPhone.

Some choice gems:

"He texted-messaged someone at The Apple Store. 'They texted me back and said they had plenty,' says Verlander. 'My girlfriend went to the store and was able to get one for Justin Morneau, as well.' Same agent, Mike Milchin."

"Somehow, it's unlikely that Virgil (Fire) Trucks blogged on an iPhone (or even downloaded grand nephew Derek Truck's brilliant music), or that Norm Cash watched YouTube."

"So Dave Dombrowski is shopping, but there are no iArms at The Apple Store."

Holy mother of all that used to be good in the world, Peter. You're better than this. Aren't you?

Ver-douche-i Strikes Again

When I'm not thinking up clever nicknames, I occasionally read online baseball columns by esteemed writers. I was participating in said activity today, when I happened upon this Tom Verducci mailbag:

Can we stop with the ridiculous comparisons of Derek Jeter to Joe DiMaggio? I remember ESPN had a graphic on SportsCenter about a month back, and now you're making the same comparison. Sure, the numbers look similar at first glance, but they're cherry-picked. Games are exactly the same, and hits are very similar (despite Jeter having 200 more ABs), so of course BA -- and to a lesser extent OBP -- are going to wind up similar as well. This totally ignores, though, just how completely different of hitters they were. Comparing the Translated Batting Statistics from Baseball Prospectus, DiMaggio destroys Jeter in career slugging, .647 to .490. Adjusted for all-time, DiMaggio's BRAA was 620 to Jeter's 408, and his career EqA was .327 to Jeter's current .304. These two players weren't similar at all, beyond the number of hits they accumulated.
-- Matt Simon, Carmel, Ind.

I don't get it. Do statheads enjoy sucking the joy out of the game? Chill a little. I like numbers as much as the next guy, but lighten up and don't take every small reference as the human genome project. Did you happen to miss the point I clearly stated that DiMaggio was the superior slugger? This was not an exercise to trot out all your acronyms and translations and define with pinpoint accuracy that -- whoa! -- DiMaggio was a better hitter than Jeter. It was, as stated, a simple exercise to show their statistical similarities (I addressed their differences, which are obvious) at the point when Jeter played as many career games as DiMaggio did.

Yeah, you fucking statheads! You nerdlingers! Look at you cute little nerdfaces, trying to prove me wrong with your numbers and abbreviations. You are sucking all the joy out of the game by disagreeing with my asinine assertion that Derek Jeter is a comparable player to Joe Dimaggio. You probably ran straight to the computer when you read my column, didn't you? But you tripped when you ran because you are uncoordinated, nonathletic dorkwads! Ha ha...burn! You went straight to the comfort of your nourishing "statistics," those pathetic, robotic numbers that are your only friends in the entire world. And look at your funny little acronyms, EQA and something called "slugging percentage." HA HA HA! Like anyone even knows what those mean.

You motherfucking, joy-killing bastards. Put on your taped-up Urkel glasses and take a look at reality. Because reality is my fist meeting your glass jaw in about ten seconds if you don't get those fucking stats out of my face. I AM TOM VERDUCCI! I played right field for the Toronto Blue Jays! And Derek Jeter is as good as Joe Dimaggio because I said so. I am an expert, and I have learned things on the playing diamond that your brainless, soulless, heartless computer machines can't possibly comprehend. I bet Marilyn Monroe would have dumped Dimaggio for Jeter in a New York minute.

So Matt Simon, of Carmel, Ind., grab a pen out of that pocket protector and take a note: CHILL THE FUCK OUT. I DON'T CARE FOR YOUR TONE, NERDBOY.

Cleansing the Airwaves

Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

The Anti-Yankees Bias Resurfaces

The Yankees' shaky start has brought Yankees-haters in the media crawling out of their dank, shadowy holes like vicious, craven hyenas smelling dead carcass for the first time in months.

Analysts, writers and broadcasters across the country have been exceedingly quick to pronounce the Yankees dead, and are fighting amongst themselves to see who can give the most baseless, fact-free, self-congratulatory eulogy. One problem, Marc Antonys: Caesar's not dead yet. So shut the fuck up.

With anti-Yankees glee building over the first 40 days of the season, the Roger Clemens signing let loose the dogs of war. Supposedly objective journalists everywhere attacked the signing, calling the Yankees desperate, claiming the fun and harmless in-game announcement was somehow offensive to the game of baseball, and slamming both Clemens and the Yankees for a contract rich in monetary value and filled with perks for the big Texan.

Funny, I don't remember this level of venom being directed against Houston the last few years, when they were signing Clemens to partial-season contracts for exorbitant amounts (before the pitching market exploded in the 2006 off-season) and offering him the exact same perks the Yankees are giving him now. In fact, I don't remember any venom at all.

It's rare that such an obvious apples-to-apples comparison allows us to see just how deep anti-Yankees media bias runs. When Clemens left New York for Houston, he was applauded for going home. When he left Houston to return to the site of his greatest glories, he is labelled a mercenary.

Even Houston manager Phil Garner took a shot at Clemens, clearly bitter that his team sucks and that they were unable to bring the Rocket back one more time.

The national sports media has shown their true colors and naked hypocrisy, and sports fans everywhere would be wise to remember this ugly incident the next time they rail to the gods about the supposed east-coast media bias, which is about as real as the liberal media bias.

The Sports Guy is an Imbecile

Really, Billy, so you have to love Yankee fans, huh? Well, I think you have to love Red Sox fans. Especially ones who actually get paid to analyze sports for a living. Ones who vastly overrate three mid-April games against a team missing 3/5 of its starting rotation and its star catcher. Ones who jump to conclusions every single season when the Yankees struggle early.

It's easy to talk shit in April when your team is up by four games. It's easy because in September, when you're fighting it out with Cleveland for the Wild Card, nobody remembers your ignorant, bandwagon-jumping column from five months earlier. Nobody holds you accountable, so you say whatever you want without regard for fact, history or common sense.

The Yankees have won the division every season since 1998, and haven't finished below Boston since 1995. Maybe this is the year the streak ends. But it's way too fucking early to know that now. On July 4, 2006, the Yankees were four games behind the first-place Red Sox. On May 18, 2005, they were six games behind the first place Baltimore Orioles (!). Yawn. It's not panic time yet.

Red Sox fans have amazingly short memories, but perhaps that's a function of having too many painful memories.

Deifying Dice-K

Some comments from the Jon Miller-Joe Morgan-Peter Gammons coverage of Douche-K during last night's game.

-Matsuzaka has "captured the imagination of New England sports fans."
-His teammates are amazed that he can "dial it up and throw a lot harder when he needs to. That's the sign of a good pitcher."
-He's an amazing athlete. With "very, very light feet." An outstanding fielder.
-He actually likes to take ground balls at shortstop sometimes!
-Joe Morgan didn't think Matsuzaka was trying to hit either ARod or Jeter, despite raving about his command.

Somehow, during all of this slobbering and rushing to judgment, very little mention was made of Douche-K's massively mediocre performance: 7 IP, 6 ER, 8 H, 1 BB, 2 HBP, 7 K, 1 HR.

And for this he was given a standing ovation by the notoriously tough and demanding Fenway crowd. What would they do if he actually pitched a good game? Offer up their eldest daughters in sacrifice to his mighty Japanese cock?

On a related note, there could be no better turn of events for Yankees fans than Julian "Does That Make Me Crazy? Probably" Tavarez taking Douche-K under his wing for tutelage in the ways of American baseball.

Mo's Still Got It

Every time Mariano Rivera struggles, every time he looks less than perfect two or more games in a row, the hyenas in the media come out, breathlessly regaling us with stories that Rivera is finally losing it.

Here we go again.

Rivera's not getting any younger, and eventually it will happen. He will lose whatever it is that has made him the best closer of all time. We all lose our fastball someday. Maybe this is the year. But there's no possible way to tell after two shaky outings in a season in which Rivera has had exactly two save opportunities.

The sports media is always in a pathetic rush to judgment, inspired by deadlines and the need to have something, anything, to say. But let's call a moratorium on the Rivera-is-done stories until there's at least a shred of evidence to back up this theory that has been wrong so many times before.

As for today's game, no real surprise. The lineup did well against Blistery, and gave Karstens a shot. But Karstens is just not that good.

Two Stupid Things

Stupid thing #1: Bobby Abreu attempting to lay down a sacrifice bunt in the 3rd inning of a 2-1 game with Derek Jeter on second base and nobody out. I don't even need to explain why this is a stupid play. I don't think Torre called for the bunt from his #3 hitter, or I would be on a flight to New York right now to try to fire him personally. Abreu bunted out of some misguided sense of what being a "team player" means. Bobby, babe, let me straighten this out for you. A great hitter willingly making an out in the early innings of a regular season game = not being a team player. That same great hitter playing the percentages and trying to get a hit or walk to drive in a run or extend the inning = being a team player.

Stupid thing #2: John Sterling and Suzyn Waldman just had this exchange:

JS: Every game is a battle.
SW: Every game IS a battle.

Waldman's inflection was such that she really wanted to emphasize for the listeners what a brilliant, game-changing point her partner had just made.

Yeah, that 9-2 game last night was really an intense, hard-fought rumble. And the 10-3 game the night before was like Actium recreated before our eyes.

P.S. Can Suzyn Waldman pleeeeease stop calling Robinson Cano "Robbie"? It sounds too informal, like something Hawk Harrelson would say.

Freddy vs. Jason

When Curt Schilling butts heads with the Boston media, who loses?

We all do.

Dan Shaughnessy is a shameless, petty, grudge-carrying, pathetic excuse for a would-be journalist. Curt Schilling is a self-aggrandizing, attention-seeking, politically-fucking-nuts, mildly overrated media whore. So who's right? They both are. And who's wrong? So, so, so fucking wrong? I think you know the answer to that one, kids.

If only we could manage to escalate the Schilling-Shaughnessy cold war into a full-scale armed conflict, complete with mutually assured destruction.

Perhaps Curt "And make sure you tell everybody to vote, and vote Bush next week" Schilling should join his hero's war in Iraq. It's a win-win: the Red Sox pitching staff grows weaker, plus it's much harder to get yourself in the papers every day from the middle of the desert.

Then, Shaughnessy would have nothing left to write about, and he'd just sit around staring at the secret shrine to Schilling above his toilet, longing for the salad days of their sexually charged feud.

I am Tired of Second Guessing

Every year in late March, a certain argument makes the rounds among sportswriters and fans. And it goes a little something like this: Because Team X and Team Y did so well/poorly in the NCAA tournament, that proves the selection committee was brilliant/retarded in their seeding and at-large bids.

What happens after the fact cannot be used retroactively to justify a decision. For example, this year, people are claiming that because most of the high seeds advanced, the selection committee did a great job, and really had their finger on the pulse of the college basketball scene. That's ridiculous. If every #1 seed had lost in the second round, the selection committee did just as good, or just as poor, of a job with seeding and selections.

You can only logically judge a decision with the information available to the decision-maker at the time. Wisconsin deserved a two seed based on their regular season resume. Losing to UNLV doesn't change that. Just as Syracuse deserved a bid, and losing to Clemson in the NIT doesn't change that.

I'm completely in favor of first-guessing, and tearing sports figures apart when they make idiotic decisions (e.g. leaving Syracuse out, letting Arkansas in). But it's unfair to second guess based on new information, particularly in a situation like the NCAA tournament where luck plays such an enormous role in the outcome. It's just an opportunity for fans to appear more intelligent than they are in bar arguments, and another excuse for writers to churn out a meaningless conjecture-based article to try to earn a paycheck.

To this day, I think Grady Little made the right decision leaving Pedro Martinez in Game 7 of the 2003 ALCS (the bullpen had sucked all year, Pedro was done but he was still their best guy). A bloop hit by Posada doesn't change the fact that he made the right call, and was then raped and scapegoated by an entire city.

So, my point is....fuck Boston.