The Passing of Another Great

In honor of the passing of George Carlin this week, I just have this to say...

Shit

Piss

Cunt

Fuck

Cocksucker

Motherfucker

Tits

George, you will be greatly missed.

My What an Interesting Smell You've Discovered!

I'm sure that Mets fans are pleased to hear that interim manager Jerry Manuel thinks they are the equivalent of manure or compost or all the other stinky shit that makes things grow, i.e. fertilizer. Manuel ripped Mets fans for booing reliever Aaron Heilman after turning in another one of his outstanding performances at Shea Stadium where he is 0-2 with an enormous ERA of 6.17.

"It's very, very fertile ground for growth in Shea Stadium. It's fertile ground for a team's growth and development. Sometimes, fertile ground has fertilizer."

Shitty fans for a shitty team. What's that smell? It's 25,000 piles of crap filling the seats booing a turd of a reliever. Instead of Shea Stadium we can have Shat Stadium! Instead of Scotts® Turf Builder, we can have Mets Turd Builder - Bringing you shitty teams since 1962.

Heilman overall is a lousy 0-3 with a 5.17 ERA. Considering he is even worse at home, no wonder the fans are booing him. The Mets and their fans had high hopes going into this season. Delgado is injured and struggling. Beltran is worse. Reyes - well see below. Santana hasn't won since June 1st. The dung heap NY fans are restless and may have to face the fact that their season may soon be flushed down the toilet.

"Fertilizer is a good thing," Manuel said before the Mets' afternoon contest against the Rockies. "It's a good thing. You get the greatest results - get the most beautiful plants - when you put it in that type of fertile soil. That's what we have the opportunity to do."

Jerry - no amount of backtracking or flowery talk is going to work at this point. Calling your fans a steaming pile of cow manure is not an endearment, except for possibly in Texas.

Manuel has been the interim manager for less than a week and he is already trying to put himself on par with the Ozzie Guillen whose statements, opinions and tantrums and becoming somewhat legendary. Just look at these tasty tidbits...

Shortstop Jose Reyes was the target of Manuel's first colorful outbursts this week. After Reyes threw a helmet-throwing tantrum last Tuesday night in Manuel's debut when Manuel pulled him in the first inning with a tight hamstring, Manuel jokingly threatened to knife Reyes if it happened again.

"I told him the next time he does that, I'm going to get my blade out and cut him right on the field," Manuel said. "I'm a gangster."

Manuel: "I'm a gangster. I've seen all of the Godfather movies and every episode of The Sopranos. Don't fuck with me or you'll swim with the fishes." Nothing motivates me more than knowing that the next time I feel hurt, my manager will gut me like a fish.

This ranks right up there with Brown's owner Bill Veeck and his statement to little man Eddie Gaedel before his infamous at bat. Veeck told Eddie that he had a shooter up on the roof of Sportsman Park and if he swung at any pitch, he would be shot.

Manuel also invoked Bill Parcells' famous reference to Terry Glenn as "she" instead of "he" by doing the same thing to describe Reyes for his on-field fit.

"She acted up with me, and she had a day off," Manuel said of Reyes.

Reyes is such a BITCH!!!! It's that time of the month, the bloating, the cramps and we were out of tampons, so I had to give Reyes the day off.

I know that Manuel was the AL Manager of the Year in 2000 with the White Sox, but my hunch is that the "interim" tag with stick with him this year and he'll follow Randolph out the door. Minaya must have been drinking from the same water cooler as ex-Knicks boss Isiah Thomas. He has stocked his team with over-priced, stars on the decline or mediocre players. The team was one win from the World Series in 2006, executed one of baseballs' biggest chokes last year and are now 37-38 and four games out of first. I just don't think that the Mets have a team that can turn it around and make a run for the playoffs. They're either hurt, struggling and/or just plain shitty. Minaya will be quick to fire Manuel at the end of the season unless the Mets can grow another miracle with all the fertilizer in the stands. Otherwise, the shit will hit fan.

I'd better end this entry before it gets any shittier.

Quick Hits

Once again it seems the entire group is either on vacation or too swamped to keep the entries going. So while I have a few minutes, I thought I could at least throw out some comments on various topics or articles.

U.S. Open/PGA

Personally, I like the 18-hole playoff format the U.S. Open uses even before the climactic outcome of this year’s tournament. It is unique to that major and adds to its mystique. It was obviously a boon for the PGA to have Tiger Woods in the playoff this year. I wonder how people would have felt if the playoff had been between Rocco Mediate and Lee Westwood?

Also, according to this article, Rocco Mediate is the David Eckstein of the golf world.

NBA

Congratulations to the Celtics! The NBA still puts a horrible show on the court and until the league understands that, they will continue to fall further behind the NFL and MLB. At this rate the NHL may be closing the gap.

Next year’s Oscar nominees should include Paul Pierce for his extraordinary acting performance when he “injured” his knee in Game 1 of the NBA Finals. I haven’t seen acting in sports like that since Reggie Miller retired.

Instant Replay

I had intended to do an in-depth blog on instant replay and some of the sorry excuses some writers against replay were giving. However, time just has not been on my side as of late. Hopefully I will be able to get to it before they actually implement it.

Indianapolis Indians Coverage

I know that the Indians are only a AAA minor league team in the International League and there are five MLB teams within a five-hour drive (Cards, Cubs, White Sox, Tigers and Reds), but I have been ashamed of the coverage the Indians get in the Indianapolis Star for a long time now. The Star typically gives the Indians only two or three paragraphs and the box score. The Indians give a 16-page press release on game days and the Star can only give them a couple of paragraphs?

There is a shit-load of material the Star ignores. You almost never see information such as hitting streaks, call ups or send downs, hot streaks, cold streaks, how Indians alumni are doing for the parent Pirates, or hot prospects on the move in the organization. Looking at the Pittsburgh Gazette, it gives a daily update of all of the teams in the Pirates organization.

I guess a newspaper that employs a columnist like Bob Kravitz doesn’t really care all that much about sports unless it is a big-time professional sport, or deals with IU, Purdue, Notre Dame football or high school basketball.

Ken Griffey, Jr.

Why does Mr. Nice Guy Ken Griffey, Jr. seemingly get a free pass on the steroid front while Mr. Locker Room Cancer Barry Bonds is still steroids poster child for “allegedly” taking steroids?

And lastly…

Vegas

Remember…what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas!

Embrace This

Sorry we've been gone awhile, but we had someone on vacation and someone in mourning because his favorite basketball team lost (and, apparently, favourite soccer team). And we're too new for anyone to have an expectation about how much we'll post.

I thought I'd come back to the grind with a bit of a controversial idea. Of course, I'll start with a dopey article:

No buzz for a star in a city that rarely embraces them

Ken Griffey Jr. slow-dances toward 600 home runs to the beat of one hand clapping. Until the weekend just passed, when the bandwagon finally tilted from the weight, libraries held more energy than the stands at Great American Ball Park.

Idiotic meatphors/cliches anyone? And the last line makes no sense, other than Reds fans weren't excited enough for Mr. Daugherty. But does he mean that fans were finally onboard? Or does he mean that this past weekend the fans were on the bandwagon, but up until then they weren't? We're one paragraph in and already nonsensical.

(Great question to ask the 111,542 who went to the games Friday through Sunday: Did you go for the possibility of 600? Or to see Jay Bruce?)

That total represents an average attendance of more than 37,000/game, so I'm guessing he's not complaining about fan support. Though, admittedly, I'm not sure.

And are the only two possible reasons for going to a Reds game Junior's 600th home run and phenom Jay Bruce? Not that the weather was awesome? Not that people just may be Reds fans? Or Braves fans? Or baseball fans?!?!?!?!?

Why so little love for Junior?

Pick your poison:
Griffey symbolizes an era of Reds underachievement.

No, the Reds have sucked for awhile now.

Griffey has never embraced his hometown. Griffey doesn't run out ground balls or sprint around the outfield like Ryan Freel.

Oh, brother. Maybe Griffey doesn't run out routine grounders as hard as he used to, but the "little white guy plays with hustle and grit while the black superstar doesn't play hard or care" narrative is getting very old.

Griffey is an innocent victim of baseball's cynical Steroid Era.

We'll come back to this.

Six hundred is the new 500.

And 50 is the new 40.

Did we miss anything?

Yes. Ken Griffey Jr. is actually a Beta Unit. The real Ken Griffey Jr. is defending the Star League.

Here's what it really is. Here is why, even as Griffey was third nationally among National League outfielders in the most recent All Star balloting, he can't get a superstar's love in his own town: We don't love superstars. Name one that's been loved here.

I'll name 3: Pete Rose, Johnny Bench, and Joe Morgan. That was easy.

Oh, you were going to name some and tell us why they weren't loved. Sorry:

Eric Davis? He was as good as it gets. It took colon cancer and a cameo re-appearance in 1996 to get him on the local good side.

After the 1990 World Series win, any one of the Reds could have gone on a killing spree and Cincy fans would have still loved him. Eric Davis was very popular then, especially after his kidney injury and the Marge Schott won't-fly-him-home-because-she's-too-cheap controversy.

Barry Larkin was a hometown guy who will get considerable Hall of Fame consideration. Our last impressions of him were the money Carl Lindner gave him (too much) and the leadership he showed (not enough).

But, while he was playing, he was extremely popular in Cincy, right? Right? Hello?

Daugherty then goes on to mention Chad Johnson and Johnny Bench, saying that Johnson has not been loved because of his on-field behavior and Bench isn't loved because he's not always fan-accessible. He also mentions Anthony Munoz, who is loved, but not a superstar since he's an offensive tackle. No real issues here.

Nearly 20 years after Pete Rose departed, his stamp remains. We prefer our heroes wear dirty shirts and say nice things about our town.

That's logical--I can't imagine Cincy fans embracing a guy who says, "the best thing about Cincinnati is that radio station they used to have."

...Griffey has been a part of an empty nine seasons, largely because ownership never built a team around him, as promised. He hasn't embraced Cincinnati because the town wanted him to be someone he wasn't any longer: The Kid came here at age 30, married with two children. That said, Griffey hasn't helped himself with you. His reticence has been seen as indifference. You respect him. You don't love him.

Part of that is Cincinnati sucks as a sports town. At least, the fans do.

I realize that's not really fair, given that Cincy only has two major league teams, and they've been pretty weak for awhile. So there's not been a lot to cheer about. But for a city that calls itself "the birthplace of professional baseball" (which is bullshit, by the way), Cincy has a hard time supporting the Reds without the help of Dayton, Columbus, Louisville and Indianapolis--even when the team was doing well (I know attendance was down for everyone in 1995, but the games in Atlanta sold out).

Reds fans have always seemed to be the very definition of fair-weather fans, so I guess it makes sense they've not been big to embrace players as their own unless the team was especially good.

That doesn't explain why San Francisco stayed blindly loving to Barry Bonds, who allegedly cheated, and whose personality makes Griffey's seem giddy.

(Emphasis mine on "allegedly." Interesting to note that the print version of this story did not include that word).

I'm getting extremely tired of people saying Barry Bonds, among other alleged steroid users, cheated. They didn't cheat, because baseball had no rules prohibiting steroids until 2003, when testing began. So if there were no rules against it, was it really cheating? Of course not.

And don't give me this bullshit about the integrity of the game. First off, I'm probably one of the youngest baseball traditionalists around. I'm not a fan of the DH. I hate Interleague play. As nice as the new ball parks are, I think they're too small. I like the idea that the last player to hit .400 in a season was this guy. There are some days where I wish MLB would go back to non-divisional play. But you can't punish someone--or claim that he cheated--if there are no rules prohibiting what he did.

I'm not condoning the use of steroids. And I want the players to be clean, since there are now rules against using, and it's better for the game, and the players, etc. But this should be a dead issue. Columnists, TV talking heads, and sports radio dunderheaded hosts keep bringing it up--the typical fan is sick of hearing about it. We don't care--move on.

Besides, there is no way of knowing who was using during that time--the Mitchell Report has more than 90 names, and you can bet that doesn't cover everyone.

As for the Steroid Era dulling his achievement, that's crazy. Parents should be taking their impressionable kids to the ballpark now, pointing at Griffey and telling them that Junior restored some nobility to baseball greatness.

I gotta ask: how the hell do you know?

I think many reasonable people would agree we don't know exactly all of the baseball players who used steroids. So how do you know Ken Griffey Jr. didn't? Because he used to wear his cap backwards in batting practice? Because he's nice to the media, unlike a certain former left fielder whose name rhymes with "Ponds?"

Look, I know there's been no reasonable suspicion regarding Junior and steroid use. But part of that may be because no one investigated him. Obviously, there have been no stories linking Junior to any steroid or HGH dealers, but to assume that he "did it the right way" when you assume that everyone else didn't is wrong. One could make the argument--which was made in the case against Bonds, by the way--that many of Junior's injuries in the late 90s early 00s were consistent with steriod use--namely, torn tendons and ligaments.

Of course Junior isn't Bonds--Bonds was implicated in BALCO, after all--but how can you possibly know anyone has been clean in the last 10 years? My point is that you can't know, and Griffey gets a free pass in part because the sports media like him.

Ken Griffey Jr. likely will get No. 600 on the road, possibly during the next three days in Philly. Citizens Bank Park is almost as made-for-softball as GABP is. We'll applaud Griffey when he returns. We might even stand up, briefly. In Cincinnati, we're nothing if not polite.

You're also crappy sports fans.