Blazing With Phelps

Is Mark Reynolds Garbage? An "Intellectual" Debate

2011-06-23T11:51:00.004-04:00

Hello there, nobody that reads BWP any more! I hope you're existing (you're not). Recently, it came to my attention that some people don't think that Orioles third baseman Mark Reynolds is a $12.5 million albatross, a horrible player, and overall an impolite and mean guy (unsubstantiated). Thus, we've enlisted the help of BWP friend Brian, a handsome and dapper gentleman if ever there was one (much unlike Mark Reynolds) to defend this $12.5 million lump of hot garbage. Retorts will be from the venerable BWPer that you know as "Rob." Away we go!

*****

MARK REYNOLDS NOT SO BAD: POINT FROM BRIAN

Thanks for putting this together, Rob. I look forward to solving the age-old O’s fan question together: what in the world are we to make of current O’s third baseman Mark Reynolds? I’m taking the pro-Reynolds side, and this is my first installment.
Reynolds may not be an All Star-caliber third baseman, but guess what: over 90% of all third basemen aren’t, either! Despite his obvious flaws (one of which is that he plays third base in a town where the legacy of Brooks Robinson as the greatest defensive third baseman of all time hangs like a Michael Gonzalez breaking ball), he has already proven to me that he is one of the better AL third basemen, one of the best current Oriole hitters, and a huge upgrade from the rotation that held down the position for the Birds last year. The numbers bear this point out well (all figures are through 6/19/2011).
Reynolds ranks third among AL third basemen with a .352 wOBA (for my money the single most important offensive statistic). He also is fourth in OBP (.335), third in SLG (.451), and first in P/PA (4.26). You might counter that these position rankings only include those third basemen who regularly occupy the position; situational players and platoons are not included. I’ll grant you that, but why should we discount Reynolds’s consistency and ability to play in 68 out of 69 games this season for the Orioles?
Still not convinced? Let’s examine his performance compared to the production the team got from third base last year. O’s third basemen in 2010 compiled a .283 wOBA, 16 HR, 71 RBI, and a .668 OPS. Reynolds is on pace to destroy these numbers, projecting to 30.5 HR and 84.5 RBI and exceeding last year’s wOBA mark by .069 and last year’s OPS figure by .118. Unless Rob intends to claim that Ty Wigginton is a Gold Glove-level defensive third baseman, Reynolds is clearly a huge upgrade for the Orioles compared to the gaping hole in the lineup that third base represented last year.
Still not convinced? Wow, Rob said this would be easy. OK, let’s check out how Reynolds stacks up to his current Oriole teammates. So far this year Reynolds ranks second among regulars in wOBA, first in HR with 13, second in RBI with 36, and second in OBP with .335. So if we were to take him out of the lineup tomorrow, the Orioles would lose one of the only relative bright spots in the lineup so far this year.
To sum up: Reynolds is among the best offensive third basemen in the AL, he is among the Oriole team leaders in every offensive category, and he represents a monumental improvement over the third base platoon of last year. Is he perfect? Heck no. I have big qualms about the defense, and the strikeouts and batting average tick me off. But the production is there, and frankly it’s time that the Reynolds-haters come up with some sort of alternative. Every team can’t have Kevin Youkilis; I’m happy that we have Mark Reynolds.

*****

MARK REYNOLDS SUPER SUPER BAD: COUNTER POINT FROM ROB

Brian makes a lot of comparisons to Orioles’ seasons past, even invoking the hallowed name of Ty Wigginton, but that’s a false dilemma. If I gave you the choice between a rotten tuna sandwich and a poop sandwich, you’d pick the rotten tuna sandwich. It doesn’t mean the rotten tuna is delicious. And the Orioles paid $12.5 million for rotten tuna.
Yes, he is an upgrade over trash like Wigginton and whoever else has manned the hot corner in recent years. But garbage is garbage, and Reynolds is garbage.
Mark Reynolds is, by most calculations, a decent-to-good hitter. The problem is that Mark Reynolds plays defense, and Raul Ibanez is the only thing keeping him from being worse at fielding than anyone else in the major leagues. All of that nice, semi-above-average offense is almost completely wiped out by his abortion of a defensive performance.
The stats support what you see on the field: Reynolds is a typical, unspectacular “three true outcomes” player (home run/strikeout/walk) that plays abysmal defense. His WAR (wins above replacement) right now is .3, meaning for the first 68 games of the season, he has generated about three more runs than you’d expect a AAAA-level player to generate. He’s basically Josh Willingham.
He produces enough on offense (20 percent better than the average player), but he’s given away about 14 runs on defense. Basically, he’s a 1.7 WAR player on offense (winning 1.7 more games than a replacement) and a -1.4 WAR player on defense (losing 1.4 games more than a replacement). In the end, he’s a replacement player. Which is to say, replaceable. And for much cheaper than $5 million this year and $7.5 million next year.
Yes, amongst qualifying third basemen in the AL, Reynolds has top-five rankings, or whatever. Until you realize that you’ve cherry-picked a criterion that only eight guys in the universe (third basemen in the AL with at least 225 plate appearances in 2011) actually fall under. If you look at more guys who are playing baseball, you’ll find that about the only time Mark Reynolds is a top-five player is when you’re only looking at five guys.
His high wOBA would be super nice, if baseball were a competition to see who could produce the highest wOBA. Unfortunately, somewhere between 5 and 10,000 other factors go into being a baseball player, and Mark Reynolds is not good at 95 percent of them.
Like I said, he gives you the three true outcomes – he homers (24th in the league), walks (14th) and strikes out (fourth). But he doesn’t really do anything else, and when you combine that with defense that should make women and children avert their eyes, you get a guy who is worth three runs over 68 games.
Comparing him to other Orioles, old and new, is like comparing a banana peel to a pile of used hypodermic needles. One is preferable to the other, but they’re both garbage.

*****

MARK REYNOLDS REALLY NOT SO BAD: COUNTER COUNTER POINT FROM BRIAN

Wow, some tough talk from Rob. Mentions of poop, needles, and garbage obviously resonate with all O’s fans, but let’s dig a little deeper into Rob’s response to look at the substance of his argument.
First of all, I’m glad he brought in WAR because WAR is a great statistic that pretty handily summarizes a player’s overall contribution to the success of the team. While Reynolds currently has a WAR of 0.3, it should be noted that as recently as a week ago his WAR was negative. Therefore, his performance is clearly trending in the right direction, as you would expect from someone adjusting to the AL East. I’m also glad Rob brought up WAR because WAR shows that Reynolds is far from the biggest problem on this team. WAR statistics indicate that only three Orioles are playing at a very high level this year: Wieters (1.4), Hardy (1.4), and Jones (1.3). Reynolds – the $5 million man – has thus far produced a higher WAR than Vladimir Guerrero ($8 million, 0.2 WAR) and Derrek Lee ($7.25 million, -0.1 WAR), among others.
The other main point I need to make regards Reynolds’s defense. Rob claims that it is an abortion, and certainly the numbers aren’t pretty at this point. But I feel it is appropriate to moderately discount his defensive statistics for several reasons. First, without wanting to beat a dead horse, defensive statistics are troublesome, frequently misleading, and not as telling as offensive statistics. They need to be taken with a huge grain of salt.
Secondly, third base is not a tremendously important defensive position. The consensus in baseball is that the most important defense position is catcher, followed in some order by the rest of the up-the-middle defense (second base, shortstop, and center field) because these positions face more chances and record more outs. After those four, I would argue that first base is the next most important position. That puts Reynolds at the 4th least important defensive position on the field. Would we like his defense to be better? Sure. But it’s not like he’s playing shortstop or something.
Thirdly, as previously mentioned, Reynolds is just starting to warm up and become comfortable. He is not going to end up with 35 errors (his current pace) and a .901 fielding percentage. In the past two years with the Diamondbacks he has recorded fielding percentages of .951 and .945 while registering 18 and 19 errors. Over a larger 2011 sample size his defensive performance will probably converge to his mean.
Finally, his poor defense is not overwhelming the team as a whole. The Orioles have committed 47 errors so far this season. This total is only 5 worse than the MLB median. Also, the team’s overall fielding percentage is .982. Reynolds must not be dragging that down too far, because the MLB-leading fielding percentage is .988. .Reynolds’s teammates are picking him up sufficiently on the defensive end and he is more than picking up for them on the offensive end.
Before I close up here I need to call Rob out quickly and respectfully on one thing. He went on rhetoric-overload to disparage Reynolds without answering the basic question I posed: who else? Name someone who could realistically be playing third base for the O’s right now and justify to me how he is better than Reynolds. I totally support the time-honored Baltimore tradition of calling O’s players trash (actually, “bum” was the term of choice in my house), but calling Reynolds names is less persuasive than providing an alternative.

*****

The argument will rage on into infinity. Expect more long-winded retorts from both of us as time rolls on, and please make sure to leave your invisible comments (as you, a reader, do not exist) and weigh in on this super-unimportant issue.

DOES MARK REYNOLDS SUCK? The true answer ... we may never find.

USA no longer number 1 at thing that isn't a competition between countries

2011-04-25T15:26:00.002-04:00

Rob-bait.

This is a dumb piece on golf from Wojo that assumed two things:

(A) There is some kind of international rivalry system in golf wherein all golf fans are also fans of their country's players to the point where there is a "golf war."

(B) The US has lost the "golf war," which isn't a thing.

The golf war is finished. We -- the USA -- lost.

Ha-ha, get it? It's like "Gulf War." People died.

We're no longer masters of our golf domain. We're No. 1? We're not even No. 3. Four of the top five, 16 of the top 25 and 32 of the top 50 players in the world rankings are non-Americans.

Golf, of course, is the Great American Pastime, invented by George Washington and Ben Franklin in 1764. The duo was drunk off of America's Beer (Heineken).

So it goes without saying we should be bummed that in the great American sport of golf, none of our boys can top current no. 1 Lee Westood. I mean come on, the guy's English. What type of golf tradition does that country have?

Also, way to cherry-pick, Wojo. A solid half of the top 14 golfers in the world are American, including no. 6 Tiger Woods, which is pretty crazy when you think about it.

"The rest of the world of golfers has grown up," said player agent Chubby Chandler, who represents an A-list of international players.

If nothing else, we could always depend on Tiger Woods. He was the surest thing since red shirts on Sundays. But he hasn't won a PGA Tour event since September 2009, hasn't won a major since June 2008 and his five-year reign atop the world rankings ended in October.

Yeah, it's almost like his entire life completely shattered into ten million pieces within a couple short months in addition to his body finally breaking down! Almost.

And guess what? That's OK. It's more than OK. It's actually pretty cool.

Curveball, Wojo style.

I'd like to take this opportunity to mention that, save for the week (or however long) that the Ryder cup is relevant, there is absolutely not one single living soul in this country that attaches one modicum of an element of national pride to fucking golf.

"There needed to be life after Tiger -- and I'm not saying that Tiger's finished," said Chandler, whose clients include new world No. 1 Lee Westwood, No. 7 Rory McIlory, No. 11 Charl Schwartzel, No. 15 Ernie Els and No. 31 Louis Oosthuizen. "But there needs to be a continuation of what goes on in golf. And if that's a different continuation, then good."

Sheesh, McIlroy at 7. You're telling me they play golf in Ireland? I don't want to live in this world.

[..]for only the second time since World War II, Americans have taken an O-fer in the majors. And if you count the supposed fifth major -- next month's Players Championship -- a non-American (South African Tim Clark) is the defending champion there, too.

If you're waiting for a point, please don't hold your breath. The combination of a lack of oxygen to the brain will either kill you or cause you to write going-nowhere stories about the internationalization of golf.

Three of the last four Masters winners are non-Americans. Five of the last seven U.S. Open winners are non-Americans. Three of the last four Open Championship winners are non-Americans. The last three PGA Championship winners are non-Americans. Four of the last five Players winners are non-Americans.

Seriously, he's never going to make this seem relevant, unless you woke up this morning to read columns thinking, "I wonder what Wojo thinks is like, super neat."

By the way, did I mention that Europeans have kidnapped the Ryder Cup? They've won four of the last five, six of the last eight. If the Cup spends any more time overseas, it's going to develop the Stockholm Syndrome.

Boom, another classy reference. Charl Schwartzel totally apharteided the Masters.

"What's happened is that you now have the best young kids from all over the world come to play here," Chandler said. "It's not a European or anything domination. It's just the way that you've got a lot of players around the world that are as good as some Americans. Whereas you used to have a lot of Americans who were very good and kept all the other players off the [PGA] tour, it's not like that anymore."

And then Chandler chided those (hello)

Hi?

who look at a leaderboard and count the number of U.S. players on it.

Seven out of 14 is still pretty good, right?

And, I mean, did anyone like Tiger specifically because he was American? I thought people liked him because he was good at golf. Maybe I'm the idiot.

"You should be focusing on how good the game is right now," Chandler said. "You should forget about this domination. You've got 10 great kids out there."

Wait, the country with half of the world's top 14 all to itself is the one getting dominated?

He's right. The rest of the world was going to catch us one of these days. After all, the world had numbers and time on its side. It drafted us for years and then did a NASCAR bump and run. We lost traction and now we're sucking fumes.

I'm reading this, and I know the words are different, but they process in my brain as "Slow news day. Slow news day slow news day slow news day. After all, slow news day. Slow news day NASCAR slow news day. Slow newsday I suck at writing." Did I get the general gist?

Again, this isn't a bad thing for golf. It's just a bad thing for our USA golf egos.

I move to strike on the basis that "our USA golf egos" are nonsense things that don't exist.

"I think these are all global players now," said George O'Grady, chief executive of the European Tour. "They are just players."

Did this really happen? At some point people watched golf going "USA! USA!"? I just... what? Why? No. This is stupid.

This is a polite way of saying that the world is sitting on our couch, feet up on the ottoman, drinking our beer, petting our dogs and changing the TV remote from Knicks-Celtics to a Manchester United-Newcastle game.

Petting... dogs... ?

Something had to give. Tiger is 35. He broke his life into a thousand pieces

Fun fact: I used almost that exact same wording earlier in this rant before I had even read this part. I don't know how funny that is to anyone but me, but I'd just like to point out that the exact verbiage I used to show how Wojo is a dummy that's writing a bad column appears later in the same column.

and he's trying to weld it back together -- and he will. But his window of majors opportunity has smaller panes of glass than it used to.

Such a shame for Team Golf USA Which Is A Thing.

Same goes for Phil Mickelson. He turns 41 in mid-June.

Same goes for Phil Mickelson?!?!?!? Great editing. "Tiger Woods's life fell apart. Same for Phil Mickelson." SIC SIC SIC SIC SIC.

Mickelson is ranked No. 4. Tiger is No. 6. Fellow American Steve Stricker is No. 9, but he's also 44 years old. Matt Kuchar, ranked 10th in the world, turns 33 in two months. They're not out of their prime, but they're not exactly in the sweet spot of it anymore.

Yes, because golf is certainly not a sport people play until they're a fucking hundred.

USA reinforcements are on their way. Dustin Johnson, Nick Watney, Bubba Watson, Hunter Mahan, Rickie Fowler, Anthony Kim and Gary Woodland have lots of potential, but zero majors among the seven of them.

Remember that time I said that American golfers were getting old? Here's a list of young, up-and-coming American golfers.

Meanwhile, Kaymer and Oosthuizen already have majors and is there anybody who doesn't think Westwood, Luke Donald, McIlroy, Justin Rose, Paul Casey or Ryo Ishikawa isn't going to eventually win one of the Big Four?

Love this argument. He names seven Americans and dismisses them for having not won majors. Then he names six non-Americans who haven't won majors and scoffs that they'll all eventually win a major. I would absolutely love to see odds on this.

Oh, and one other guy: Italian Matteo Manassero, who recently outkicked McIlroy in the final round to win the Maybank Malaysian Open.

Yeah, an Italian who did really well in a round one time! PACK YOUR BAGS, AMERICA. IT'S THE WORLD'S GAME NOW.

And, I mean, on top of everything, he took down Rory McIlroy, world-renowned big-time pressure-situation final-round golf monster.

"You look how good Manassero is," O'Grady said. "He's only 18, by the way. He's certainly got a major championship within him somewhere."

What the living fuck are we talking about any more?

Tiger or no Tiger, this really has the possibility of becoming golf's next golden age. Fifty years after South Africa's Gary Player won the Masters (and was referred to as "a foreigner"),

Wow, how far we've come. People in America would never refer to someone from a foreign country as "a foreigner" nowadays.

the game is borderless. Country flags no longer matter. Or they shouldn't.

They don't. They never did. This column didn't get written. Wojo didn't get hired at ESPN. I did work at my job instead of writing this.

"You've got an absolutely brand new era here," Chandler said.

An era of new names, not nations. It took a while, but it was worth the wait. Really.

A distraught Tiger Woods, captain of Team USA Golf, finishes reading Wojo's column. He looks away as tears form in his eyes. Slowly, he opens his desk and clears out its contents into an old leather suitcase.

He starts toward the door but stops for just a moment, looking around his dusty office at the memorabilia from all those years of Golf World Cups (which is a thing) and international team championships (Which totally happen besides the minuscule amount of time we pretend to care about the Ryder Cup).

He stops specifically at a picture of he and best friend and teammate Phil Mickelson. After a final glance, he sighs and turns out the light, letting the door shut slowly behind him as he walks into this new world.

Fin

So what's going on here?

2011-04-04T23:42:00.003-04:00

This is a tag-team from me and Nick (who snapped the video). What the hell is Jim Calhoun tossing onto the court, at the 7-8 second mark? Is it marbles like Amy Poehler in Blades of Glory? Is it holy water? Sure seems to have some bounce. Does he carry three or four super balls in his sleeve for every championship game?

Yahoo! fantasy baseball writers stupefy....one sentence at a time.

2011-04-01T14:01:00.003-04:00

In the interest of fairness, the people writing what I am about to rip may not actually be the Yahoo! fantasy baseball writers. They could just be some dudes whose job it is to right one-sentence blurbs about fantasy baseball match-ups. Frankly, it doesn't matter, because someone is writing them, and that person is an idiot.

Please let me explain.

When I am at work I open and close dozens of websites each day. Some of them kosher, some of them less kosher, some of them not-very kosher at all. Can you guess which category this site falls under? Anyways, while many websites appear and disappear from my screen, there are four which are always open somewhere. Those websites are, Gmail, Facebook (because it is part of my job believe it or not), Pandora, and my fantasy baseball league.

So here I am setting my roster for this afternoon and little did I know that Yahoo! has decided to ratchet up its fantasy baseball information presumably because it wasn't already ridiculously over-the-top and insufferable.

This year they decided to add a five-star system for rating how favorable the match-up is for a certain player and his opponent.

In theory this seems like a good idea. It's intricate details that could be the difference between starting a guy who is going to hit two home runs, or a guy who is going to strikeout four times.

You would assume said match-up blurbs might be things like "Ken Griffey Jr. has a career batting average of .376 in the Kingdome", or "Larry Walker has hit twice as many home runs at Coors Field as he has on the road." or even "Albert Pujols is hot this month and has a career batting average of .415 in 80 at-bats against Yovani Gallardo."

However, if you assumed that Yahoo! was going to bring you pertinent information about your fantasy team, well then you just don't know Yahoo!. Please join me as I try to translate some of the more idiotic blurbs.

Michael Morse (Nationals OF): Four stars against Tommy Hansen

The blurb:

Hansen typically struggles against hitters like Morse

Translation:

Apparently there are statistics out there that show that Hansen normally gets crushed by free-swinging gorillas like Morse. Never mind that Morse has played in the majors for less than a full season. They could have at least included another sentence about what the fuck they meant by "hitters like Morse". You know, something like, "In his career, Tommy Hansen has given up 28 home runs and 4495834 doubles to hitters with biceps large than the size of a grapefruit". It sounds stupid, but it would be better than trying to figure out what the fuck they mean.

Kevin Youkilis (Red Sox 3B): Four stars against Colby Lewis

The blurb:

Youkilis slugged .500 in four at-bats against Lewis

Translation:

While this blurb at least includes numbers, it essentially means Youkilis had one good game against Lewis. Well I checked, and sure enough, Youkilis went 3-4 against Lewis with two doubles on July 16th. Great. I guess that means the match-up is favorable. Or it could mean absolutely nothing because it is an extraordinarily small sample size.

Drew Stubbs (Reds OF): Two stars against Milwaukee

The blurb:

Well-Hit Average of only .179 (27-for-151) against right-handed pitchers in the top-tier since last season.

Translation:

I am pretty sure that this was intended for yesterday's game against Yovani Gallardo -- a game in which Stubbs went 2-5 with a home run and a double...thanks for nothing Yahoo! -- but I have so many questions. What the hell defines a top-tier pitcher? Did they really think Shawn Marcum and his 80-year-old right arm are qualified for "top-tier" status? What the fuck do they count as "Well-Hit"? I am so fucking confused.

J.J. Hardy (Orioles SS): 2 stars against James Shields

The blurb:

Hardy is slugging .231 in 13 ABs against pitchers like Shields since last year

Translation:

I guess the small sample sizes and the vague player comparisons weren't enough for Yahoo!, so they decided to combine the two just to fuck with me. 13 at-bats since last season is not indicative of diddily-shit, and I assume "pitchers like Shields" means J.J. Hardy is petrified of goateed pitchers who like to yell into their glove a lot...so you can bet I am gonna sit him against Josh Beckett too.

Chase Headley: (Padres 3B): Two stars against St. Louis

The blurb:

Headley has a well-hit average of .176 against middle-tier pitchers.

The Translation:

Although I still don't understand any of that, I can easily infer from this that Chase Headley is not very good at baseball. So there's that.

and my personal favorite...

Gordon Beckham (White Sox 3B): Three stars against Cleveland

The blurb:

Match-up data is very neutral, but favors Beckham slightly.

The translation:

Oh now you have really outdone yourself Yahoo!. Not only do you not explain what match-up data you are talking about, you also contradict yourself in back-to-back clauses and leave the users completely and utterly mind-fucked. The data is neutral...but it favors one side slightly...I mean you have to be fucking kidding me with this shit!!

VCU Belongs! ... and 5,000 other topics crammed into the same column

2011-03-22T11:11:00.002-04:00

Hi, I'm something named Paul Daugherty and I wrote a bad column for Sports Illustrated today where I commemorated the NCAA tournament by shoving 68 disjointed different thoughts into the same column and acting like it was cohesive. Can you count them all? Send a list to BWP for a free prize*! Feel the "madness"!

*No prize

Another year, another wild opening weekend in the NCAA tournament

This column is going to literally attempt to recap everything that happened in the first round of the NCAA tournament.

VC-Who?

At least he nailed the opening. VCU? More like greasy boobs! Alright, score one for the D-Man. (The D-Man is Paul Daugherty)

The Rams of Virginia Commonwealth University appeared out of nowhere, straight from the far-right edge of the office pool bracket. Damned if we saw them coming.

Nevermind whatever in the wide, wide world "the far-right edge of the office pool bracket" could possibly mean, but we're going to hammer this entirely original point home: Seriously, who knew VCU could win three games -- one of them even against a good team!

We could go on about the wonderful wackiness of the NCAA tournament's first weekend, but that is a given.

Wait, but -- you -- the headline -- only the third paragraph --

We could ask for a moment of silence for the officiating, which was fatally dreadful in crucial moments. But that's going to happen. The ceremonial bracket-burning took place slightly earlier than usual this year -- thank you very much, Texas -- but that's nothing new. We've been flaming brackets for decades.

I would gripe to a national audience about my bracket, too, if SI paid me. But that's because I'm a bad writer.

Let's just sum up the first weekend by offering some meas and culpas to VCU, superstars of truTV, validators of the First Four and all-around Madness poster-guys.

Is this supposed to come off sarcastic? "Congrats on your basic-cable wins, guys." I mean, I think G'Town was soft, and who gives a shit about USC, but Purdue was a top-10 team this year.

Oh, and in no way was VCU a "validator" (not a word) of the First Four, those games were still stupid and ruined the whole process of filling out the brackets.

The Rams persuasively dismantled a very good Purdue club Sunday to earn a Sweet 16 game with Florida State in San Antonio Friday. Afterward, VCU forward Jamie Skeen declared, "Look at us now.''

We are. We can't look away. It's like a wreck on the highway. The Rams could have us rubbernecking from here to Houston.

Yes, an 11 seed winning two tournament games is exactly like when cars going 70 miles per hour smash into each other on the highway. In every single imaginable way.

What's more, Richmond, the Southwest's No. 12 seed, plays top seed Kansas Friday. If the Spiders do the unlikely, we could have an all-Richmond regional final. The capital of the Confederacy and college basketball? Who knew?

Right, if Richmond does something that has never fucking happened, then there would be an all-Richmond final, provided that VCU can get past the nation's best defense. This is a perfectly acceptable thing to glaze over so we can get to a strange Charlie Daniels reference.

A nod to Charlie Daniels, boys: The South's Gonna Do It Again.

But don't think that this means D-Man thinks The South Is Actually Gonna Do It Again. In a minute, he's going to mention that he's openly rooting for chalk from here on out. He just said that to make an awesome and totally-not-36-year-old reference out of the clear blue sky.

"Anybody can beat anybody,'' said the aptly named VCU coach Shaka Smart, 33, whose name is suddenly on the speed-dial of all athletic directors seeking the Hot Young Coach of the Moment.

His name is smart, and his team won basketball games! SMART.

Smart's right. Four double-digit seeds will play on this week. Butler, an 8 seed, returns. The Big East is suddenly little: Only two of its 11 bids escaped the weekend, though it didn't help that the league cannibalized itself in two games: Marquette beat Syracuse and UConn took out Cincinnati. When four of your teams play each other, casualties are inevitable.

This is where we start getting jumpy. Keep in mind that we're talking about VCU and Richmond, but at the same time D-Man throws in this random, half-thought-out reference to the Big East. Despite staying on this topic for .03 seconds, he still manages to make an ass out of himself: Yes, the Big East did have two games they were bound to lose, but no mention of the obvious: Those two games were the only ones where a Big East team won.

Picking a champion looks to be as easy as picking who's Marcus and who's Markieff. The Morris twins combined for 41 points and 24 rebounds in Kansas' win Sunday over Illinois.

Mk is an inch taller and 10 pounds heavier, and when they're on TV playing basketball they wear different huge numbers on their shirts. Sorry to nitpick but that was such a lame reference used as a sloppy transition to Kansas.

A key to winning when you're not supposed to? Cherish the basketball. VCU beat Purdue when it combined 26 assists with four turnovers. Richmond has nine turnovers in two games. Contrast that with Syracuse, which exited stage early again, partly owing to 18 turnovers

VCU! Richmond! Remember the Big East? Kansas! Don't turn the ball over! I can't feel my face!!!

The elephant at half court is Ohio State. The Buckeyes are filing their nails and saying, "N-e-e-xt.'' They merely demolished George Mason Sunday, 98-66, with a thoroughness that makes them seem the best Shining Moment candidate going.

Whatever.

Their main perspirer, coach Thad Matta, barely offered a drip while watching his team go on a ridiculous, 50-15 run in the last 16 minutes of the first half. George Mason wasn't Kansas. But the eighth-seeded Patriots owned a history of slipper-wearing, having reached the Final Four as an 11th seed in '06.

Don't count them out -- they did really well five years ago! And everyone knows that there's tons of continuity for college basketball teams at the bookends of five-year periods. Like, no way a five-seed in the '06 tournament could have gone 13-19 this year!

Surviving a No. 8 seed isn't a given. Ask Pitt, which did not survive, and Duke, which blew a 15-point lead in the last 10 minutes, before beating Michigan by two. Ohio State has five players who can score, a load in the middle in Jared Sullinger, and coolness at point guard, where freshman Aaron Craft had 15 assists and two turnovers.

Pitt lost! OSU is good! Their point guard is "cool"! TOO MANY TOPICS FOR SNARKBOT3000 101011101010101010101

"If they play like this every day, they're a tough out,'' George Mason coach Jim Larranaga said. "But you don't play like this every day. Every game is different. Every opponent is different. The next round, they're probably going to play a team with a little more size and a better matchup, physicality-wise.''

Hey, there's something we could do some analysis on -- could OSU get bothered by Kentucky's super group of freshmen? Or will it be UNC's size? Or will we just forget we even inserted that quote and change gears with no transition?

Physicality speaking, here's a question: When do UConn guard Kemba Walker's legs fall off at the thighs?

Knew it.

A grueling Big East regular season was followed by a grueling Big East tournament was followed by 74 grueling minutes in two games over the weekend. The Huskies and Marquette are all that's left of the Big East's 11 tournament invitees.

I don't blame D-Man for repeating himself; even he can't remember saying the same thing like 20 topics ago.

But, back to lesser-hyped teams that are still around. VCU shot 65.6 percent in the second half and scored 48 points in the paint against a Purdue team known for its defense. The Rams carry the classic boulder on their shoulder into the region.

We're switching topics too fast. I feel like I'm going to throw up.

Clichés are clichés because they're true. Nobody thought VCU would be here now. Certainly not the heathen media, which universally trashed the Rams even getting into the tournament. VCU tiptoed in through the back door, having lost five of its last eight then being shuttled off to Dayton to play in what the NCAA ingloriously termed the First Four.

Sorry, which part of this was a cliche? The media being "heathens"?

Also I have a lot to say in re: VCU getting into the tournament (namely that winning in the tournament doesn't magically make their regular-season profile better and prove they should have been here; I think unequivocally, Harvard, VTech and Colorado had a better case to get into the tournament) but I could literally harp on that all day. Suffice to say: this column is getting stupider exponentially.

The Rams weren't playing Broadway. They played on truTV. Until Tuesday, did anyone know what truTV was?

I don't blame D-Man for implying that the games on lesser channels were somehow less meaningful or important. I blame the NCAA for passing the rule that if you play on TNT or TBS, you have to give 85% effort, and truTV was a whopping 65%. I think it's criminal.

Column's almost over, let's not even pretend we know what transitions are any more!

Florida State is in the Sweet 16, even as the Seminoles' best player, Chris Singleton, lasted only 10 minutes against Notre Dame. Singleton broke his foot Feb. 12. Butler is back, thanks to Matt Howard's look-what-I-found putback against Old Dominion, and a head-shaking foul in the last second against Pitt.

These teams won too! Ahhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!

By the way, it's nice that the TV can have NCAA supervisor of officials John Adams on for purposes of explanation and clarification. But the guy's not exactly objective when it comes to questionable calls. Over the weekend, egregious followed questionable followed infuriating.

Hard-hitting fact-finding from D-Man: The NCAA's supervisor of officials will tend to be subjective in favor of NCAA officials. Someone get this man a Pulitzer.

The ref in the Arizona-Texas game couldn't count to five. The guy in the Pitt-Butler game decided he'd decide the outcome himself. Washington lost a crucial second of time in its loss to North Carolina. And so on.

Wah wah my bracket's busted too.

But we digress.

A natural pause before we get to the height of this column's flagrant retardery.

At some point, we want the upsets to stop.

Wait, what? We do?

The Little Teams That Could are a fine diversion during the first weekend.

Wow, that's condescending and not at all true.

This week, we really need the big boys to hitch up their pants. Unless, of course, your idea of greatness is Richmond-Butler in a national semifinal.

That would be pretty cool. Better than the same shit we see every year, isn't it?

We don't visit the National Gallery of Art seeking graffiti.

Wow. Just wow. How many mid-majors can D-Man offend at this point?

No disrespect to VCU and Richmond and Charlie Daniels. But this weekend, we'd prefer the classics: Kansas, Ohio State and Duke.

Who the fuck are we? You don't speak for me, jerk. And I like that he spends a little while disrespecting the shit out of teams, calling them "graffiti" in an art museum, and touches it with a finesse "No disrespect."

The Southeast will give us the fly in our soup: Butler, Wisconsin, BYU or Florida. We'd prefer it be BYU, because you can't not root for the audacity of someone who calls himself Jimmer. Let's see Fredette go for 40 against the Brothers Morris.

Mmm, yes, yes. We normally reserve the fourth place in the national semifinal round for a "team of diversity." Let them have their little piece of luxury for once, don't you say? Mmm. Yes. [Adjusts monocle]

Finally, a spadeful of dirt to the No. 16 seeds, who stunk on toast, as usual. They lost to the No. 1s by an average of 28 points. They're now 0-108 all time. We'd call them Charlie Browns, but that'd be an insult to Charlie Brown.

Really?

And the NCAA thought it was necessary to add four teams this year?

Might as well finish with a non sequitur, right?

Oh, yeah. One of those teams was VCU. Never mind.

Yeah. And they don't deserve to win. But their coach is smart. Kansas. Also, the 16 seeds lost. Butler. Richmond and Charlie Daniels. TEXAS GOT BONED. WASHINGTON MICHIGANDUKECAROLINAWISCONSINMONTREAL[head explodes]

Gene Wojciechowski attacks Barry Bonds, ends up looking really stupid

2011-03-21T18:48:00.012-04:00

Spring training is in full swing and most baseball writers know what that means. It essentially means trying to find worthwhile information about their beats, in what is essentially a month-long practice, filled with useless information and statistics.

Most writers admirably fill the pages of their newspaper by digging for stories about hot prospects fighting to make the big league club or maybe stories about veterans trying to bounce back from a tough season.

But for everybody’s favorite moral compass, ESPN columnist Gene Wojciechowski, it means piling on Barry Bonds – who left baseball never to return in 2007 – because he was a miserable prick during his time with the Giants.

I would summarize Wojciechowski’s idiocy, but I think I would actually be doing Gene a disservice. So instead I will let him handle the idiocy, and I will cherry-pick his most idiotic parts so that I can make myself feel better.

Giants thriving in post-Barry Bonds era

Do you think it is worth telling Gene that there have been three baseball seasons played since Bonds retired and that the Giants have made the playoffs in just one of those seasons? Nah, let’s just move on.

Barry Bonds helped the San Francisco Giants win the World Series last season. And he could help them win it again this season.

Dear Gene,

Barry Bonds doesn’t actually play for the us anymore. In fact, he hasn't played for us since 2007. Our point is that it is more than a little insulting to those of us who actually played in the games that you infer our World Series victory is a direct result of Barry Bonds' absence. Maybe, just maybe, if Bonds had left before last season, you could convince really stupid baseball fans that his departure allowed the Giants to play better baseball. But Bonds retired fucking THREE seasons ago. It also seems kind of counter-intuitive that you are trying to pillory Bonds while simultaneously giving him a completely unreasonable amount of credit for our World Series' victory. We are not happy, but Lincecum got us all stoned and we are too high to come to your mother's basement and kick your ass. Nice glasses. Dick

Love,

Your 2010 World Series Champion San Francisco Giants

When Bonds and his toxic presence was finally removed…

In the interest of nit-picky grammatical fixes, that sentence should read “Bonds and his toxic presence were finally removed…” but I will look past that understandable mistake as long as you proceed to make sound baseball arguments using statistics and facts.

…by the hazmat people after the 2007 season, the Giants began to win more games. Not a lot at first, but enough to realize that Bonds' forced departure was like an emergency tracheotomy on the franchise's windpipe. The Giants could finally breathe again.

You know you are an excellent national columnist when you can barely write three paragraphs without making smart baseball people want to euthanize themselves.

In 2008, the year after Bonds left, the Giants went 72-90. That was one game better than the 71-91 mark the team had posted in Bonds’ last season. For most, that is a completely negligible difference. For Gene, it is “enough to realize that Bonds' forced departure was like an emergency tracheotomy on the franchise's windpipe”.

Another sign you are an excellent national columnist?

Compare a baseball-playing jerk’s retirement to an emergency surgical procedure often performed on people with tumors. No over-dramatization there. Let’s move along.

Lincecum isn't saying that Bonds' exit is partly why the Giants are world champions today; I am.

Boom! That right there is an excellent example of how a national columnist shows he has huge balls of steel while simultaneously telling his readers he knows more about baseball than a guy who plays the sport for a living and even played on the same team as Barry Bonds. Gene clearly brought his A-game.

But he is saying team chemistry matters in ways that can't be quantified from reading a box score. After all, it's hard to win games when you're dragging around a cinder block or two of Bonds-related drama.

Let me summarize Lincecum’s long and rather cliché quote for those who don’t want to read the actual column. “When I first got here, the veterans, led by Barry Bonds, were real dicks. Now the younger guys have been able to open up more. You know, burn down a few doobies, talk about how gross it was when that fat chick can squished bread under her toes on Tosh.O.”

Okay, so I made the last sentence up. But Lincecum isn’t talking about how team chemistry helped them win games. He is just talking about how the locker room isn’t filled with as many assholes. Also I am pretty sure no one else had to drag Bonds’ drama around. I imagine Barry had to do a lot of the dragging himself.

Bonds hit lots of home runs (thank you, flaxseed oil!), but nobody ever voted him teammate of the year.

This is a terrific example of Gene realizing that Bonds was actually super good at baseball, then turning it around on him because Bonds didn’t run around the locker room high-fiving people.

Yes, Bonds hit a lot of home runs, likely while using steroids. But from 2001, he also led the league in on-base percentage every season he played in, never hit less than .270, and never OPS’d less than .999. He won four consecutive MVP awards from 2001 to 2004 and was also worth at least 10 wins more than a replacement level player during that time as well.

In fact, some might say that, even though he was using steroids, there has never been a player in the history of the game who had a better offensive season than Bonds’ had in 2001, 2002, 2003, and 2004. Even after injuries and old age slowed him down, he was still reached base nearly half the times he was at-bat and had an OPS+ of 174, 156, and 169 respectively.

Of course, as Nike once taught us, “Chicks (and Gene Wojciechowski) dig the long ball”. Other advanced and telling metrics don’t mean shit because hearing that Barry Bonds had an OBP of .480 in his final season of baseball doesn’t make Gene’s dick hard.

He represented the Giants' old guard -- and the old guard won just 71 games and finished last in the NL West in Bonds' final season in the majors.

Gene would have us believe that the reason the Giants only won 71 games is because Barry Bonds and the rest of the “old guard” were soul-sucking, fun-hating, teammate-beating, assholes.

Proven statistics and calculations would have you believe that the 2007 Giants were among the shittiest of shit teams in all of baseball.

Only one player (Randy Winn) other than Bonds had OPS+ above the league average. Bonds was the only player with an OPS higher than .800. No one in their starting lineup was younger than 32. Their best two starters were Barry Zito and Noah Lowry. Their closer was Brad fucking Hennessey.

I could go on but I think the point has been made. GM Brian Sabean constructed an incredibly shitty team in 2007. Then, as Lincecum, Matt Cain, and Jonathan Sanchez got more experience, and Sabean slowly phased out his oldest and shittiest players in exchange for younger and better plays, the Giants got better.

Hey I got an idea for a column!

A season ago, they won the division on the final day to squeeze into the playoffs, and then overpowered the Atlanta Braves, the Philadelphia Phillies and eventually the Texas Rangers. They did it with power pitching, timely hitting…

Woah! I wasn’t expecting that. I knew that pitching and timely hitting were what helped the Giants win it all, but I thought Gene would talk about how Barry’s evil aura was gone so the Giants could be cool and carefree ag-..

…and a cool, carefree clubhouse vibe that never would have been possible in the Barry era

Fuck.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

We need to have an editorial pause here as I explain what Gene is about to do now. After at least circumstantially discussing actual baseball factoids in the first half of his Bonds’ takedown, Gene decided that wasn’t enough hard evidence.

So Gene decided to take a casual stroll through the Giants’ spring training locker room, spending more than an hour playing “I-Spy”, or as it is more commonly referred to, “National columnist makes first trip to locker room in years and proceeds to wildly overreact and read too far into shit that probably happens in every baseball clubhouse everywhere.”

Let's dive right in.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Postseason hero Cody Ross happily tell a reporter that he can't walk down a San Francisco block without being recognized. "And that's a good thing,'' the Giants outfielder said.”That's what you want. That's what you dream of as a kid.'' Just then, a teammate walked by and, without breaking stride, began singing, in a surprisingly decent Steven Tyler imitation, "Dream on … Dream on …''

It should also be noted that Gene is so fucking serious about breaking down the reasons Barry Bonds is an asshole that he is using bullet points now.

Here is Gene witnessing ultimate nice guy, Cody Ross, turning into a self-absorbed asshole by reveling in the attention he has received since becoming a star.

Oh I almost forgot! Gene also witnessed an unknown teammate who can walk and sing “surprisingly decent” at the same time.

Can’t you just imagine Gene thinking back to 2007 when Cody Ross wasn’t even on the Giants and the only one allowed to sing Aerosmith and not break stride at the same time was Barry Bonds.

Veteran outfielder Pat Burrell work almost the entire room, cracking wise with a dozen teammates as he collected money in an old bank pouch.

This is an example of citizen journalism trumping national columnizing. Everybody from Philadelphia to Tampa Bay to San Francisco knows that Pat Burrell is a renowned asshole. Girls in Philadelphia and San Francisco all have stories about one of their friends leaving to have sex with Pat “The Bat” and learning that his idea of foreplay is standing in front of a mirror, stark naked, practicing his batting stance.

Gene either willfully ignored all of these stories, or he is completely oblivious to the internet and has never read any of the thousands of sordid stories about Pat Burrell and his sexual escapades.

Just google "Pat Burrell sex" and you get this. These types of stories are EVERYWHERE. But I appreciate Gene's desire to see things for himself...and then make immediate value judgments that lead to retarded theories about why the Giants won the World Series.

Essentially what Gene saw is a douchebag player making jokes with teammates while collecting money for some unknown prostitute gangbang or Roman orgy.

Reliever Brian Wilson, who showed up at the first day of camp in a cop car, search the entire clubhouse for a blank USA Today crossword puzzle.

Ladies and gentleman, welcome to the point in the column where Gene realizes he has written a shitty column, but also knows he can’t backtrack and start all over, so he just starts pointing shit out he sees, like Brick in Anchorman.

Most important fact in this bullet point: USA Today is not a popular newspaper in baseball locker rooms.

Second most important fact in this bullet point: Barry Bonds fucking hates crossword puzzles.

Younger and older players squeezed around a table playing cards and dominoes.

Nothing says "Repeat Champs" to Gene quite like a friendly game. I have never visited a professional locker room or been on any team-chartered flight in any sport, so I may be wrong. But I am confident in saying that cards and dominoes are played by pretty much every professional athlete in every sport.

There is a lot of downtime and travel with professional sports, so people play cards. The game is also played by regular kids, regular adults and criminals. In fact criminals might spend more hours playing those games in prison than athletes do.

But you know who hates cards and dominoes? Barry Bonds.

I can’t wait for the next Michael Lewis book about how a national columnist becomes a baseball GM and is fired three years later when his strategy of having team practices replaced by long games of RISK failed to pan out.

Bonds' godfather, Willie Mays, a frequent visitor, hanging out in the clubhouse

Each time I read one of these bullets I thought there was no way he could get any dumber. But then he typed this sentence, and thought it was a salient point.

You know who else visits the Giants’ clubhouse to chat with players and even hang out with Willie Mays? Fucking Barry Bonds!

You know who visited the locker room as recently as last year's playoffs? Fucking Barry Bonds!

Let’s skip Gene’s next sappy story about Aubrey Huff and his budding bromance with a reporter and just skip down some because I am getting bored.

Fun is partly why the Giants won their first World Series since 1954. And fun is partly why they could repeat.

It can be argued that the Giants won their first World Series in a long time because their pitching staff logged 44 innings against the Rangers and only allowed 12 earned runs. It could also be because Edgar Renteria had seven hits in 17 at-bats. It is decidedly NOT because the Giants were having more fun than the Rangers.

There is more stupidity. But I am at work and it’s not worth over-analyzing. Go fuck yourself Wojciechowski.

Rick Reilly in he how he forget what how to write the sentence.

2011-01-25T11:27:00.006-05:00

I don't get this one. Is this good literary style? Or are these just badly written sentences? I really don't get it.

An American Beauty Rose

I mean right off the bat, does that headline even make sense?

Derrick Rose isn't so much a name as a sentence. As in: Derrick Rose in the NBA three years ago and hasn't stopped since.

Okay, so Derrick Rose is so good that he ... can't be spoken of, unless it's in a sentence? As opposed to Theo Ratliff, who is so bad that everyone just walks around like zombies going "Theo Ratliff... Theo Ratliff."

I've read "Derrick Rose in the NBA three years ago and hasn't stopped since" a thousand times this morning and I have no idea what it's supposed to mean. Someone please help me.

He's my MVP so far, not just for the way he's carried the limping Chicago Bulls the way Penn's carried Teller. And not just for the way he jumps like a frog bred with a kangaroo. And not just for the way he scores, defends and passes like he's going to the electric chair tomorrow.

Yuck. Three analogies in one graf, first off, is like a cheese grater to my eyeballs. And it's not just that Reilly's schtick is older than Father Time! It's that it's also as uncreative as a joke... that's bad... and it's not a really good joke.

He's my MVP for moments like this:

There is a 102% chance that Reilly will now share some strange anecdote about how good of a person Rose is and for that reason deserves the MVP award, given annually to a player that Rick Reilly observes being nice.

Three young fans are walking alone after leaving the United Center.

Wait, three people are walking "alone"?

They're the last to go, so they're all alone.

Oh, I guess they are. I'm all alone too, me and my 50 co-workers in my office today. We're all alone.

A white SUV pulls up next to them. This part of Chicago could use a shave and a clean shirt, so somebody rolling up on you isn't usually happy news. The young men try not to look. The window comes down and who is behind it but Derrick Rose himself, The Heir to Air.

Whatever, Derrick Rose was nice to some fans so he's the MVP. Skip ahead:

Derrick Rose, but the pass still hadn't come.

Are these typos? Or ... what? Can someone explain to me what this is?

Now his elbow was at about rim height -- which is insane for a man who is only 6-3. He had done his part -- the alley -- but the oop still hadn't arrived from teammate Ron Brewer, so there was nothing to do but hang around and wait. He looked like some David Copperfield trick up there, immune to gravity.

Is it just me, or is the "alley" part of the alley-oop the pass, and the oop is the dunk? Oh, and Derrick Rose is the MVP, according to Rick Reilly, because:

He is a good basketball player
He was nice to fans
He is a nice guy
He jumped really high once and it looked like a magic trick

Rose tomahawked it through with one hand so hard he nearly left a dent in the floor.

I like that he linked this -- which I have no designs on clicking -- so we can all see how much of a nightmare basketball monster Derrick Rose is as he dunks a basketball, something that happens literally thousands of times every NBA season, NCAA season, year of rec league games, etc etc.

But wait -- Rose was humble about it!!! MVP. Because the MVP goes to the most humble player -- just ask Michael Jordan.

Who builds athletes like this nowadays? Rose calls people ma'am and sir. He doesn't have a Twitter page. After ad shoots, he personally goes around and thanks everybody in the room, even the lens-cap-holder guy. And he has the peculiar habit of referring to himself in the first person.

Nice guys finish MVP!!!!! Hey Rick, you haven't used the term "tongue-bathe" in 14 seconds, what gives?

Rose could put up numbers that would fry your calculator. He is easily talented enough to lead the league in scoring. His drive to the iron is unstoppable. His 3-pointers made are up 800 percent this season. The kid has made 69 treys already. Michael Jordan didn't make that many until his sixth season. But Rose would sooner tongue-bathe --

--phew --

-- goats than go for the scoring crown. "I can't do that! I'm the point guard!"

Because only Humble Derrick Rose agrees to fit into his team's system. Literally there are two players in the NBA that don't do this: Kobe and LeBron. Also this "800 percent" figure is REALLY fuzzy math, as Reilly is actually talking about Rose's 3PM/G, not total threes. Even though there has been a marked improvement, he felt the need to strangely embellish it, and now my head hurts.

My point here is: These statistical arguments are dumb (Rose is a great player beyond his 3-pt shooting so it's just really strange that the only time Reilly decides to back up his claim of Rose for MVP with stats is threes) and they come so late in the story that most readers have already blown their brains out anyway. So... whatever.

Derrick Rose where the blood flows in the gutters and fear rides on the wind on the South Side.

sdkfsfksjdkfsjdlf

In 1991, when Rose was 3, his Englewood neighborhood had 81 murders -- in the first four months. In 2008, the singer Jennifer Hudson's family was gunned down on West 79th, four blocks from Murray Park, where Rose learned to ball. So far, in the first three weeks of 2011, there have already been two murders.

Criteria for MVP, according to Rick Reilly:

Be really nice
Fit into your team's system
Be nice to your mom
Be humble
Good at basketball
Grow up in a dangerous part of Chicago

Derrick Rose the last few weeks in the All-Star voting to become a starter on the ridiculously loaded NBA East.

Seriously man, what the fuck??????

He pretended he'd be happy to be "a towel boy" but he admitted to friends that he was aching to be voted onto the starting team by the fans.

So humble.

In fact, he'd like to be more than that.

"Who gets your vote for MVP so far?" I ask.

"Can I vote for myself?"

"Sure."

"Myself."

HUMILITY.

We're entering a shimmering era in the NBA. I can't remember seeing this many thrilling young players all at once. Dwight Howard. Kevin Durant. Russell Westbrook. Blake Griffin. Chris Paul. Rajon Rondo. And Rose. All 25 or under and all could end up in the Hall of Fame.

Wait, Russell Westbrook is a potential Hall of Famer? He must be REALLY nice to fans.

The pick is Rose for all the right reasons.

All the right reasons being: Anything that has nothing to do with basketball.

And when someone asks you, "How'd the Bulls get so good?" you answer in a complete sentence: Derrick Rose.

Who goes around asking why the Bulls are good? Does this happen? And wait, I thought "Derrick Rose" was supposed to be part of a sentence, but now it's just its own sentence? As always with Reilly, more questions than answers.

Mike Wilbon moved to Crazy Town.

2011-01-24T13:09:00.008-05:00

Mike Wilbon left the Post recently to move to ESPN Chicago, but I guess his plane got re-routed into Crazy Town, because that his where he lives and writes stories like this.

As usual, Bears can't cut it at QB

Which is totally going to be a measured reaction to yesterday's Bears-Packers game that in no way blames Jay Cutler for getting hurt -- an injury panned by hundreds of thousands of people who had no fucking idea what it was and is being reported today as a fucking torn MCL -- and doesn't overstate the fact that the Bears just sort of weren't as good as the Packers this year.

CHICAGO -- The only thing older than the Bears-Packers rivalry is the Bears' failure over most of that time at quarterback.

Obviously this makes no fucking sense at all. The only thing older than thing A is thing B, which has only been going on during the duration of thing A.¹

¹ If B is less than A, then A is less than B, because I said so (Wilbon's theory of stupid fucking leads)

Great linebackers, running backs and linemen the Bears have plenty of; quarterbacks are another matter entirely. And perhaps never has there been more despair in Chicago over quarterback incompetence than in the wake of the loss to the Packers in the NFC Championship Game on Sunday. Forbidding the mention of the name Jay Cutler may be the best way to cope with winter. Only a Bears quarterback could stink out the joint and then get worse while sitting on the sideline.

Okay right, so this is complete fucking nonsense. Cutler is sort of the middle class man's Brett Favre in that he's up and down and everything, but really he's overall a pretty good quarterback. To call yourself a Bears fan and then allege that "never has there been more despair in Chicago over quarterback incompetence" than right now -- when the Bears made the fucking NFC championship game -- is the absolute height of the aftereffects of being pummeled in the brain repeatedly with many heavy and sharp objects.

Quarterbacks who inspired less despair than Jay Cutler to Bears fans, according to Mike Wilbon:

Brian Griese
Craig Krenzel
Rex Grossman
Kordell Stewart
An old Chris Chandler
Cade McNown (!!!!!)
Shane Matthews

I'd rather take any of those guys than Jay Cutler. That is, if I was starting an anti-football team.

Look, you're not going to read in this space any suggestion from me that Cutler's knee injury wasn't serious enough to send him to the sideline or that Cutler was a complete baby for not going back on the field with a trip to the Super Bowl at stake.

By which he means he will spend most of the column talking about it and looking like a complete asshole within mere minutes because it turns out that Cutler fucking tore his MCL.

But any credible analysis of the NFC Championship Game, especially of the Bears' performance, has to start with Cutler, the pivotal figure in the game whether we're talking about his first-half incompetence or his second-half absence.

Right, credible. So let's look at "credible" reports of retarded tweets from other players and not things that aren't credible like the fucking report that he fucking tore his fucking MCL.

The absence, without question, infuriated more people.

Stupid people. We call these people "armchair QBs" or "Monday Morning QBs" for a reason, because they can sit at home and suggest that Jay Cutler -- who played with undiagnosed diabetes for a season, losing 35 pounds and almost dying -- is a pussy.

In 30 years of covering professional football I've never seen a front-line player crushed by his peers the way Cutler was Sunday in real time. Granted, communicating via Twitter is still relatively new, and we're now privy to unedited thoughts in a way we've never been previously.

And it turns out that most of them are just wrong and/or buttholes and even though they're football players and not just stupid fans, they're pretty stupid too, because even if Cutler wanted to play on his fucking torn MCL , the coaches wouldn't let him go back, and you just said that you weren't going to talk about this, but here we are, so... ???????????????????????

Tampa Bay Buccaneers linebacker Derrick Brooks, a future Hall of Famer, tweeted, "I have to be crawling and can't get up to come off the field. Josh Freeman would not come out. Meds are available ... " A few minutes later when the Bears sent their third-stringer, Caleb Hanie, in to the game and Cutler was therefore ineligible to return, Brooks tweeted, "There is no medicine for a guy with no guts and heart."

Ugh.

Derrick Brooks is an all-time football player, but it also seems he had all-time good luck in that he never suffered a major injury at the professional level. Maybe he did and he played on torn MCLs all the time, but I can't find anything that suggests he ever had one of those crazy seasons where he plays on a broken leg or whatever. Moreso it just seems like he had very, very good fortune for his whole career. So sure, he's the guy to ask about playing quarterback on a torn MCL.

Another future Hall of Famer, Deion Sanders, said, "I never question a player's injury, but I do question a player's heart."

Right. Deion Sanders, the guy who never met a tackle he felt like making, is the guy to ask about a player's heart. Also, Jay Cutler tore his MCL and the coaches took him out of the game. Why is this article still going on?

Arizona Cardinals defensive lineman Darnell Dockett tweeted, "If I'm on the Chicago team Jay Cutler has to wait 'til me and the team shower [and] get dressed and leave before he comes in the locker room."

Darnell Dockett runs his mouth on Twitter about everybody. Also, Jay Cutler tore his MCL.

Mark Schlereth, the former lineman and current ESPN analyst, said via Twitter, "As a guy [who has had] 20 knee surgeries you'd have to drag me out on stretcher to leave a championship game."

Mark Schlereth is also a crazy asshole that shat on himself during games, earning the nickname "Stink." Also, let's talk about those 20 knee surgeries in 10 years, but then again, handicap parking spaces are fucking primo.

This one is my favorite:

And Maurice Jones-Drew tweeted, "All I'm saying is that he can finish the game on a hurt knee ... I played the whole season on one."

Time for another game of Unlicensed Doctor Versus Unlicensed Doctor! Today we have Dr. Jones-Drew and Dr. Blogger.

Dr. Jones-Drew's argument: He played the season with a "hurt knee" so Jay Cutler is a pussy.

Dr. Blogger's response: Well.

Mojo played the season on a torn meniscus, which I'm sure is painful and according to that article really sets back your ability to shift your weight properly. As a running back, it must, you know, hurt really bad.

Cutler, once again, tore his fucking left MCL, compromising the stability of the knee in his plant leg, which in addition to hurting really bad, completely fucked with his ability to plant and throw the football, as evidenced when he attempted to play on it and couldn't throw with any semblance of accuracy. So rather than be ineffective and bad, he was TAKEN OUT OF THE GAME, and a quarterback that could plant his foot was put in. So ... what are we arguing about?

This game has been won by... Dr. Jones-Drew!!! Aw, sorry Dr. Blogger. Back to the University of WebMD for you!

During a postgame radio show, a person closer to home, Steve McMichael, perhaps the toughest of the 1985 Bears, said that Cutler, for his own sake, needed to be legitimately injured.

Which he is.

Brian Urlacher, precisely because he's a great teammate, passionately defended Cutler's toughness in his postgame news conference, answering a question about the issue by saying, "Jay was hurt. I don't question his toughness. He doesn't bitch and complain when he gets hit." And Urlacher shot back about the players expressing their opinions via Twitter, "jealous guys, sitting at home watching on TV."

I love how Urlacher defending Cutler is smugly waved away by Wilbon as Urlacher having to do it because "he's a great teammate."

But what sticks out is that Brooks, Sanders, Dockett and Schlereth have all played in the Super Bowl. All but Dockett won at least one Super Bowl. Expanding the picture even more, it's clear Cutler has a credibility problem, and not because he's not popular with the media. Those tweets are a small sample of what was communicated about Cutler and his failings during the NFC Championship Game.

Right, he had a bad half and then got hurt. Ryan Grant was placed on IR in Week 1 this year with ankle and leg injuries (high ankle sprain, torn ligament, fractured bone -- lots of stuff was reported) and he didn't even try to get off IR and play Sunday. What a fucking jackass.

Then there's some more nonsense about how Cutler is a prick that I'm not even going to bother copy-pasting because it's the same old tired bullshit about how he doesn't have Peyton Manning's work ethic or Brett Favre's texting dexterity or Tom Brady's rapport with goats or whatever the fuck people keep blaming Jay Cutler for.

A former quarterback who wears a Super Bowl ring, who has studied Cutler's entire career in the NFL, told me before he left the field Sunday, "The sad thing is that if he embraced working on the monotonous details of quarterbacking he could be great."

No, the sad thing is that you don't just get on with your own life. Who cares? Jay Cutler is fine.

Then there's some crazy bullshit about how Jay Cutler doesn't "deserve" the Bears because the rest of the team is really awesome or something (which they're not, I mean they're good but it's not like they're the fucking All-Pro team with the janitor at QB). This would be REALLY funny if the unnamed QB "who wears a Super Bowl ring" is Trent Dilfer, which I'd bet it is.

It's hard for those of us who've grown up following the Bears to not wonder how many more championships the franchise would have won if the club played year in, year out with a competent quarterback. I'm 52 years old and have followed a team whose top quarterback, by passer efficiency, is Erik Kramer. It's a team whose best quarterback (Sid Luckman) has been retired 60 years, whose best receivers (Johnny Morris and Harlon Hill) have been retired 47 and 50 years, whose all-time leading receiver (Walter Payton) is a running back who has 170 more receptions than the franchise's No. 1 wide receiver.

Somehow, some way, this is the fault of Jay Cutler. Doesn't this just prove that the team has always had crappy QBs and crappy WRs? By the way, Cutler's wide receivers this year were Earl Bennett, Devin Hester, Johnny Knox, Devin Aromashodu and Rashied Davis. Which, I guess, is his fault.

All of that is because the Bears can never find/develop/acquire the right quarterback, which is directly attributable to bad management. The Packers have gone from Brett Favre to another All-Pro, Rodgers, while the Bears have a second-stringer, Todd Collins, who isn't any longer fit for the NFL. For Collins to be the second-string quarterback ahead of Hanie is an example of egregiously poor decision-making as it concerns the position of quarterback, only the most important position in all of sports.

Sorry, I choked on my sandwich and died for a second and had a horrible dream where you started complaining that the Bears' 2nd and 3rd-string quarterbacks weren't very good.

The Bears are never the ones to draft and develop an Aikman or Manning or Roethlisberger, or wisely trade for a Brees. Hell, the Bears can't even come up with a Matt Ryan or a Joe Flacco. They gave two first-round picks and two other picks and a player for Jay Cutler, who at his best constantly has the metropolis holding its breath, looking at games through spread fingers, praying to God he doesn't screw it up by throwing it to the other guys. And at his worst, he looks for the perfect pass instead of moving the chains and managing the game and thinks his arm is stronger than John Elway's, which is both stupid and immaterial.

"I could pass for the first down, but fuck it, my arm is stronger than John Elway's, so hheeaaahhh!!!!!"

Before Cutler was hurt and his heart was questioned, he missed passes to Devin Hester (one crossing pattern, one deep ball) that 20 quarterbacks in the league would have made. Actually, Hanie completed essentially the same pass to Johnny Knox that Cutler missed to Hester.

I can't be sure but I think the crossing pattern to Hester he's talking about was at the 10:38 mark of the third quarter, when Cutler's MCL was already torn, and obviously he couldn't plant and throw, which is why he was taken out of the game, not a strange statement about his heart, which makes this come full circle as the worst paragraph ever written in sports journalism ever, and fuck you Mike Wilbon.

FJM is stirring in its grave.

2011-01-05T12:25:00.003-05:00

Another post because I'm bored, I miss Fire Joe Morgan, and Jayson Stark writes a very nice column about his Hall of Fame ballot during which he has a minor brain aneurysm:

Jack Morris

Oh noooooooooooo.

I know the sabermetrics crowd hates this vote. Sorry.

It's okay. It's really not a big deal, but I'm bored at work, so this post happens. It's nothing personal -- again, the rest of this column was great.

I'm as grateful for the invention of WAR, WPA and VORP as anyone else in my profession. But I still believe we're allowed to consider more than just raw numbers when we evaluate what a Hall of Famer is, or isn't.

This sounds like a fine argument, until you realize that by "consider more than just raw numbers," he's about to propose a bunch of ... you guessed it... numbers. Spoiler alert: They're crazy.

And if we look back on Morris' career, it sure looks as though the teams he pitched for, and the people he played with and against, were trying to tell us something.

I don't even know what to make of that. Baseball was trying to tell us that Jack Morris should be in the Hall of Fame? Jayson Stark: The Baseball Whisperer.

This man started on Opening Day 14 years in a row (1980 to 1993) -- for three different teams. The only pitcher to start more openers than that since World War II was Tom Seaver (16). Just real aces are allowed to do that. Don't you think?

So instead of using "raw" numbers to show his HOF argument, he uses the non-raw stat of "consecutive Opening Day starts," a statistic used by nobody to prove nothing, ever.

I love the assertion that "just real aces are allowed to do that."

These guys have started on Opening Day in the past 10-15 years or so:

Mark Hendrickson
Andy Benes
Brian Moehler
Joey Hamilton

You know, real aces.

This site actually did a great entry on the worst Opening Day starters of the last 50 years, and surprise surprise, look who pops up -- Jack Morris!!

And yeah, I get that there's some merit to the fact that he was the no. 1 starter on some pretty good Tigers teams and everything, but how does that make him a Hall of Famer?

Morris also started three All-Star Games. The only pitchers in the division-play era to start more were Jim Palmer and Randy Johnson. One thing I've noticed throughout the years: They don't run just any old stumblebum out there to start an All-Star Game -- let alone three of them.

You know, for an argument that doesn't use statistics, you're sure using a lot of statistics. Also, Charles Nagy started an ASG. And Hideo Nomo. And for Christ's sake, Jimmy Key. These guys are the absolute definition of "stumblebum."

Then there's October. Of the seven postseason series that Morris' teams played in, he started Game 1 in six of them -- again, for three different teams.

This is a more misleading sentence than "Mission Accomplished!" (And I even supported President Bush, I just needed something snappy there).

The point is, first of all, October is a SMALL SAMPLE SIZE. That's why there's so many unsung heroes, because sometimes shit happens. So a guy's HOF resume shouldn't really rest on what he did in October.

And furthermore, it's just downright disingenuous to throw out the number six, because it makes it seem rare and special. Instead of saying, "He was the no. 1 starter for three playoff teams," Stark double-counts 1984, 1991 and 1992, by virtue of the fact that, obviously, as the team's "Ace" pitcher, he started Game 1 of both the ALCS and the WS.

I'm not even going to bother finding other guys who have started Game 1 of a postseason series, but trust me, they're just as shitty as my other examples.

And his teams brought him back to start on short rest five times -- always in a Game 4 or 7 -- in those postseasons. There must have been some reason they liked the idea of trotting him out there when their seasons were hanging in the balance.

He pitched on short rest five times, so he's in the Hall of Fame?

Jack Morris has a career ERA+ of 105 in 18 seasons. That puts him in a tie for 478th all time. These arguments about him being the best pitcher on a team for 14 years, or starting ASGs and postseason series, they're nice. But they'd help a borderline guy's case -- not a guy who, statistically has had a worse career than Arthur Fucking Rhodes.

So I understand why Morris' 3.90 ERA gives people the shakes. But for all the reasons I've just laid out, it obviously wasn't just a couple of hundred misguided voters who looked at this man and thought: "Ace."

You're right, it was many more misguided people than just a couple hundred.

A real "funny" column!

2010-11-15T11:20:00.002-05:00

Of all the columnists on all the web sites in all of sports commentary in all of the Internets of all the days I read instead of doing my job, Gregg Doyel is the worst. The worst ever. I live in a perpetual state of shock that he has a job writing national sports columns.

Commiserate with me.

Bengals' comedy tour reaches hilarious new low

For a column that has the words "comedy" and "hilarious" right in the headline, this is about to be a really smelly, awful, unfunny piece of shit.

INDIANAPOLIS -- The Bengals told a few more jokes Sunday. They slipped on a few more banana peels. They're not any good, but by golly they're entertaining.

Isn't this a really strange team to be picking on? You've got a bunch of teams that were supposed to be at least decent this year but instead are awful, and you're going to pick on ... the Bengals? What did they do to you?

Gregg is also going to use a lot of "humor"-ish words to describe the Bengals, but really he's being sarcastic, because he hates the Bengals for some reason!!! I really don't get it. It's like if someone wrote a really acidic piece saying "The Mariners paid all that money for Erik Bedard, those FUCKING RETARDS!!!" Dude calm down, they're the Mariners.

Owner Mike Brown must love this team more than any he has ever had, because Brown clearly loves a good joke. He is, after all, the guy with the wacky idea of putting Pacman Jones, Tank Johnson, Terrell Owens and Chad Ochocinco on the same roster -- and leaving pushover Marvin Lewis in charge of that roster.

Words used so far:

Comedy
Hilarious
Jokes
Banana peels
Good joke
Wacky

...I think I get it, man.

Also, Gregg is correct in assuming that the Bengals are the only team in the NFL that has players who have image problems, because you don't see guys like that on winners like the Ravens, or the Titans, or, Jesus Christ, the Eagles.

Hilarious!

But really it's not hilarious. Clever turn of phrase (?).

The latest knee-slapper

kfsdkfsdjfsjd

was the Bengals' 23-17 loss Sunday at Indianapolis, where Cincinnati had three interceptions and two fumbles to lose to a watered-down, injured Colts team that mailed in the final three quarters and still won more convincingly than the six-point spread would suggest.

I get that the Colts have had injuries, but Peyton Manning and Reggie Wayne still play for them, don't they? No? It was Curtis Painter throwing to three practice squad guys the whole game?

Here is also where Gregg begins a really puzzling charge that the Colts didn't play hard during the game, or something, which is complete bullshit, because ... are you serious?

Let's back up that wild claim with insane inaccuracies.

The Colts scored 17 points in the first 15½ minutes, then called off the dogs. Colts quarterback Peyton Manning stopped throwing the ball. The Colts' defense stopped blitzing. The Colts went from rainbow sherbet to vanilla, just like that, and it was enough to overwhelm the undeveloped palate of the silly Bengals.

If this was FJM -- which this isn't -- I'd be in food metaphors heaven right now.

But we've got something more important here: Gregg's assertion that "Colts quarterback Peyton Manning stopped throwing the ball" after the Colts scored their second touchdown, in the second quarter. From that point until the end of the third quarter (I'm not counting the fourth because the Colts ran the ball then like ANY team with a lead EVER would), here's your run-to-pass breakdown:

Passes: 23
Runs: 5

Really looks like Peyton stopped throwing, doesn't it?

And they're silly, all right. Harmless. Pathetic. The Bengals aren't going to beat many teams this season, but it's OK because they're just so darned cute.

Jesus dude, why do you hate the Bengals so much?

One of the most earnest, professional players in the locker room, offensive tackle Andrew Whitworth, met the media afterward and summed up the hopeless situation that faces a hapless team looking at six consecutive losses.

"The key," Whitworth said, "is getting guys to play with confidence -- even if we don't have anything to be confident about."

I wonder how Gregg will take this innocuous quote that anyone on a losing team ever could have said. Let's predict: Crazily.

Adorable. And true. The Bengals are entering Dave Shula territory, losing in new and ridiculous ways.

You know a team that's losing in new and ridiculous ways? The Lions. Have you seen them? They lose in the craziest ways ever this year and their numbers suggest they should be winning, unlike the Bengals, who are just sort of below-average and why are you writing this?

Quarterback Carson Palmer had two interceptions returned for touchdowns -- although the second pick-six, by Colts linebacker Tyjuan Hagler, was generously overturned by a replay review. The interception stood, but after further review Hagler was ruled down at the 10 yard line. By then the damage already had been done. The Bengals faced a 17-0 deficit early in large part because Palmer's passer rating after one quarter was 2.8. Even Rex Grossman thinks that's lousy.

Palmer had two picks returned for touchdowns, besides the one that wasn't because he was down, so it wasn't a touchdown at all, but I'm calling it one because I'm Gregg Doyel, goddamnit, and I have a point to make.

I really don't get what point this makes. Somehow the Bengals have invented a "new" way to lose in that they turned the ball over and their quarterback had a bad start.

It wasn't just Palmer, of course. Running back Cedric Benson, who had lost three fumbles in the previous four years, lost his third fumble of the season Sunday because of Colts linebacker Kavell Conner's back. Benson brushed against the No. 53 on Conner's jersey and the ball popped loose. Conner never saw what happened. Still, he was credited with a forced fumble.

So a guy who normally is good at not fumbling had a bad day, and also why the fuck are we spending this much energy on the fucking Cincinnati Bengals?

Maybe Gregg just lost a big bet on them and is venting or something.

But enough anecdotal humor. We should hand someone the microphone. Here, let's give it to Ochocinco, who played his heart out -- sincerely. Ochocinco made diving plays all over the field, leaped for passes over the middle without hesitation and even returned for the fourth quarter after landing on his shoulder earlier and leaving the game in obvious pain.

Ochocinco seems convinced the Bengals can salvage their season -- even at 2-7, last in the AFC North.

Unlike Carson Palmer, who said that the season is over and he doesn't plan on showing up to practice any more. Jonathan Joseph is already in the Bahamas!

"We'll get it figured out," he said.

Meanwhile, Jermaine Gresham said, "We'll never figure it out and the team is doomed forever." Added Pacman Jones, "This team sucks and I don't plan on winning any more.

Hahahaha. Oh, sorry. He's not done talking. He wants to tell us why the Bengals will get it figured out. We're all ears, Och'.

I want to Punch Gregg Doyel in the face. And please don't call him "Och'."

"We have enough leaders in this locker room," he said. "Myself, Terrell ..."

I don't know what goes on in the Bengals' locker room and I don't pretend to. But that's because I'm not a national columnist, who has every right to pretend he knows the inner dynamics of a football team:

Hysterical. A leader in the locker room, Ochocinco?

Terrell?

I mean, maybe, right? We don't really know what goes on after the press leaves, so we don't really have grounds to openly suggest that Chad is, you know, lying, or whatever. Or do we?

Terrell is Terrell Owens, who leads not with words but by example. For example, Owens alligator-armed one long pass, letting a potential 50-yard reception land at his feet because, I suppose, a man can get a rug burn sliding for a ball at his feet.

Actually, it seemed like he lost the ball in the sun because he had to stare back into that really randomly-placed window-thing at Lucas Oil. Or maybe it's because he didn't want to get rug burn (because T.O., a renowned sissy, never played a Super Bowl on a broken ankle or anything).

And for example, there was Palmer's third interception of the game, a poorly conceived pass over the middle, in the vicinity of Owens, that he let float past him and into the arms of Colts safety Aaron Francisco. Owens could have made an effort on the ball -- it didn't appear to be out of his reach -- but that would have meant getting hit. Terrell Owens is a leader, but let's not go overboard.

Yeah, he could have made a play on that. Which brings me to my next point, who the fuck cares?

Afterward, Palmer came as close as he ever will to calling out a teammate -- declining to attack or defend Owens' effort on the play, saying instead, "I'm going to have to look at it on film."

Because he should have said, "Yeah you pussy, catch the ball next time! I'm out here shotgunning balls right into your chest, it's time to catch one with your ovaries, you bitch!"

Oh wait, Carson Palmer is a professional and acted professionally.

Do us a favor, Carson, and make sure Marvin Lewis is watching the film too. Because Lewis said he had no issue with Owens' effort on the Francisco interception.

"I've not seen T.O. give up on any plays," Lewis said.

Yes, because a coach openly throwing one of his star players under the bus is good for team chemistry.

An NFL team run by Gregg Doyel would result in an 0-16 season and the murder of the head coach.

What about that 50-yarder earlier in the game, I asked Lewis? The one that fell at his feet? The one he didn't dive or slide or even lean over to try to catch?

The one he lost in the sun and couldn't see?

Lewis giggled at me. Told me, "You need a new line of questioning."

Referring to grown men as "adorable" and "giggling" is starting to get really fucking weird.

Me: "You mean, easier questions?"

Lewis: "Or someone smarter than me to answer them."

Honestly, I'm just shocked that Gregg was anywhere near the game and still had the brain injury bad enough to write this.

Not a bad idea, now that he mentions it. Someone, please show that quote to Mike Brown. But first, tell the Bengals' joke of an owner that the world isn't laughing with him.

Fire the coach!! Fire the owner! Cut the players! Tear down the walls!!! Kill everyone!!! Bomb Cincinatti!!! ALL MUST PAY!!!

We're laughing at him.

It's like that old saying -- I have to laugh [at the fact that Gregg Doyel gets paid to do this]. Or else I'd cry.

Fans? What Fans?

2010-11-09T23:57:00.007-05:00

If the seating capacity at Camden Yards is cut by 4% but no one ever attends any games, will anyone notice?

I stumbled across this article today that made me angry enough to remember my BWP password and make my first post in over a year. In case you are too lazy to click links, let me summarize the article for you:

The Baltimore Orioles are tired of the embarrassing sight of 48,290 empty seats during meaningless September baseball games so they decided to decrease the stadium seating capacity to 45,971.

They are disguising this move as a stadium upgrade, installing more spacious seating in the upper decks and club level. This, plus the addition of less intrusive railings, are supposed to improve the sight-lines and "fan experience" at Camden Yards.

I don't even know where to start with this.

First of all, I wish the Orioles would stop insulting the intelligence of their fans. We all know that the only thing that will improve the fan experience in Baltimore is winning. Camden Yards is a beautiful ballpark, with no obstructed view seats and cheap tickets. The stadium is not the problem with this team. Should money really be wasted on thinner railings and bigger seats when the O's can barely attract 15,000 fans a game?

Also, how sad is it that this team has fallen so far that seats actually have to be removed from the stadium? I remember in the 90's when the team was regularly competitive, they had to add seats and the standing room only section was frequently sold out.

The city of Baltimore is a passionate sports town. The Ravens attract 70,000+ fans every home game and they have sold out each and every game since they have come to town. The Orioles need to prove to their fans that they are dedicated to winning; an impact free agent signing or a big trade. Until then, no stadium "improvements" or other stupid ideas will attract any fans.

I hope, one day, when there are not enough tickets to meet the heavy demand for a big home playoff game, the Orioles regret getting rid of those seats. But, judging by the general ineptitude of the franchise over the past 15 years, I fear that day may never come.

40 Wrong Opinions

2010-11-09T14:10:00.005-05:00

On a blog that was better than this, this type of article was called "bait."

As in, Jon Heyman is baiting meta-critical-sports-journo-parents'-basement bloggers into making fun of him on their meta-critical-sports-journo-partens'-basement blogs.

Consider me bated. Jon Heyman, you are the master of baiting.

Potential free-agent busts (Pavano, Wood) and bargains (Garland, Lee)

It's funny to call Carl Pavano and Kerry Wood "potential" busts. The Giants were this year's "potential" champion.

No teams want to make a mistake in free agency, as a bad contract can hamper a franchise for years (although the world champion Giants overcame bad deals for Barry Zito and Aaron Rowand). Nobody wants to add the wrong person to their clubhouse, either. Here's a list of 10 free agents to be avoided, or at least be very wary of.

A bad contract will ruin your franchise except if you're the team that just won the World Series with two awful contracts on a $150 million payroll. Let's get the self-contradictory statements out of the way right off the bat, we have a huge undertaking from Jon Heyman: 10 busts, 30 bargains. That's a potential for 40 wrong opinions! Play along!*

*Don't play along, go outside and enjoy the day or something.

1. Carl Pavano. He was said to be fine in the Twins clubhouse, but it's risky business dealing with someone who has been self-centered elsewhere (some Yankees people were amazed at how little he tried after getting a $39.95 million contract from them). Should stay in Minnesota, where he has thrived.

It's hard to really know what any of these guys are going to command on the open market, but Pavano had a pretty good season (111 ERA+) this year for $7 million, which sounds fine to me. He self-centered 221 innings, too, and didn't-try 117 strikeouts to 37 walks. I will lazily refer to this opinion as: wrong.

Heyman batting average: .000 (0/1)

2. Jorge de la Rosa. Talented pitcher is only 29. But he's apparently seeking a five-year deal. His numbers might justify it, but he has been inconsistent. Some see another Oliver Perez waiting to happen. He was a 16-game winner two years ago and averages eight strikeouts every nine innings over his career. His WHIP has improved in each of the last three seasons (to 1.315 this past season), but only once has he won more than 10 games. He'll be enticing in a very weak free-agent market, but there's a reason why the Rockies didn't want to go more than two years (for around $15 million total).

Obviously let's go ahead and say: Wins are worthless unless he's taking the 2009 Rockies with him wherever he's going (not likely) and a time machine back to 2009, where the 2009 Rockies will assist him in getting to 16 "Wins," in which case, he will be worth 16 "Wins."

de la Rosa is a questionable guy because he has a career 1.5 WHIP, which is fucking awful. Not because he hasn't been able to get to 10 wins that often, which is an arbitrary cutoff for an arbitrary statistic. This is double arbitrary and it doesn't cancel itself out so I vote Heyman loses.

Heyman batting average: .000 (0/2)

3. Mike Hampton. The Rockies once made a $120 million mistake with him. Signing him now -- at any price -- would be an error.

Somehow the fact that he once signed a bad contract a long time ago makes a difference now. Because the MoonBlork Blork City Sluggers were THIS CLOSE to signing Mike Hampton 2010, age 38, for $120 million.

I bet Mike Hampton would be a nice signing for $1. I would hire him for $1 just to hang out with me and play catch.

Heyman batting average: .000 (0/3)

4. Nick Johnson. An injury waiting to happen. Has good numbers (.401 lifetime on-base percentage), so undoubtedly he'll fool someone.

He's a good baseball player so he'll "fool someone" into signing him to play baseball. What a clever ruse pulled off again by that old rapscallion, The Amazing Injured Johnson (Wait, That Sounds Wrong!)!

5. Jose Guillen. On top of the fact that he's a nightmare in the clubhouse, he's got an HGH investigation to worry about now.

I doubt anyone will give him the $12 million he got this year, but whatever, fine. This is the first one I'll give Heyman (.200, fitting that he's at the Mendoza line for journalism). What's most troubling is that he's assigning value to being a "clubhouse" guy, which is going to be really, really dangerous, because that means we're going to have to deal with things like "Don't sign Adam Dunn, he's a bad clubhouse guy!" or, God forbid, an Eckstein sighting.

6. Felipe Lopez. Be forewarned about guys released by teams still contending, as Lopez was last year by the Cardinals.

I mean he made $1 million this year and was an above-average hitter as a second-baseman as recently as 2009. But be wary, all ye who pay .05% of their money for a man abandoned by los Cardinales Muertes! Old pirate tales said that this man would bring the BLACK DEATH!

7. J.C. Romero. Be skeptical when guys with failed steroid tests have down years.

Romero's lines were actually pretty much in concert with a lot of previous years. He seems more like a middle reliever that's not worth >$4 million than a guy who owed all his success to performance enhancers. Half point. 1 1/2 out of 7.

8. Pat Burrell. He helped the Giants tremendously in the regular season but looked lost in the World Series.

SMALL SAMPLE SIZE SMALL SAMPLE SIZE

That's a small sample size,

Yeah, right? So please rescind your statement just now and find another wrong statement to make. No? Okay.

but no one should be fooled by a good regular season to match his $8 million salary.

What the hell? "Sure, he played great for six months, but he played bad for one month after that! Don't be fooled!"

9. Kerry Wood. Great talent was very good with the Yankees (0.69 ERA), but this is a case of buyer beware; someone's going to think he's sound again and then possibly be disappointed.

Someone's going to think that Kerry Wood isn't injury prone. And that person is: Fucking nobody ever ever ever.

10. Miguel Tejada. Did fine with the Padres, but he's another guy losing his power (.381 slugging percentage this year).

Or that he's getting old. But of course, baseball GMs have no idea how old their players are, they just look at SLG and throw money accordingly. Funny story: Andy MacPhail pays his players expecting them to get younger and the crazy thing is that the bastard's normally right!! How's he do it? I don't know.

Top free-agent bargains

Your score for the 10 "busts": 1 and a half out of 10 for a batting average of .150. We're going to have to turn this around with some strong analysis on ... oh, you're leading with Jon Garland? Shut it down, guys.

1. Jon Garland. He has signed two straight one-year deals but turned down his $6 million player option with the Padres and should do better this time around. A consistent innings-eater and performer, he won 18 games in two straight years under pitching coach Don Cooper's tutelage in Chicago. He may not blow away scouts with his radar readings or stuff, but he's having a very nice career.

Obviously wins are worthless but here we've cherry-picked two seasons here that aren't even relevant: four and five years ago. 2005 and 2006! What gives, man? Miguel Tejada was 15th in the MVP ballot in 2005 and he's a bust. In 2005 I was in high school. This is to say: That was a long fucking time ago.

Also, "he may not be good, but somehow he's having a nice career! Pay the man!" Zero points.

2. Joaquin Benoit. Had a superb year with the Rays but has barely been mentioned as a free agent with Tampa expected to lose Crawford, Soriano and maybe Carlos Pena. Had great numbers (1.34 ERA, 0.68 WHIP) after being picked up by Tampa Bay's very smart front office.

Of course, he's another $4 million middle reliever, but I guess that's a bargain now. Also, yeah, he had great numbers for Tampa, but the rest of his career in Texas doesn't count, when he was mostly a bit below average?

3. Orlando Hudson. He has signed a late one-year deal two straight winters after out-pricing himself with the Diamondbacks a few years back, but he can hit and run, and he brings a nice spirit to the clubhouse. The Mets could use a second baseman for the third straight winter, and with Luis Castillo seeming to be a candidate for release, maybe Hudson will finally wind up in New York.

Okay, Heyman, you're scaring me with this clubhouse stuff. I could have sworn I smelled a David Eckstein sighting just now, too. Please stop. You're scaring the children.

Also, this is stupid, as O-Dog is decent at hitting and can't run worth a lick (career high SB: 10).

4. Derrek Lee. He was once a big star, and at 35 he's not so old that he can't recover from a weak 2010 performance (career-low .774 OPS). He did rally once he got out of Chicago and played decently for the Braves. He's also an excellent defender at first for a right-handed thrower. Maybe a fallback for Washington if Carlos Pena falls through?

"Bargain" Derrek Lee made $13 million last year, which is a shit ton of money for anybody. Also, the blindly made argument that Lee will be able to rebound because "he's not so old" is stupid.

5. Hideki Matsui. Not sure how under-the-radar the 2009 World Series MVP can ever be, but while he didn't have the best of seasons in Anaheim, he still has tremendous drive (word is, he made it a goal to hit higher than Derek Jeter, and he did beat Jeter, .274 to .270). Also quietly hit 21 home runs with 84 RBIs. Would never bet against him.

World Series MVPs are the 177th most telling thing about a player's talents, directly after Gold Gloves and right before eye color.

Also, congrats to Hideki Matsui, who made it his goal to outhit Derek Jeter and beat him, .Medicore to .Slightly More Mediocre! We were all pulling for you buddy!

6. Jim Thome. He turned out to be one of the biggest bargains last year when he signed with Minnesota for $1.5 million and saved them after Justin Morneau went down with a concussion, hitting 25 home runs in 340 at-bats. He probably solidified his Hall of Fame candidacy with his 2010 season, and the big fellow appears to still have something left in him.

Hey, this one seems pretty legit! 2.5/16 (.157)

7. Juan Uribe. The 2010 postseason hero seems to have a knack for the big hit. Still looks pretty solid at shortstop and third base, as well.

I swear to WAR (which is the God I choose to worship), why does everyone call Juan Uribe a solid defensive player? I don't get it.

Wait.

... Wait.

It can't be.

8. David Eckstein. A two-time World Series champ, this all-time scrapper is a big plus for any clubhouse.

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You know who else is a two-time World Series champ? Ricky Ledee. Ricky Fucking Ledee has two rings, did you know that? Being on a World Series team, most of the time, is the product of luck.

Actually, it's luck ALL OF THE TIME, because if it wasn't, the Cardinals will win the World Series every year because Albert Pujols is the best player, and they would have gone 162-0 when they had him and Eckstein since Eckstein is the scrappiest underdog grit gamer winner of all time.

9. Scott Downs. The Blue Jays held on to the lefty at the trade deadline after failing to receive the haul they sought. The Giants showed what a strong bullpen means (and nobody else has starting pitching like the Giants). Dominant vs. lefties, who hit .152 against him last year.

The infamous LOOGY, Downs pulled a cool $4 million this year. Which makes him a bargain for teams that can afford to spend more than that for a guy to come in and get one out some of the time.

10. Adam LaRoche. He must regret turning down a big offer last winter from the Giants to sign with the Diamondbacks, who discarded him after a change in their hierarchy following a decent year. He's a great second-half player, and his overall numbers (25 home runs, 100 RBIs, .261) weren't too bad, either.

Whatever. 3.5/20 (.175 -- Watch out Mendoza!)

11. Kevin Gregg. Solid closer could also work as a setup man for a contender. Bounced back from rough year with Cubs to save 37 games in Toronto last year.

I'll pass on a 35 year old closer who's going to want $4 million for a K:BB of less than 2:1. This comment wasn't funny. If I was Matt Berry, I'd say something about how he has two first names, which is HILARIOUS, but I'm not, so I'll say that his last name is the same as the worst columnist of all time, Gregg Doyel, who is worse than Jon Heyman, which means: nothing so 10,000 points for me and let's all go get drunk!

12. John Buck. A lot of Toronto hitters had big years in 2010, but in a weak catching market Buck and A.J. Pierzynski stand out.

Holy crap, we're not even halfway through the bargains so let's speed this up.

Pierzynski is terrible, has been since 2004, and if he commands anywhere near the ~$7 million he got this year I might cry.

13. Pedro Feliciano. Ironman reliever is very tough on left-handers (lefty batters have hit .214 against him in his career).

Another LOOGY, feel the excitement!

14. Orlando Cabrera. Productive shortstop is a feisty competitor who will want to come back with a big year after his rival Edgar Renteria was a World Series hero.

You'd better pay up for Cabrera, cause a guy who he doesn't like just played well! BASEBALL.

15. Ty Wigginton. Versatile player showed some pop (22 homers) for the Orioles last year.

Whatever.

16. Jason Frasor. The Jays had a lot of good arms in their pen, and this is yet another.

"The Jays have pitchers. He is one of them."

17. Andruw Jones. He showed signs of continuing to regain his hitting form with the White Sox, but was hurt by a glut of hitters after Manny Ramirez was acquired.

Fine.

18. Lance Berkman. He has been overpaid the past few years but could be a bargain after a so-so season. Showed strong signs after returning from injury with the Yankees.

Randomly assumes that Puma will take considerably less money than the $15 million he earned this year during what was either a "so-so" or "strong" season, according to the contradictory sentence Jon Heyman just wrote.

19. Bill Hall. Has versatility and power (18 homers last year). Boston seems to want him back after he became a bigger player than they wanted following their injury-riddled year.

Sorry Jon, I just had a minor brain aneurysm and thought you said that $9 million of Bill Hall is a "bargain."

20. Jeff Francis. Ultra-smart former ace was still working his way back last year (4-6, 5.00) from shoulder issues.

I like how for his "busts," you should be wary because of their injuries, but when his "bargains" have had injury problems, that somehow makes them even more of bargains.

21. Jose Contreras. Seems to have found a home as a reliever in the National League. Very effective for both the Rockies and Phillies (6-4, 3.34) in relief roles after previously starring for the White Sox.

Fine. Now it's time to play "Bust or Bargain!" I give you a generic explanation from Jon Heyman and you guess if it goes to someone he labels a "bust" or a "bargain"!

Here's your hint: Born a year off from 1980, Heyman calls this player "talented" but "inconsistent!"

If you guessed "Bust" Jorge de la Rosa, you were correct!

Wait, you guessed "Bargain" Rick Ankiel?

22. Rick Ankiel. Has the skills to be a star, but poor 2010 numbers (.232 batting average) should keep the price down.

Also correct! Good job! And for the record, Ankiel is two years older than de la Rosa.

23. Edgar Renteria. His $18.5 million, two-year deal looked like a miracle for agents Barry Meister and Jeff Lane, but Renteria was the biggest surprise World Series MVP ever. Will never get that kind of loot despite his incredible week.

Edgar Renteria, as I will go into painstaking detail about tomorrow, is not very good, despite the World Series MVP that will guarantee him to be granted heaps and heaps of undue praise.

24. Xavier Nady. The solid hitter gained more playing time once Mike Quade came aboard for the Cubs, but was limited by a crowded outfield. He's a year removed from his second elbow surgery, so perhaps he'll show improvement in 2011 after batting an uncharacteristic .256 this past season. He could always hit.

"He could always hit except all the time this past season but pay him!"

25. Javier Vazquez. He'll get back to business about finding a National League team.

"Back to business" is Heyman-speak for "He's not very good so don't make him face good players." This "bargain" has been making $11 million-plus in each of the past six seasons.

26. Eric Hinske. He seems to be a good-luck charm, making the World Series with Boston, Tampa Bay and the Yankees before only reaching the first round last year with the Braves. He's a clutch hitter and a team player who would have had a big game-winner against the eventual champion Giants if not for poor Brooks Conrad and his fielding foibles.

Hey, baseball fans! You know how you sit in a cubicle all day to make a decent paycheck, most of which goes to taxes and bills? You know the few dollars you scrape together to go see your favorite sports team play? Well, a man who is one of the most famous and top-paid analysts about that sport just suggested that it would be a "bargain" for a team to spend $1 million-plus for a "good luck charm." Sleep easy tonight!

27. Jeff Weaver. He was all-overpaid for years, but the Dodgers keep getting him on very reasonable deals lately, considering his productivity. Probably has so much money socked away that he's just happy to play at home (he's from Simi Valley, Calif.).

Weaver isn't good. He also gave up 30 ER in 44.1 innings this past season, which is nightmarish.

28. Yorvit Torrealba. After turning down a $5 million, two-year deal with the Rockies, he aided the Padres' cause at a much lower rate. Solid player who seems underrated.

Starting to think this list shouldn't have been 30 players long.

29. Gabe Kapler. Solid fifth outfielder keeps coming back for more after previously retiring.

Now REALLY thinking this list shouldn't have been 30 players long.

30. Craig Counsell. Has been a contributor to two World Series winners. Good team man and backup somehow finagled $2 million from the Brewers last year, but that seems unlikely again.

"Good team man" ... "contributor" ... "backup."

This column didn't end -- it was at this point that they did the honorable thing: Taking it out back and shooting it in the head.

Also the final count of wrong opinions is: Who cares? Just be glad it's over.

This isn't fair

2010-11-08T11:16:00.002-05:00

Because Doug Glanville isn't a classically-trained sportswriter like the other bad analysts I make fun of in my ongoing attempt to interest myself by pretending to be FJM. Instead, he's part of ESPN's stable of former players brought on to give insight about the sport they played, further proving that you don't have to know shit about a sport to be great at it.

On the other hand, who cares?

A new world open to Barry Bonds

With Giants as champs, slugger has new chance to move from villain to ambassador

Barry, of course, doesn't play baseball any more, is 46 years old, was really good at baseball, injected himself with a bunch of steroids, lied about it, ruined his team, etc etc, he's an asshole.

But Doug Glanville will now show how Bonds can piggyback on the success of a team he used to play for and make everyone forget that he's the preeminent roided-up asshole of his sport.

Mr. Glanville, I am skeptical.

The San Francisco Giants are champions and the city certainly waited long enough. Since I spend the majority of my time in Chicago, and as a former Chicago Cub, San Fran didn't really wait that long, come to think of it.

They waited forever! Wait, no they didn't! Strong opening.

During that wait, the city saw its share of controversies and tensions. Being part of the baseball exodus from New York left a few sore spots in New York fandom, but for the most part, that hatchet is buried, even if not so much for the Dodgers. But the Giants did help pry open the door for the expanding influence of baseball, landing almost as far as possible from their native New York.

This is gobbledeegook, right? "While they waited for a championship, New York fans were upset because they left, but not any more, and they helped the influence of baseball." This would be a circular argument if it, you know, was an argument and not what it is, which is, nonsense.

In watching their World Series championship march, I found it interesting to note the ever-moving shadow of Barry Bonds, the man who may be their most iconic figure of controversy and tension. Bonds was visibly supportive of his former team. He came out to cheers before Game 3 of the NLCS against the defending NL champion Phillies at AT&T Park, and he showed that he does still have some love in San Francisco, despite the cloud over his statistically illustrious career.

He did steroids.

Also, why does he get points for being "visibly supportive" of the Giants? You know, Hitler was a bad guy, but he was so supportive of the Germans at the Olympics, you really have to give it up, for him, don't you?

But the assessment of his career on the larger stage of baseball's legacy does not stand up and applaud so readily. He had a record-breaking career, surpassing Hank Aaron in career home runs and smashing the single-season record in 2001. Most of his next moves have revolved around a reactive game of defense. Denial, inquisition, question marks, asterisks.

Let's play a game called: Beat Around The Bush! Here's how you play.

1. Take the face of the Steroid Era in baseball.
2. Try not to mention he did steroids.

Doug Glanville is winning right now with 14 points. He got 4 just now, one each for "Denial," "inquisition," "question marks, and "asterisks," and a perfect 10/10 for referring to "the cloud over his statistically illustrious career." Congrats, Doug!

In breaking one of the near-impossible baseball records, he had no ambassadorship to develop, no time to provide perspective, no opportunity to heal through his accomplishment. When Muhammad Ali became king of his sport, he traveled, he broke down doors. He also had many on the world stage welcoming him even amidst his controversies. And his controversies carried tremendous weight, involving religion, war, politics and race. But he moved people.

You know who else was controversial? Gandhi. Nelson Mandela. Cher. Not so quick to hate Bonds now that you know what sort of company he totally keeps through something that isn't a giant hole in logic, now are you?

Even when Riddick Bowe became a boxing champion, he tried to do the same. He toured the world, attempting to open doors and be a diplomat of humanity, but it fell a little flat. Maybe that was just a function of the charisma of a man, or maybe it was inherent in how people perceived the achievement itself.

In related news, I just woke up from a 10-year coma and the first thing I found out was that Barry Bonds is like Riddick Bowe because both "attempted to ... be a diplomat of humanity." After decoding this because it's not anywhere close to sufficient grammar usage, I then slipped into another coma. Seeya!

Nevertheless, on paper, Bonds has tremendous entrée to have an Ali-like door open to him. Endless talents, coming from a baseball family, record-breaking abilities, a brilliant mind for all things Major League Baseball. Yet, with all these factors, at no time since his record-setting season could he spend time beyond what was required for his own defense. His methods of achieving those records were in question, the wounds of his father's frustrations were still tangible and bleeding, he did not have catchy rhymes or a consistent message and approach to provide ... other than to dip and dive.

Ali, of course, was at the top of his game when he made those controversial stances about war and religion and race, which made him awesome because he rose above the WHY THE FUCK ARE WE COMPARING ASSHOLE BARRY BONDS TO MUHAMMAD ALI THIS IS FUCKING STUPID.

That is what can happen when you don't think about what something means beyond the numbers before you surpass it. You end up seeing it only through your personal lens. Then you have to make up the rules as you go, spend time on the short-sighted initiatives like clearing your name, instead of seeing the golden opportunity to connect with people and fans who long to witness history or watch history be rewritten.

So Barry Bonds can restore his image by: Going back in time to when he set those records and being more Ali-ish about it. Simple fix!

Also he scores a couple more Beat Around The Bush points, I think, by referring to Barry's steroid use as not "think[ing] about what something means beyond the numbers before you surpass it," which I can't commit to because it's so vague and abstract that I only think he's talking about steroids. Which is either no points, or the most points ever, because that's amazing.

But there is no rule as to how you are supposed to embrace the game and its history. We all come from somewhere and have our perspectives. Just as when I played in Philadelphia, Scott Rolen had no interest in being front and center, whereas Jimmy Rollins thrived at being front and center. Different players, different experiences.

Doug is right that there are no rules about embracing the game. However, he doesn't mention the "rule" about how you can't use steroids. This rule is called "the law."

Also, we're through 609 words in this story and not one of them has been "steroid." It's a story about Barry Bonds. It has to be getting closer.

Yet I was hopeful, as we all are, about who can come along to take the game to the next level, who can create a new legacy for the game and how they might do it.

And we don't want them to cheat. And do steroids.

Even with those hopes, baseball is a game we don't want to change so much all at once. We want to still recognize it after records have been shattered.

BY PEOPLE WHO DID STEROIDS PLEASE SAY STEROIDS

We want to have time to frame it in the proper context compared to what happened before.

If I was an FJM writer, which I am not, and will never be, I would go off on a tangent about OPS+ here. But that's neither here nor there. STEROIDS.

Just as so many steroid-induced players became unrecognizable in their physical attributes, so too did the statistics they suddenly could produce. As a result, the game underwent reasonable suspicion and no one could say for sure what new path the game was on.

God, thank you. It only took you >600 words to actually mention the reason Barry Bonds has an image problem, which is: He cheated, a fucking lot, he lied about it, he is/was an asshole, he broke the most hallowed record in baseball which was held by the nicest man who ever lived who had to do it when a ton of people still hated him just for the color of his skin, and then Bonds was just a general d-bag to you know EVERYONE FOREVER so he has a slight image problem.

But please, go on about how he can somehow fix his image problem by being a "diplomat for humanity."

But the time is ripe for a metamorphosis. Bonds performed for a city that is now a champion.

This is the most flawed logic of all time. "The Unabomber was from Atlanta. Atlanta won the World Series in 1995. Free the Unabomber!"

A place that can now open doors to new markets and new possibilities for this franchise and the game. Few have captured the minds, opinions and emotions of so many fans during his tenure as did Barry Bonds.

Negatively. He captured the "minds, opinions and emotions" of people who fucking hated him for destroying the game of baseball.

That type of impact could be channeled to bring to the forefront issues beyond the drug culture in sport or the waiting game within legal wrangling; it could transform a nation of fans in the spirit of its other trailblazers.

Little known fact: in the 1800s, a man named John Chapman was the biggest purveyor of apples and apple products in America. However, a great controversy arose when it turned out Chapman was putting harmful, illegal chemicals in his apples to make them grow big and delicious, and killed tons of people who loved apples, thus killing the American apple industry. Everyone hated Chapman for ruining apples for them, and he became a social pariah.

Fast forward to 1850, and Chapman decided to "channel his impact" on apples, to issues "beyond" how much he had poisoned apples for everyone, and through this nonsense wordage somehow he became -- you guessed it -- Johnny Appleseed.

The proof is in the pudding. Apple pudding.

Maybe it is too soon to know or understand Barry Bonds and what he or his work will mean to the game.

Maybe it is too soon to know or understand Barry Bonds.

He is 46.
He is three years out of baseball.
He... I... are you fucking serious?

The game may take the lessons from his career and apply it in its own way, see it as turning the page toward a cleaner game, a game of integrity, a renewal in a game that can still excite without patronizing superhumans on the diamond. He may not have intended it, but the game may put more emphasis on what transpires beyond the numbers, and that may well be his legacy.

Lesson: Don't be an asshole that does steroids.
Legacy: An asshole that did steroids.

Bonds still has an opportunity; the game is resilient, even forgiving, despite so many unwritten rules and biases. Maybe he will reach out and work for the greater game and start a new legacy. He just has to step beyond the small space of his personal batter's box.

...and into a time machine, back 10-15-20 years, and not do steroids, and then he'd just be an asshole.

Even Associated Press writers occasionally suck at their jobs

2010-11-03T18:30:00.000-04:00

This will be the first of many times I try and fail to be as funny as Rob. Not all of my columns will be FJM-inspired, I will also talk about my favorite white basketball players, football players I hate, and why I have a man-crush on Zdeno Chara.

I truly do feel for writers for the Associated Press. But the job they have to do when a team wins a World Series is pretty damn brutal.

Most of the simple details and facts are written long before the game is over. But when it is over, and everyone on the field is one giant, joyous, dirty, sweaty mess, the writer has to chase around a bunch of players more concerned with "raging" than talking to the media.

Then they are supposed to crawl into any old nook or cranny with decent WiFi, fill in the quote holes, send it off to their editor, breath deeply, and probably get shitfaced at the nearest bar.

There is no doubt their job can get monotonous, but that is their job.

Occasionally, they suck at it.

Say Hey. Say World Series champions.

This sounds like one of those cheap t-shirts my Mom might buy so she can pretend like she has been rooting for the Giants the whole time.

She would say to me, "Willie Mays was known as 'The Say Hey Kid', and the team he used to play for just won the World Series. Isn't this a great t-shirt!"

I would be shaking my head in disgust, but this AP writer would bust through my front door (probably your average shoulder charge) calmly walk into the kitchen, shake my mother's hand, and leave.

The prize that eluded Willie and Barry for so long finally belongs to the San Francisco Giants, thanks to a band of self-described castoffs and misfits and their shaggy-haired ace.

It happens every year. The baseball playoffs roll around, and each team has the player who was released (Freddy Sanchez), the young superstar who is marketable and lovable (Tim Lincecum), and one batshit crazy player who everyone rallies around (Brian Wilson).

When they won the title in 2004, the Red Sox called themselves "The Idiots".

I am not saying it isn't an accurate statement, and I just imagining the AP writer thinking that he is waxing poetic, when really he is just regurgitating an incredible overplayed cliche.

"This buried a lot of bones -- '62, '89, 2002," Giants general manager Brian Sabean said, ticking off losing Series appearances. "This group deserved it, faithful from the beginning. We're proud and humbled by the achievement."

Forget whatever the hell Tony Soprano thinks he is talking about in the first half of this quote.

How do the Giants possibly deserve the World Series more than, say, the Texas Rangers?

Oh wait! I forgot! The Giants never cheated on Sabean.

Maybe they like their teammates, the city, the management.

More likely is that they were already described as a bunch of castoffs who the Giants took off the scrap heap to salvage bolster their anemic offense.

Did Colby Lewis dress in disguise and pitch for the Rays at some point during this season and only this AP writer caught it?

Maybe our intrepid reporter did an investigative piece about the secret love affair Elvis Andrus is having with Don Zimmer.

This is almost as dumb as thanking God for helping them achieve success....almost.

Lincecum won this game of Texas Hold 'em, beating Lee for the second time in a week. He gave up three hits over eight innings and struck out 10.

Mike: Correct me if I am wrong Norman Mailer, er Mr. AP writer, but isn't Texas Hold'em is a type of poker? I never saw Lincecum bluff Cliff Lee out of the pot when he only had a low pair, or catch a king on the river to make a straight.

Mr. AP writer: Well Mike, this is what we in the business call a turn of phrase. See the game was played in Texas, and Lincecum pitched really well and so obviously......

Mike: Oops! Can you hold on just one second?

(Goes into the garage, closing the door, turns on the car, puts in Pearl Jam's critically acclaimed "Ten", and waits for death to come.)

The two-time NL Cy Young winner arrived at Rangers Ballpark wearing a bow tie, as if he was going to a party. He had one on the mound, for sure.

This writer isn't done though.

He will see your shitty turn of phrase and will raise you an even shittier turn of phrase about how Lincecum's excellent pitching performance was equivalent to a party.

Also, in what alternate world does this writer live in where people wear bowties to parties?

My high school guidance counselor wore a bowtie, and I promise you, that guy did not party. If I saw a guy wearing a bowtie at a party, I would point and laugh at him.

"All the experts out there picked us last," Huff said. Normally rough and tough, he teared up.

Maybe I am wrong and Aubrey Huff lays out every magazine and preseason power rankings before the season starts and memorizes them. But if he does have one publication where the Giants were picked to finish last, I will apologize to Huff, and kill the writer who did that.

San Francisco won 88 games last year, the most for a team that missed the playoffs. They also returned one of the best pitching staffs in all of baseball, upgraded their offense slightly, and had two all-world prospects (Buster Posey and Madison Bumgarner) waiting in the wings.

Also have you seen the division they play in? Most of those teams would have trouble scoring ten runs if they got to hit off a tee.

Oh yeah, and the PECOTA supercomputer picked the Giants to win the division with a 91-71 record. They finished 92-70.

Thanks for doing your homework Aubrey Huff, and thanks to the writer for including this clearly misguided quote.

I will spare you from a long rant about how "rough and tough" Aubrey Huff is.

Just know that he once fell on his skateboard, scraped his arm, and didn't even cry.

Tough bastard...

Manager Bruce Bochy enjoys calling his Giants a ragtag bunch.

In other news, the Giants, many of whom are blessed with extraordinary baseball ability, really hate when Bruce Bochy calls them a ragtag bunch.

Let's skip a few grafs to one of my favorite parts. Yes, the Barry Bonds official "statement".

"There is no city that deserves this championship more," Bonds said in a statement. "I grew up watching my dad and godfather as Giants, lived out my dream playing in the same uniform in front of the best fans in the world and I just witnessed the Giants winning the World Series. I am ecstatic for the team, the city and all the fans -- you truly deserve it."

Screw this! If I was a member of the Giants I would pissed that the members of the media have been paying any attention to Bonds at all. He's not on the team, he didn't have any influence over the team's success.

And, forgive me for saying this, but what in the name of Juan Marichal's butthole does Bonds' 15 years of service have to do with the World Series.

Bobby Doerr spent all 15 of his seasons with the Red Sox, but they never asked him what he thought when Boston won the World Series.

And Doerr didn't even cheat the game or get indicted lying under oath.

A team seemingly free of egos did everything right to take the lead. Ross, the surprising MVP of the NL Championship Series, stayed square and hit a leadoff single and Juan Uribe followed with another hit up the middle.

That put a runner at second base for the first time in the game and brought up Huff, who led the Giants in home runs this year. So what did he do?

Hit a home run? Oh god please tell me he hit a home run!

He expertly put down the first sacrifice bunt of his career.

Oh how I over-estimated you Bruce Bochy. Maybe you are one of those nice guys that all the players love, and maybe you are good at managing a ragtag group of long-haired freaks, but bunting with your best hitter, with nobody out, and a runner ALREADY IN SCORING POSITION, was colossally retarded.

Also it was Huff's first CAREER sacrifice. To me that screams AUBREY HUFF IS NOT GOOD AT BUNTING!!!!

I get that in a pitcher's duel you want to scrape together any runs you can get. But if you wanted to play the odds, I would argue that you give Huff, who hit .290/.385/.506 during the regular season, a chance to swing the bat before you let Pat Burrell (six postseason hits in 45 at-bats) or Edgar Renteria, a sub-.750 OPSer during the regular season, do it.

Luckily for Bochy, Renteria hit an improbable home run.

Which saved his manager from answering questions about his stupidity, also reinforced how stupid it was to bunt a runner already in scoring over to third with your best power hitter.

Speaking of power hitters...

Bonds, Mays and several other former San Francisco stars are still a part of the Giants family.

Bonds got a hallowed home-run record, but questions persist about alleged steroids use. He visited the Giants clubhouse during the Series and got a big hand from fans when he took his seat at AT&T Park.

Yessssssss!!!!!!! Everybody's favorite cheating, anti-social, douchebag teammate is back!!!! He even visited the Giants' clubhouse during the Series, because we all know former players never do that!!

Now for the paragraph about one of baseball's other best players and classiest ambassadors -- Willie Mays.

His godfather, the 79-year-old Mays, was supposed to throw out the ceremonial first ball but the Say Hey Kid was absent because of illness.

Yup, the Giants' most famous player, the same one this writer chose to play off when he wrote his lede, got the royal "he is old, sick, and decrepit" treatment from this story. The next paragraph talked about his famous catch, but first the writer decided to make it clear that the 79-year old is sick.

Also this sentence has nothing to do with anything.

Shoot me in the face!

They moved West in 1958 and had tried ever since to escape a sort of big league Alcatraz -- the place where teams get stuck for decades as also-rans. The Red Sox and White Sox got free, not so the Cubs and Indians.

Wait, there is a big league Alcatraz? That was my favorite part of San Francisco when I visited. Do you think the big league Alcatraz offers audio tours where they show Steve Bartman screwing the Cubs, or Troy O'Leary screwing the Indians?

I would visit.

So clang the cable car bells. Loudly, too. Baseball's best play by the Bay.

San Francisco has cable cars, other cities do not.

Also, Baseball's best play by the Bay? I assume he means "Baseball's best, play by the Bay".

Or he could have just crafted a really shitty sentence with no meaning whatsoever.

I am not the AP writer, so I don't know.

Exactly when these Giants turned into world beaters is hard to say. Trailing San Diego by 7½ games in the NL West on July 4, they meandered in the wild-card race until the stretch run, winning the division and finishing 92-70.

It's not really that hard to say. It was actually right around the time this writer is referencing. A simple check of Baseball Reference showed me that the Giants went 20-8 in July and, after a ugly August, bounced back to go 18-8 in September and win the division.

Good thing I am the only person with the necessary journalism skills to find these interesting factoids.

Somebody get this kid a pen and a laptop!

Come the playoffs, they became dangerous. Any well-armed team is. Start with Matt Cain -- three postseason starts, a 0.00 ERA. Throw in Lincecum, the two-time Cy Young winner. Add Madison Bumgarner the 21-year-old rookie who helped blank Texas in Game 4.

So according to this writer, the Giants' incredibly deep and talented pitching staff only became dangerous once the playoffs started?

Nevermind that the three people he mentioned in the subsequent sentences combined for 36 wins and none of them had an ERA above 3.45 during the regular season. They weren't really effective until the playoffs.

I am nearing my breaking point...

"This doesn't make sense. You don't realize it." Cain said.

Ok you caught me, there was more to this quote and Cain was talking about winning the World Series. But when I close my eyes I imagine Matt Cain reading this article about his team, calling up the AP writer, and giving him this quote.

"The Giants win the pennant! The Giants win the pennant! The Giants win the pennant!" announcer Russ Hodges shouted over and over after Bobby Thomson launched "The Shot Heard 'Round the World" in 1951.

Time to redo that cry: The Giants win the Series! The Giants win the Series! The Giants win the Series!

It's only fitting that this writer, who started the recap by loosely tying one of the Giants' most famous players to winning the World Series, chose to end his story by once again loosely tying a moment in Giants' history to this year's World Series win.

I don't know Russ Hodges personally, but I assume his family reads this blog because everyone does. So if I am wrong, someone from the Hodges' family should correct me, but I just don't believe Hodges would "redo that cry".

The AP writer would ask, and Hodges would kick him in the penis, throw down his microphone, and immediately quit his job.

It's sweeping the nation!

2010-11-03T15:40:00.002-04:00

Hey guys, I'm probably the most well-known sportswriter in America, Rick Reilly. I've written for dozens of years about sports. I get paid, literally, millions of dollars to do this. And you know why? Because I write what no one else can. I've got my finger on the pulse of America. It's not big until Reilly says it's big.

And check this out guys, it's the newest craze, you've probably never even heard of it:

Fantasy football.

You could always spot them, the addicts. The Frisbee-eyed fools leaping off their bar stools over a missed FG in the first quarter of a game 3,000 miles away.

This might be the worst column I've ever read. I don't even know where to begin. The worst part of this is referring to people as "Frisbee-eyed fools," which is nonsense. Wait, no, it's the allegation that only people who play fantasy football care about games that are "3,000 miles away." Wait... it's the way that he's setting himself up for the reveal, like we're all sitting at home saying, "Addicts? Addicted to what?! I don't know what you're alluding to! What is this new technology?! FEED ME, RICK REILLY!" Wait... no... it's... it's... forget it, please just fucking murder me in my sleep.

The sickies checking WebMD on their iPhones to see how long turf toe takes to heal.

Get it? Sickies, looking at WebMD. Another award-winning, hot-button column from Rick Reilly, who again, is paid millions and millions of dollars to write this.

The incurables watching two hours of Sunday-morning Weather Channel before picking a kicker.

I was about to ask if Reilly had ever heard of weather.com, but then I realized that he also apparently had never heard of fantasy football, so it's possible.

Actually what I realized is that this is a fake anecdote actually experienced by nobody and that Rick Reilly is the biggest hack writer ever.

They're fantasy football freaks, and I always figured the "fantasy" referred to their sex lives.

BAM! Revealed. You had no idea he was talking about this brand-new thingamajigger called "Fantasy Sport," did you? Rick Reilly also figured that the "fantasy" in "fantasy football" meant "sex," which TOTALLY would have made sense. I also thought these guys were talking about "sex football," which is definitely a thing, and not "fantasy football," which no one has ever heard of!

Oh, and don't forget how famous Rick is. He didn't just join a league with the boys. He joined a league with SUPERSTARS.

But this season, I was talked into joining a Hollywood league with Season 7 "Bachelor" Charlie O'Connell, actor Jerry Ferrara (Turtle from "Entourage"), movie critic Ben Lyons, and a bunch of stand-up comedians and movie and TV producers.

That's right, a Hollywood league, bitches. Reilly is jumping into this new deal face first, motherfuckers. He's rolling deep with someone named Ben Lyons and a guy from the bachelor. Not enough star power for you? How about fucking TURTLE. Rick Reilly = Badass Fantasy Sex Football. QED.

What did I find out? They weren't getting any, either. But only because they were too busy working the waiver wires all Saturday night.

Yep, Rick found out that these "stars" weren't getting laid -- but they totally could! Man, these guys are fucking cool.

Also, who's waiver wire processes on Saturday? That's retarded, and as you'll see, this super badass league is really fucking weird to anyone who has even a cursory understanding of fantasy football. Oops, I mean sex football.

"I once broke up with a girl because she told me to start Ahman Green," says Ferrara, 30. "He had minus-3 points. I said I needed space. She asked if I was still mad about the fantasy football thing. I swore I wasn't. But I dropped Ahman Green the next day."

Turtle. Please call him Turtle.

Also this makes him sound like a guido douchebag, not a fantasy football "sickie." Which: Surprise! He is.

It's sad, really. Because the girls these guys get would make a mohel botch a bris.

That's a really creepy way to say that these guys are SUPER COOL BADASS SUPERSTARS that can have all the sex they want but they DENY it. And you know why?

Super brand new never-before-heard-of-craze FANTASY FOOTBALL.

I've used caps lock way too much for this post.

"I've had opportunities for sex on Sunday mornings that have been waaaaay too close to game time," says actor Max Greenfield ("No Ordinary Family," "Ugly Betty," "Veronica Mars," et al). "I've had, you know, difficulty focusing."

This is getting weird and pathetic. But mostly really fucking weird. Also, if you think there's anyone in this league you've ever heard of, please don't hold your breath.

Lyons' girlfriend woke up last weekend only to find him feverishly scouring the waiver wire. "She wanted to watch," Lyons says. "After about 90 seconds, she got out of bed and said, 'Wow, that was really boring.' So no morning sex for me, but I did pick up [Bills receiver] Steven Johnson, which I'm really excited about."

Why is there so much emphasis on these guys having sex? It's really strange and uncomfortable and I don't need to know that. It's a good thing there aren't any gay people in the league, or I'd have to hear Rick go on about buttsex (not that there's anything wrong with that!).

Still, the defending champion of our league -- Todd Milliner (co-producer, "Hot in Cleveland") -- has never passed up sex with a girl to concentrate on fantasy. He's gay.

No... Rick... please don't....

"Do you have any idea how many brunches I miss for fantasy?" he laments.

I absolutely LOVE the inherent gay stereotyping that gay people do fancy things like eat brunch.
He doesn't miss morning sex with his girlfriend, he's gay! He misses gay stuff like brunch and wearing sweaters! Crazy! This new trend even effects the gays!! I think it's going to catch on!!

Milliner has got to be one of the best fantasy football owners in the country -- gay or straight.

See, I know this sounds really oddly placed and faintly homophobic, but remember: Rick thought fantasy football was sex football (which is a thing), and obviously gay and straight people play different types of sex football (which is a thing). So you can't blame him on this one.

He went undefeated last season, 15-0. He's so obsessed, he doesn't do Thanksgiving dinner. He doesn't do fall holidays, period.

That's weird. Not eating Thanksgiving dinner doesn't make your fantasy team better. This guy sounds like he needs legitimate psychiatric help.

"I spoiled the Halloween of every kid who came to my door this year because I couldn't answer it. I had to be ready at all times to know whether Mewelde Moore got a TD or not. And I don't even HAVE Mewelde Moore."

Times Rick tried to show how funny and badass his cool Hollywood friends are but instead just made them look like raging dickheads with serious mental issues: 3

Into this craziness stepped little naive me, vowing, "I'm just going to do this for laughs. I refuse to become obsessed."

As if.

BWP MURDER MYSTERY: What year does Rick Reilly think he's in?

Clues:
- He would watch two hours of the Weather Channel instead of going to their web site.
- He's just now being introduced to Fantasy Football.
- He unironically used the term "As if."

Mail your answers to Rick Reilly in a bloodstained envelope with a note attached telling him to quit his job.

The draft was at a Sunset Boulevard joint called Happy Endings. All these comedians and actors and yet nobody said a single funny thing all night. They were nose-down into their stacks of spread sheets and laptops. They were on phones to consultants. They had calculators out.

It was swanky! There were celebrities! Famous Hollywood people! I'm Rick Reilly!

I stood there with my one crappy printout from Rotoworld.

I'm sure Rotoworld appreciates you calling their work "crappy."

The very first week, I found out why fantasy players morph into fantasy freaks.

What could possibly make these, virile, strong, handsome, bulging... gorgeous... men...? I'm sorry, I lost my place, what was I saying? Oh yes, what could possibly make these men stop having sex with thousands upon thousands of nubile women? Seriously, these guys are badass and could have sex with anyone!

If you don't go in up to your hairline, you get scalped.

That sounds serious.

It's serious.

So people in your league kill each other?

Guys were adding and dropping like incoming Harvard freshmen. Mauling the waiver wire. Gypsy trading.

I'm sorry, what the fuck is "Gypsy trading"?

They were proving my exact point about fantasy -- it ruins the games. Your childhood team lost? Your favorite player won? Who cares? You don't own them!

I blame Obama for passing the 88th Amendment stating that you're only allowed to either root for your favorite team, or for the players on your fantasy team. Asshole.

"I'm at a bar,

SO COOL,

and there's a crowd of people all cheering for their team, bound by the common love of their squad," says one of our owners, comedian Kevin Christy. "And I'm freaking out because Nick Folk just hit an 18-yard field goal in the middle of the first quarter in a losing effort against who gives a s---. I've become a sports bar non sequitur."

What an unfunny statement from a "comedian."

And then I found myself doing worse, like bugging reporter buddies for Reggie Bush injury updates. Like rooting for an Indiana tornado when Monday night came and I had nobody left on my roster. Like yelling insane things at the TV.

You rooted for Indiana to get hit by a tornado?

Times Rick tried to show how funny and badass his cool Hollywood friends are but instead just made them look like raging dickheads with serious mental issues: 4 (if you count himself)

"Honey, why are you cheering for No. 80 but against No. 88?" said my confused wife, the lovely Cynthia. "Aren't they on the same team?"

Sounds like someone's not getting any morning sex tomorrow.

It's a kind of sweet misery only fantasy freaks like me can understand.

Millions. Tens of millions of people play this game.

"I'm most embarrassed about rooting for guys to have a six-week groin injury," says one of my opponents, realtor to the stars Jon Bronson. "And watching my phone too much. I think I was staring at my iPhone when my kid took her first step."

He rooted for a guy to have a six-week groin injury? God, this is amazing. He's systematically taking down everyone in his league, including himself. It's going to turn out that there's an LA morning radio DJ in his league that murdered his children in a sacrifice to Arian Foster.

Times Rick tried to show how funny and badass his cool Hollywood friends are but instead just made them look like raging dickheads with serious mental issues: 5 (if you count himself)

But the more I got to know these guys, the more I saw why they did it.

Because they're fucking crazy?

Most of us don't go to an office. Our Guy Time Meter hovers near zero sometimes. I love my wife, but she doesn't want to kick paper field goals or ask if I got my haircut at the Oakland airport. Guys show love by giving each other crap. It's just how we do it.

If badly-written paragraphs were baseball players, this column would be the Murderer's Row Yankees and this paragraph would be Babe Ruth. It's the perfect storm. Unreadable, unfunny, untrue, amazing stuff. Really, really amazing.

First off, he manages to disconnect himself from his readers by mentioning that most of the people in the league don't work in an office. What, not everybody's a rich writer or movie star? What?!

I'm not going to touch whatever the fuck a "Guy Time Meter" is. And what is that "Oakland Airport" part? Is that a razz? "Hey Gary, where'd you get that haircut, the Oakland Airport? Which is notorious for giving haircuts... that aren't very good? Yeah, told you."

He then finishes with the cherry on top of a sundae that is made out of the worst, most foul-smelling animal shit of all time: "It's just how we do it." Wow, Rick, wow. Fuck yourself.

What are we gonna do, compliment each other's shirts and then make clam dip?

I'm sorry, I think I had a stroke and missed a part where toward the end of this column there was a big argument against playing fantasy sports, or something, and Rick was forced to come to the defense of guys everywhere.

Nothing presents more chances to taunt than fantasy football. It's daily for me now with these guys, hourly sometimes. And it's more fun than a fistful of pardons.

You might criticize Rick for not making any sense in this graph, but you have to cut him some slack: He's just invented this new game, called "Fantasy Football," and it's really about to catch on, so he's just a little excited!

"It's the camaraderie of the guys," says Ferrara of his fantasy entourage. "It allows you to kinda be kids again. It's like we're all back playing Wiffle Ball in the yard. Man, I'm getting kinda teary just thinking this stuff."

This is weird but it's almost over so I need to mention some weird stuff from the sidebar:

First off, according to Rick, his team name is "The RomoSapiens," which is the most awful fantasy team name in the history of ever, made up by a guy whose job it is to be creative for a living.

He refers to his "best pick" as Zach Miller, the TE from the Raiders.

He then mentions that his team -- in a league of diehard assholes with money to burn and who forgo sex, meals, and human interaction to check on their teams -- is 5-3. Five and three!

But here's the weirdest part, for anyone who knows anything about fantasy football:

He compliments himself for picking up the Packers defense before they scored 43 points this past week. And is upset he dropped Carson Palmer before he scored 63 points in a week. What kind of cracked out, insane scoring system is this? 63 points?!?!?!?! Do they get 10 points for a touchdown or something? This is nonsense and no legitimate fantasy league is set up like that.

I mean, sorry to go off on a nerdy tangent, but for a guy who just wrote a column about fantasy football, he really closes the book and inarguably proves that he knows fucking nothing about fantasy football.

Sorry. One sentence left. Turtle said some unfunny shit about something:

That comes from Ferrara's heart. It has to. He's 1-7.

I... what?

firewojo.com

2010-11-02T10:57:00.003-04:00

The SF Gigantes won the World Series last night, which is a big win for sports-critical-meta-FJM-impersonation blogs.

So hear ye, national bad sportswriters, which one of you will heed the call and submit awful knee-jerk, badly/un-researched nonsense about small sample sizes, grittiness and team chemistry? Which one of you is brave enough to test the fires of bad column writing?

A HERO COMES FORTH.

ARLINGTON, Texas -- The Cliff Lee Rent-An-Ace Tour has played its last 2010 gig. When we next see Lee, there's a good chance he'll be the lead singer for the New York Yankees.

Sabathia will be on drums. Granderson plays bass -- not because he's black!! The guitarist is Jeter, who refused to move over to synth when A-Rod came on, but no one really blamed him.

If so, the memories of his 17-week Texas Rangers career will be a conflicted one. So good and yet, so 0-2.

He went "so" 0-2 in the World Series. As opposed to Matt Cain, who only sort of went 1-0, and Julio Borbon, who undecidedly went 1/2.

Also, Cliff Lee gave up 4 runs in 4 2/3 in Game 1, which is bad, but last night he actually pitched really well, going six shutout innings before giving up a couple singles and then the big mistake to Renteria. But still, really, you're going to say that a 7 IP, 6/0 K/BB, 6 H performance is going to really haunt him? And not, you know, the offense that managed 12 runs in 5 games? This is Cliff Lee's fault now?

Lee started this World Series against the San Francisco Giants with a loss and ended it with one. As prop bets go, you would have gotten Bengie Molina-sized odds on the chances of Lee taking the L train twice in six nights.

No, the Rangers started the World Series with a loss and ended it with one. If Darren O'Day, relieving Lee, didn't give up a home run to the first batter he faced -- I mean, Texas actually managed seven runs that game. Kinsler, Guerrero, Murphy, Hamilton (!), Cruz... all of those guys hit .200 or LOWER. Lee "took the L," but he didn't lose those games (he sure didn't help in Game 1, granted). But how is this his fault!?!?

He wasn't the best pitcher in this Series. That was San Fran's Tim Lincecum. He wasn't the second best (the Giants' Matt Cain). Or third best (SF's Madison Bumgarner). I'm not even sure he was fourth best (Texas Colby Lewis?).

SMALL SAMPLE SIZE SMALL SAMPLE SIZE SMALL SAMPLE SIZE.

On June 21, 1984, Dennis Eckersley pitched 6 1/3 innings for Chicago against Pittsburgh, giving up 9 hits, 7 earned runs, striking out 2 and walking three. IT HAUNTED HIM FOREVER.

Instead, he was on the wrong end of half the wins the Giants needed to close out this Series on Monday night at Rangers Ballpark in Arlington. Not only did he give up the deciding three-run dinger to Edgar Renteria with two out in the top of the seventh, but he was out-dueled by a guy who arrived at the stadium wearing a bow tie. It was like getting beat by George Will.

He was so bad, he gave up runs! And the other pitcher wore a bowtie!!! What a fucking loser!!!

I don't even need to say this, but this is retarded, to say that Lincecum's looks have anything to do with the fact that, you know, he's one of the top 5 pitchers in baseball today. Because nobody thinks that looks correlate to talent any more, right?

I mean, this might be the greatest QB in NFL history.

Actually, Lincecum had electric stuff. The Dallas-area power grid could have run off it for weeks. Lee was good (seven innings, six hits, six strikeouts, those three earned runs), but Lincecum was, well, freakishly good.

"Cliff Lee went 0-2. He played bad! Except when he played good but Lincecum was better. Why am I writing this? I don't know! I can't feel my face! Help the Wojo!!!"

"It was a classic pitchers' duel -- down to that home run," Lee said. "Nobody in this room is more disappointed than I am."

Lee spoke in measured, even tones, but his eyes said otherwise. They were red and borderline misty. Anybody who thinks these losses didn't leave more than a flesh wound doesn't know Lee.

This is just complete nonsense now. Of course Cliff Lee is disappointed, because his team just lost the World Series. But to pin all the blame on him is just really misguided, just because he threw what you're about to admit was one mistake pitch.

"If I could go back in time and make a different pitch, I would," Lee said. "But you can't do that."

It was a cutter, by the way. A cutter that didn't cut. It found the fat part of the plate, then the fat part of Renteria's bat and then the left-field seats.

Why he didn't go ahead and walk Renteria with the count at 2-0 is a question that will make the sports-talk rounds. With runners on second and third and first base open, Lee could have pitched around Renteria and taken his chances against the little-used Aaron Rowand.

At the end of the day, Cliff Lee is a pretty good pitcher that will continue to pitch well and make lots of money and not really be haunted by one mistake pitch, especially in a World Series where the real story was how his team's offense got dominated. Cool. Now let's make fun of Wojo.

Lee could have pitched around super duper power hitter Edgar Renteria, but he had the CARAAAAZZYYYY thought that maybe since Renteria hit, like, 7 home runs this year, he wasn't really a power threat, and that Cliff Lee is an objectively better baseball player than Renteria and could have gotten him out.

But instead Wojo suggests that he gives Renteria the base to face Aaron Rowand ... why? This is the stupidest thing ever written by anybody. And by "this," I mean this blog post, by me, right now.

"I don't really want to load the bases right there," Lee said.

Wojo then went back and erased the previous paragraph, realizing how fucking stupid it would have been to intentionally walk Edgar Renteria.

So he threw the cutter and Renteria hit the dinger that gave the Giants their first world championship since 1954.

Rowand flew out to right to end the inning.

Hey Wojo, what type of vision does hindsight have?

Edgar Renteria has been intentionally walked 14 times in the past 7 seasons.

That's how it goes. Without Lee, the Rangers probably wouldn't have defeated the Tampa Bay Rays in the American League Division Series or perhaps the Yankees in the American League Championship Series. He was the rotation's rock.

I like when columns just disprove their own points.

But now the Rangers have to beat the Yankees again. They outflanked the Yankees in the July 9 trade that brought Lee to Texas. They outscored and outpitched them in the ALCS. Can they out-money-whip them?

Can they out-cost-effectiveness-analysis them? Stay tuned for THE MOST EXCITING OFFSEASON EVER.

Lee, 32, became a free agent as the Giants were dousing each other with bubbly. This weekend he can begin entertaining offers from all teams.

"This is the first time I've been a free agent," he said. "I'm going to see what that's all about. … I know I enjoyed it here. I'm not ruling out the possibility of coming back, but I've got to play things out and see how it goes. I know this was a great group of guys, a lot of fun and I would love to be a part of it next year, but like I say, there's so many things that can happen, you never know."

At one point, this column was about how Lee's 0-2 record in the World Series is going to haunt him in the offseason, or something, but now it's just Gene Wojciechowski's Tangent Land.

Lee's priority list isn't all that unusual for high-profile free agents:

• The traditional "What's best for my family" was mentioned first.

• Playing for a winning team was next.

• Being the team's "lead singer"

• Money

• Oh whoops, number one should have been money

He didn't have to say anything about money. It's a given Lee is going to command something in the range of $20 million per season for five or six years. And nobody in the Rangers' clubhouse will blame him if he goes elsewhere to get it.

I made myself laugh because I wrote that last thing before I read this paragraph. But hey Wojo, "What's best for my family" means money.

"I think any guy here would tell you, 'God bless him, go get what you can,"' Rangers outfielder Jeff Francoeur said. "At the same time, it comes down to what you're comfortable with, what's enough money. … It depends how bad, obviously, New York wants him and how bad they have to have him. And you can see how bad we want him here."

What is this column about any more? I'm bored. There's a few random graphs thrown in there that I'm not going to bother to reprint, so let's skip ahead a bit:

Let's face it: the Yankees are baseball's Death Star. Their checkbook blots out the sun. They can offer Lee the most dollars and the most contract years. Most free agents are powerless against The Force. (Hal Steinbrenner: "Cliff, I am your faaaather.")

I always thought of Hal as more Sith Lord than Vader. Pablo Sandoval is Jabba the Hut, of course. Eckstein is obviously Yoda.

"Whenever there's an attractive player, the Yankees are part of the equation," Greenberg said. "So that's just part of the reality of the industry."

And the team band needs a new lead singer.

Lee is a Cy Young winner, a three-time All-Star and a left-hander. Good things to have on a roster. But he's also 32. If you're the Rangers, do you want to commit at least $100 million and five years to a starting pitcher in his early 30s?

If you're Gene Wojciechowski, do you really want to commit 1,000 words to whatever this has been?

If it's me, I say no. And not just no to Lee, but no to any pitcher with a similar birth certificate. Love the guy -- just not for that money and those years.

This column is titled "Cliff Lee's unhappy ending in Texas."

The Rangers are his fourth team in two years. He can stay and become Lotto rich and beloved. Or he can go to the Yankees and become Lotto rich squared and maybe beloved. He'd join a rotation of CC Sabathia, Phil Hughes, Andy Pettitte (who is a decent bet to re-up for a one-year deal) and A.J. Burnett.

"I really don't know what's going to happen or where I'm going to be," Lee said. "I want to be on a winning team. I want to be on a team, if not this team, like this team. The most fun I've had playing the game [was] with these guys. It's been a good ride. I've enjoyed every single second of it."

Breaking news: Cliff Lee would like to play for a team.

Every second of it, except the ending.

Ironic, because the most enjoyable thing about this column is that it's over.

Giants win!

2010-11-01T22:31:00.000-04:00

Looking forward to the batch of bad columns tomorrow about the leadership of Pat Burrell or something.

Choose Your Own Adventure!

2010-11-01T14:07:00.005-04:00

(Page 1)

You're an editor for the biggest sports news web site in the universe. You need a front-page column about the Giants. One of your columnists, Jim Caple, is a die-hard Giants fan.

To choose anyone else to write the column, turn to page 33.
To spit in the face of objectivity and just have him write it as a starry-eyed homer without any semblance of analysis or relevance, turn to page, 59!

Page 59.

ARLINGTON, Texas -- Two terrible things happened on Oct. 16, 1962. The Cuban Missile Crisis began, bringing the world to the brink of nuclear holocaust. Worse, the Giants lost 1-0 to the Yankees in Game 7 of the World Series.

Ha-ha! Good one, Caple. Let's get the insensitive comparison of sport to a time of international panic out of the way right off the bat.

As every Giants fan knows -- it's embedded in the DNA -- the 1962 series ended with the potential tying and winning runs stranded at third and second base in the ninth inning when Willie McCovey lined out to Bobby Richardson. The loss still pains me even though I was only 9 months old at the time. No one, however, feels worse about that ending than Felipe Alou, who failed to bunt a runner from first to second that inning.

I'm going to take issue with the fact that "every" Giants fan knows this. I consider myself a passionate fan of the Orioles and Redskins, and I don't think I could tell you much about either of those franchises from 50 years ago.

I also like "The loss still pains me," because it totally did then, as one-year-old Jim Caple cried and cursed the name of Felipe Alou.

That seems like enough about an irrelevant 50-year-old anecdote that was really just sort of untrue, so let's move on.

"I could not advance the runner and that runner was Matty Alou, my brother,'' Felipe said in the Giants' clubhouse Sunday night. "So Matty was still at first base when Willie Mays hit that double that didn't score Matty. It's one of the sore spots of my career. Of my life, really. But if this team wins, maybe I will forgive me a little bit.''

Oops, nope, we're still on it. So we're three paragraphs in and have covered: The Cuban Missile Crisis, and a time when Felipe Alou failed to bunt his brother over from first. This is a front-page story.

This is sadder than the time Ozzie Canseco left Jose's syringes in the team bus! :-(

The world nearly ended after that first World Series loss. The world literally shook and cracked in a second Giants World Series loss in 1989. The sky figuratively fell in during the third World Series loss in 2002 when the Giants somehow blew a 5-0 lead in Game 6 when they were eight outs away from the championship. But now, after all that and more, after 52 years, after two near moves to Toronto and St. Petersburg, Fla., the Giants are one victory away from their first world championship since moving to San Francisco in 1958.

As if the Cuban Missile Crisis comparison wasn't enough, Caple has now compared Giants World Series losses to natural disasters (basically saying there was a relationship between the 1989 earthquake and their playing in it [!?!?!??!]) and the sky "figuratively" falling (which is nonsense.) Just in case you thought that this was going to have any semblance of objectivity.

If only Caple had put his foot through his computer right now. But instead he keeps writing.

"We're one win away and we can all feel it and taste it and smell it -- everything,'' outfielder Cody Ross said after 21-year-old Madison Bumgarner and the Giants shut out Texas 4-0 in Game 4. "But we have to stay focused and keep grinding like our backs against the wall. If we do that, we'll be all right.''

It's about time to remind you that this column is allegedly about why the Giants winning the Series shouldn't be a surprise.

There have been better Giants teams that fell short -- that 1960s team had five Hall of Famers on the roster -- but we shouldn't be at all surprised that San Francisco leads this series 3-1.

This is referred to as "burying the lead."

For one thing, the Rangers got so much praise after beating the Yankees 4-2 in the American League Championship Series, everyone conveniently forgot that Texas was essentially a .500 team after June (43-42). Meanwhile, the Giants went 52-32 in the same span and then went on to beat Atlanta in four games in the NL Division Series and then beat the team most everyone predicted would win the World Series, the Phillies, in six games in the NLCS.

How convenient, everyone! Or should I say, Rangers apologists! Thought we'd forget you weren't good in an arbitrary period of time defined by a Giants fan, did you? Well it's all out in the open now! You bastards!!!

I mean, I don't know how much you want to weight this as a reason for the Rangers playing worse than the Giants, but it should be noted that the Rangers were a half-game up on June 11 in their division, reeled off 11 straight wins, and were never really challenged again. Meanwhile, the Giants' race went down to the very last day, and almost a playoff. So the Rangers can be excused to lapsing in really meaningless games when the Giants had a bevy of must-wins.

Or we can just make the numbers say what we want them to say.

The Giants are a very good team. And a better team than the Rangers.

I'd like to imagine that there was a rest of this paragraph that gave relevant statistics and analysis but was lost in a violent windstorm or something.

The Giants' pitching was highly regarded -- and rightly so, when Bumgarner is your No. 4 starter and Barry Zito doesn't even make the postseason roster -- but all that talk about torture led to a slight exaggeration about their inability to score runs. For instance, you could win a lot of bets in a bar -- in fact, you could win bets in the Giants' clubhouse -- with this one: Who hit more home runs in the regular season, the Giants or the Rangers?

What this column should have been was: The Giants' pitching is really good and the Rangers' hitting is really good, but the Giants hitting is better than you'd think and great pitching beats great hitting in the playoffs. Instead it's basically been abject nonsense like this based on strange non-facts and numbers molded to make a point.

Also a quick note on Barry Zito is that he sucks. The worst argument to make for how good the Giants are is that Zito was left off the roster. The best argument is: none, because their pitching is awesome and everyone knows that.

So let's get to the next nonsense point, which is that, yes, the Giants and Rangers each hit 162 home runs this year.

"Our ballpark is a tough place to hit, especially compared to this park here -- they're complete opposites,'' Giants outfielder Nate Schierholtz said. "So our home run totals wouldn't be as high as the Rangers' in the regular season.''

But they were. The two teams' home run totals were exactly the same: 162. "Were they?'' Schierholtz said. "I didn't know that.''

Okay, so they both hit 162 home runs. I'm about to spend way too long on this but let's count up the ways that this is misleading:

The Giants HR total counts three from a guy who is on the other team's roster (Bengie Molina). It also counts a 11 from Aaron Rowand, who has one World Series at-bat. And then there's just a bunch of strange multi-homer efforts from dudes like John Bowker and Jose Guillen who have absolutely no effect on the Series.

Meanwhile, the Rangers' 162 homers came more from people you'd expect home runs to come from: Hamilton, Cruz, Young, Guerrero. I'm not going to do the math because it takes too long and I refuse to do AB/HR because that REALLY takes too long and is the only way to get to the bottom of this, but suffice it to say: The Rangers WS lineup is homer-hittinger than the Giants WS lineup. Someone, please prove that wrong.

Also, and this is just getting ridiculous now that I'm even bothering but: The Rangers had a shit-tonne of injuries this season. Kinsler and Cruz BOTH missed 1/3 of the season. They didn't really have a regular first baseman or catcher. Oh, and the fricking MVP, Josh Hamilton, missed a month. Pretty remarkable that so much of this team either got hurt or was in some kind of turmoil and still had just as many HR as the Giants.

He's not alone. Everyone seems to look at this team as the Hitless Wonders. "Last year we had a lot of trouble scoring runs so I think that kind of carried over to this year as far as the media goes and everyone expecting us to be the same team,'' Schierholtz said. "Aubrey Huff got hot early and that got us going. We got Buster Posey and Ross and picked up some pieces.''

The Giants were eighth in hits and eighth in OPS in the NL this year. And if everyone expected them to have trouble scoring runs this year, they were dead wrong, because the Giants scored 697 runs, so take that!!!! (Ninth in the NL). Also, they were tied with the Cubs for last in the NL in stolen bases, for what that's worth.

Meanwhile, Texas (who hit just as many home runs!!!!!) had twice as many stolen bases and OPSed .757 to the Giants' .729. You know, as a point of reference for the claim that Texas' offense performed better in the regular season. But these are silly things -- I should have just taken one statistic that both teams randomly had the same amount of and abjectly called the teams the same.

This is a different and much better team than the one that left Scottsdale, Ariz., at the end of spring training. In addition to Ross and Posey, the Giants added Pat Burrell. With a healthy Edgar Renteria now at short and Juan Uribe at third in place of Pablo Sandoval, the infield defense is also improved. San Francisco's lineup still may not inspire fear, but it doesn't have to with the Giants' pitching. And as good as that pitching was at the beginning of the season, it's even better now with Bumgarner.

The hitting was good! The hitting wasn't as good! It didn't need to be good! Don't pay attention to me!

What is all this stuff about how good Juan Uribe's third base defense is? Is this true? This can't be true. Just because he used to be a fat shortstop and now he's a fat third baseman doesn't make him good at defense all of a sudden.

"I played against these guys [with the Marlins] and I'm telling you, I hated facing these guys,'' Ross said. "It doesn't surprise me they shut out one of the best offensive teams in the game because I faced them and I know. We had a pretty good team in Florida with some guys who could really swing it and they shut us down left and right.''

Caple gracefully ends on the note that the Giants have really good pitching, which everyone knew. This column started with a strange Cuban Missile Crisis reference.

As Ross said, the Giants are so close they can figuratively smell it and taste it, but they aren't there yet. They have to face Cliff Lee in Game 5 first, and other Giants clubs have come close without closing it out (damn you, Scott Spieizio!). But those teams didn't have a 3-1 lead and they also didn't have Tim Lincecum and Matt Cain lined up back-to-back.

Whatever.

Giants fans have been waiting more than a half-century for this, but with one more victory (cross fingers there are no earthquakes), they and Felipe may finally be able to literally taste a world championship. And I wouldn't be surprised if it tastes like a fine Napa or Sonoma Valley sparkling wine after it has been poured over their heads.

Good luck Giants! We're all rooting for you because apparently when you lose it causes international disasters.

AP voters are stupid.

2010-11-01T13:53:00.002-04:00

I've got a "real" post coming soon (which is to say, one that again rips off the old rip-apart-bad-journalism method done expertly and then never again anywhere near as well by the blog firejoemorgan.com) but first: This.

The preseason All-American team for NCAA basketball includes a freshman, Harrison Barnes of North Carolina. Barnes is really, really good. He was arguably (almost even inarguably) the top recruit and top prospect this year in college basketball.

So with that in mind, 17 super-duper-morons voted for him as a preseason All-American in a league he has never played in. This blows my mind.

Yes, many freshmen are one-and-done now and are obviously in the elite class of players aged 18-22, i.e. Carmelo Anthony, but to put a guy on the preseason All-American team before he's even played one minute of college basketball? That's retarded. This is retarded.

Even if he does play well enough to warrant the selection, what kind of statement does this make? "Hey, we've voted for a bunch of guys who we think are good and we decided that they'll probably be good. We have recklessly disregarded whether or not they've actually, you know, played college basketball before."

It's this type of shit that keeps Boise State out of the national championship for football. These idiot pollsters make all these inane predictions before the season happens and then stick to them until proven beyond a reasonable doubt otherwise. Preseason polls are stupid. Preseason awards are stupid. Preseason everything is stupid. AP voters are stupid.

And while we're here, this gem from Roy Williams:

"This is indicative of the great respect that Harrison has nationally, and it's an unbelievable accomplishment for a freshman," said Tar Heels coach Roy Williams, who is coming off his first non-NCAA tournament season at North Carolina. "I know Harrison would agree, however, that it would be even more exciting to make the All-America team that's picked after the season.

The only thing MORE exciting than being on the fake all-star team is being on the real all-star team! Whodathunkit!!?!?!

What Wojo's Looking Forward to

2010-10-27T13:30:00.006-04:00

BWP User Survey:

Are you looking forward to seeing any of these in the World Series? (Check all that apply).

(A) Elvis Andrus

(B) Matt Cain

(D) Winning a battle with your anamorphic DVR

If you selected only (D), then you must be Gene Wojciechowski!

SAN FRANCISCO -- Watch. Don't watch. It's not as if Joe Buck will send me a commission check if you do.

A ringing endorsement right from the start. "Hey, watch the World Series!!! Or don't."

But this World Series has yee-haw thrill ride written all over it. In fact, when the Texas Rangers and San Francisco Giants advanced to the Fall/Early Winter Classic, I sprayed myself with ginger ale.

Let's just get past the fact that a "yee-haw thrill ride" isn't, nor will it ever be, a thing. I just like that the Rangers and Giants clinched a day apart, meaning Wojo spent an entire 24 hours pouring ginger ale on himself.

Also, this is an allusion to Josh Hamilton, and it's important to point out that this is the closest we're going to get to the probable MVP in an article about an upcoming World Series that his team is playing in for a while. We're instead going to detour into crazyland.

Nothing against the New York Yankees, but I needed a baseball blood transfusion. I'm A-Rod'd and Derek Jeter'd out.

Ian Kinsler. Nelson Cruz. These are players playing in the World Series. Very good players. Players you'd want to watch.

Another appearance by the pinstripers would have meant at least two games at Yankee Stadium and countless shots of really rich people on cell phones sitting behind home plate in those cushioned chairs the size of Murphy beds. And you don't even want to know how many times we would have had to watch the chalupa commercial in which Joe Girardi slaps another man's bum.

I didn't want to see the Yankees either, but this is your argument? "Really rich people on cell phones sitting behind home plate." Like the Yankees are the only team that has expensive seats behind home plate. In Milwaukee, home plate seats are auctioned to orphans! Seattle plays in a parking lot.

And someone please check me on this, but: That chalupa commercial is still going to get played 982,423,928 times during the World Series, to everyone's chagrin.

Also, this is about the Giants and Rangers and we are past the lead of the story without bothering to mention anything relevant about those teams. At least the argument against the Yankees couldn't get any stupider.

Meanwhile, the Philadelphia Phillies have gone to the past two World Series. So it's somebody else's turn, OK? Plus, who wants to see good guy Ryan Howard go through the division, league and possibly the World Series without driving in a run?

Oops, spoke too soon! Good thing the Phillies aren't in it, or we'd have to see universal nice guy Ryan Howard not get an RBI, which totally wouldn't happen [citation needed].

I love this Series and this matchup because absolutely no one on the planet predicted it in March. (And if you did, I want to see documentation.) Its come-out-of-nowhere quality makes it the Boise State versus Missouri of World Series.

This Series reminds me of the most exciting things ever, Boise and Missouri!!!!

Would it have killed him to say Oregon, which is a super-exciting team?

As late as Aug. 28, the Giants were jockstrap-deep in trouble. They were six games out of the NL West lead and trailed Atlanta in the wild-card race, too. They had just lost their third game in a row, this time 11-3 to last-place Arizona. The Giants weren't out of it, but their traveling secretary wasn't exactly calling around for postseason hotel rates.

Balls deep. Say Balls deep. With Big Daddy Balls.

We're seven paragraphs in without any mention of any players or really anything that will make this Series interesting. Just that the Giants looked bad at some point.

And "their traveling secretary wasn't exactly [etc] [because I don't want to quote the rest of that drivel]" is a really long, drawn-out and strange metaphor for "it didn't look like they'd make the playoffs."

Of course, that's nothing compared with the Rangers. As late as Aug. 5, the franchise was auctioned off like a foreclosed house on eBay. Think about it (I guarantee you Mark Cuban does; his investment group was the losing bidder): One of your World Series teams was a custodian of bankruptcy court less than three months ago. Now, the team is overseen by the legendary Nolan Ryan, who still looks as if he could beat the sani socks off Robin Ventura.

Eight paragraphs. Lincecum and Lee are coming later in the story, I promise.

First mention of a Rangers player is: Nolan Ryan. I just ran the numbers to find out how many people are excited to see Ryan in this series and it is: zero. And the team's financial trouble isn't at all indicative of how the players were playing, which was well, all season, really.

Also, "One team looked like they were out! One team went bankrupt! What a great World Series!"

How strangely cool is that? This whole Series is cool.

SO cool. Cooler than cool. Too cool for school.

In honor of Giants closer Brian Wilson, I'm dyeing my goatee Just For Men jet black. Hockey players grow playoff beards, Wilson grows facial hair from Mars. Meanwhile, I can't look at Giants starter Tim Lincecum without thinking Jeff Spicoli and "Fast Times at Ridgemont High." What Jefferson was saying was, Hey! You know, we left this England place 'cause it was bogus; so if we don't get some cool rules ourselves -- pronto -- we'll just be bogus, too! Get it?

Finally, 10 paragraphs in, Wojo gets around to mentioning players in this World Series. 10 paragraphs in. Yikes. And what he's looking forward to about Brian Wilson is his "facial hair from Mars."

Wojo one-ups himself after his Wilson mention with his analysis on Lincecum, the one guy who you would want to see just for his wacky delivery and stuff outside of just performance, by somehow mentioning only that he looks like a movie character from 1982. There are people with young families, homes and mortgages out there who are too young to get this reference.

Then he painstakingly quotes Spicoli for no real reason. World Series! Feel the... Spicoli!

The Freak is your Game 1 starter. He'll face the Rangers' pitching freak, Cliff Lee, who has not lost any of his eight postseason starts (7-0, 1.26 ERA). Lee is more automatic than a gas station car wash.

BASEBALL!!! Strange metaphor. BWP insta-poll: What's weirder: Lincecum : Spicoli, or Cliff Lee : Automatic gas station car wash? Send your answers to no one.

The Rangers are managed by Ron Washington. No biggie, except that he tested positive for cocaine use in 2009, publicly apologized in March and rewarded the Rangers' faith in him by leading the team to its first Series appearance.

No mention of Josh Hamilton making this World Series "cool" yet, but the fourth mention of someone actually involved with the series is Ron Washington, because he used to use cocaine. And cocaine is cool.

Their best every-game player is outfielder Josh Hamilton, who was a walking drug and alcohol lab until 2005. If Hamilton's ongoing story of demon fighting doesn't cause a lump in your throat, then you're the world's only living heart donor.

Hey, there he is! Josh Hamilton, probable league MVP, great story. Let's talk some more about how "The Natural" is potentially the greatest baseball player today but set back by injuries, drug problems, addictions and -- oh, you're just going to write two sentences and move on?

Also, "a walking drug and alcohol lab"? That's like six weird analogies before any actual baseball talk.

Then there's ultra-private Vlad Guerrero, deemed expendable by the Los Angeles Angels. So he comes to Texas and makes his first Series appearance in a glorious 15-year career. I like watching Guerrero because he swings at anything and usually hits those things very hard and very far. You know when the plate umpire tosses a scuffed ball toward the dugout? Vlad will swing at those, too.

So in addition to comparing this "cool" Series to Boise vs. Missouri (and yes, that would be a good game, but it sounds so boring), he's now mentioned the "cool," "ultra-private" Vlad Guerrero. So cool.

The Rangers' catcher, Bengie Molina, was the Giants' catcher until he was traded in July. He's holding a winning baseball Lotto ticket. That's because he's likely to get voted a full Series share by each team, meaning an estimated $1.2 million postseason payday.

Bengie Molina might make an extra million dollars, which is a reason we should watch the World Series. I feel like Woj has gotten a little off-track.

And it's hard not to have a soft spot for Rangers president Ryan. I covered one of the Ryan Express' no-hitters when he pitched for Texas. Afterward, he kept us reporters waiting --

Because he was a jerk?

not because he was being a jerk but because he first wanted to work out! The man pitches a no-hitter, then does a workout that buckled my knees. That old-school mentality has rubbed off on the Rangers like pine tar on a bat handle.

Wow, what a work ethic for a person that used to play baseball for one of these teams!! That seems like an argument for the Yankees, because think of all the cool players that used to play for them that don't play any more!

Babe Ruth*

Joe DiMaggio*

Don Mattingly***

Reggie Jackson*

Scott Brosious*

* denotes a true Yankee

***Mattingly gets three stars.

Again, cool.

I think Wojo needs to be reminded that Nolan Ryan doesn't play any more. And that, you know, he could be spending this space talking about Cliff Lee or Hamilton. But at least those guys are mentioned. I mean, Elvis Andrus is electric and he gets NOTHING.

I love that the Rangers got here on a $55 million payroll and meanwhile the Yankees and their $206 million roster are being treated for playoff withdrawal. I love that Jerry Jones built a football palace for his Dallas Cowboys but that Ryan and GM Jon Daniels built a team.

Small payrolls: Cool. And take that, Jerry Jones! You'll never make a World Series in this town! How's it taste?!?!

Nelson Cruz hit 22 home runs and OPSed .950 this year.

And how can you not go on a warm and fuzzy alert when talking about the Giants? The Giants last celebrated a World Series in 1954. They weren't even Californians back then; they were New Yorkers. Only the Cleveland Indians (62 years) and, sigh, the Chicago Cubs (102 years) have longer winless streaks.

Yep, we've moved on from talking about the Rangers. That's it. Now we're into the Giants. This part was gobbledeegook.

Look at the Giants' lineup and bench. It's dotted with baseball refugees, such as outfielder Pat Burrell, who was dumped by the Tampa Bay Rays. And had you heard of Cody Ross before the postseason started? Didn't think so.

Sorry sir, please use the term "misfits."

The Giants signed Barry Zito to a $126 million contract -- and left him off the playoff roster. They traded respected Molina so they could insert a rookie catcher, Buster Posey, in the lineup. They diminished the role of pricey outfielder Aaron Rowand, all in the name of winning.

The Giants wasted a lot of money! They got rid of that old loser Molina, who I just said made up part of the "coolness" of the World Series for his other team five seconds ago. They wasted more money! "All in the name of winning."

Wojo typed this paragraph, smiled to himself, took a long puff of a cigar, and thought, "Now that's journalism."

The Giants win heroically (Juan Uribe's eighth-inning dinger in Game 6 of the NLCS) and nervously (Wilson's 3-2 strikeout of Howard to end that series was on the lowest sliver of the strike zone). Six of their seven postseason wins have been by one-run margins.

Whatever. The important part now is how the story ends:

I've reached a settlement agreement with my DVR. It gets the NFL games while I'm gone. I get to watch the World Series live.

For once, I got the better deal.

What? WHAT?!?!?!? You... WHAT?!?!?!?!

This whole column was stupid, but WHAT?!?! the... fuck?

Wojo has "reached a settlement agreement" with his DVR, which I suppose has taken on a life of its own. I guess. In the agreement, the DVR gets NFL games (I don't know what that means), and he gets to watch the World Series. ...What?

Read that over again. Does that make sense? He got the better deal?

So, like, he has a standing agreement that his DVR, which is a person or something, gets to watch the NFL games, but he gets the World Series, and normally the NFL is better...? I'm really trying to work through this.

Somebody help me.

How LeBron Could Have Improved His Image For Cheap

2010-10-26T19:24:00.007-04:00

Spiteful, full of misguided rage, probably angers Cleveland, yet effective. Not only is this the BWP motto*, it is the new LeBron ad geared toward improving his image. I love the ad. I like the attitude of firing back at famous critics who actually accomplished something, because fuck it, everyone hates me anyway. But it never had to come to this. Here's a few suggestions of how LeBron could have fixed his PR disaster and saved some cash for future hush money.

1. Boba Fett Mask

You can say anything you want in a Boba Fett mask, and nobody will be offended.

Point proven. Moving on. Quickly.

2. Rape and/or Sexually Assault Someone

LeBron is in a unique situation. He is the only celebrity hated for hurting feelings. Rape and sexual assault paves the way for the come back story. LeBron doesn't have that luxury. If Roethlisberger and the Steelers win the Super Bowl, the story will tell of the Steelers persevering through the first 4 weeks of the season without their leader. If LeBron wins the title, people hate him more. LeBron has no avenue to becoming a sympathetic figure until he has something to overcome. Unless I've severely misjudged the American psyche, any problem of human character and sympathy can be solved by rape.*

3. Crystal Meth

Not an expensive drug. More self-destructive than rape, but rape can't get you on a reality show. Or maybe it can. I don't watch much VH1. Just throwing things out there. Who doesn't like a meth head? Intervention get pretty high ratings, after all. Plus, when the Heat can't live up to their impossible expectations, he can blame his meth addiction. I can see it now. LeBron crying in Dwayne Wade's arms during the highest rated Intervention episode, tearfully accepting to take the flight to the rehab team in Cleveland. A&E needs to make this happen.

4. Have A-Rod Follow Him Around
He already is.
Win-Win. A-Rod thinks he's improving his image and will do it for free. LeBron looks like less of a douche by comparison. That was easy.

5. Play Like Adam Morrison

Adam Morrison has cracked the code. He developed the perfect skill set that would allow 2 championship rings to fall into his lap. Sure, he didn't play, but he still has the jewelry and a story to kill his grand kids. That is, of course, if he doesn't die alone. Which he might. And might have already. We'll have research look into that. The point is, you don't have to be in the spotlight to be a role player on a championship team.

6. Combine 1-5

What do you call a man who can always be seen wearing Boba Fett helmet and hanging out with A-Rod, who despite the fact is a serial raping meth addict has managed to be a part of 2 NBA championship teams? The most interesting man in the world.

Should have just sent me a tweet LeBron. I'm here to help.

25 Baseball Players Playing in the Playoffs

2010-10-26T14:18:00.005-04:00

Still not as good as FJM.

John Heyman was forced to write a baseball column on a day with no baseball. Instead of taking the obvious route (Why Choke-Rod choked away the Yankees' chance to win the World Series again and/or Why Choklie Manuel choked as a manager against San Francisco), he instead tried to give bad sports writing some new flavor. So +10 points.

It's about postseason heroes. Fine. +-0 points.

From this season. So... small sample size, but there should be a few, right? Maybe "5 postseason heroes so far." +5 points.

Uh oh. Minus a billion points.

Several players have enhanced their reputations this October, though none more so than the top two guys on this list -- the unheralded Cody Ross and the much-heralded Cliff Lee. Ross has done what no one expected, and Lee has done exactly what he did last postseason, undoubtedly en route to a stratospheric salary in 2011. Here is my list of 25 men who have enhanced their statures so far this October.

"Here's two guys who have done well in the postseason and 23 others. Holy crap. 25?! There have been 27 games played in the postseason this year. And 25 "heroes." This gets ugly, fast.

It might as well just be like, "Hey, here are some guys who are involved in the postseason." 25!

1. Ross. The former rodeo clown wanna-be was acquired by the Giants for nothing. Not only that, but they claimed him off the waiver wire partly just to block the Padres. The Marlins let him go only to save a measly $1 million, and at the time he looked like nothing more than an extra in the Giants' crowded outfield. Now he's earning folk hero status. He has shown: 1) that he's clutch, 2) that he can beat the best pitchers, and 3) you don't ever want to throw him an inside fastball. Has all three of the Giants' home runs in the NLCS.

So Heyman is already fighting an uphill battle because some of these are going to be downright nonsense. But he manages to fudge one of the gimmes up horribly with this analysis of Cody Ross:

1) He's clutch.
2) He can beat the best pitchers.
3) You don't ever want to throw him an inside fastball.

Ross is 7/23 in the playoffs this year with three home runs and is OPS-ing 1.385. Which is awesome and everything, but ... really? 23 at-bats and we're willing to attach all three of these to Cody Ross, a career slightly-above-average hitter?

Fun time: which of these three is the silliest? Mail your answers to no one, they're all stupid.

3. Buster Posey. The cleanup-hitting catcher must be making those who voted for someone else in the Rookie of the Year balloting second-guess themselves. It looked like a toss-up between Posey and Atlanta's Jason Heyward, but Posey bats cleanup for a team that may be headed to the World Series. Heyward was moved up in his lineup, but only to No. 2, and put up numbers that were not much better in many more games. Some might suggest that the Giants could have called Posey up earlier, but maybe they waited for exactly the perfect time. It isn't easy catching this young pitching staff, and he's doing it marvelously. "As good as Joe Mauer at the same age," one competing executive said.

"Take that, people who voted against Buster Posey in an award based on regular-season play! Look how good this guy is in the postseason! [Posey's postseason OPS is .612 (I know it's a small sample size but still, how is this guy a "postseason hero"?)]"

Also, this is shooting fish in a barrel but:

Buster Posey, age 23: .305/.357/.505, 129 OPS+
Joe Mauer, age 23: .347/.429/.936, 144 OPS+ (holy shit!)

Mauer please.

Number four is Matt Cain, which is perfectly fine because he's pitched really well (Obviously two was Lee). Five is Halladay, which I believe proves that this list isn't in any kind of order (?). Six is Lincecum, whatever.

So there are six guys I guess you could call, at least semi-defensibly, "postseason heroes." But ah, clever reader, you correctly recalled that Jon Heyman is trudging forth with another 19 "heroes", do you? Well done. Where will he pull them from? Choose the correct answer:

(A) His ass
(B) A

7. Robinson Cano. No less than Reggie Jackson said he could see Cano hitting three home runs in a big postseason game. So far, he has four overall and is batting .387.

This was written on Friday, and then the Yankees went out and lost, so Cano never got his chance to hit three home runs in a game, which was, I guess, predicted (?) by Reggie Jackson, which makes him a playoff hero.

So just in case you're keeping track, the first six are on this list by merit of playing well in the postseason. Other ways to be a "hero":

- Have Reggie Jackson think you could hit three home runs in a game.

8. Elvis Andrus. Folks understood that he could field, but seeing him up close makes a difference. Also, being compared occasionally to Omar Vizquel doesn't hurt, either. Hitting .344 for the postseason.

Be "occasionally" compared to Omar Vizquel. Also, at any point, an editor at SI could come in and take out the word "hero" and change it to "some people who are playing pretty well in the postseason." But then I wouldn't have taken issue with this and I'd be doing work right now.

Nine is Wilson, who probably loses points because he doesn't remind Jon Heyman of anyone.

10. Andy Pettitte. His reputation as a big-game pitcher wasn't hurt when he picked up his record 19th postseason win in Game 2 of the ALDS.

"People thought he was good and he was pretty good." There are 15 entries left on this list.

11 is Mo and is badly written but whatever. Now we get to the fun part.

12. Bruce Bochy. The Giants' manager has taken a few hits but he's a very solid manager who has brought together a collection of players that sure doesn't look like it should be beating the Phillies. Never had a shot at winning the World Series with the 1998 Padres, his only other pennant-winning team, but his rotation gives him a chance this time.

Yes, Bochy outmanaged Charlie Manuel, for as much as a guy can get outmanaged. But I will argue to the death, as did the blog I steal this idea from now, that a manager doesn't coach up Cody Ross to hit home runs. But to Heyman, he's a hero. A HERO.

Firefighters on 9/11
Soldiers dying for our freedom
Bruce Bochy for being a "very solid manager"

13. Nelson Cruz. According to Mark Teixeira, Cruz could be baseball's next superstar. A throw-in along with Carlos Lee in the trade that sent the two of them to the Rangers in 2006, Cruz is hitting .378 with four homers. He's hoping to play on Friday night despite a tight hamstring.

14. Bengie Molina. Nobody but Texas really wanted him when the Giants were looking to get rid of him because they were about to promote Posey to the majors. Yet, here is Molina in the postseason again, eight years after being the starting catcher on the Angels' World Series title team, contributing for the Rangers with a big home run vs. the Yankees in ALCS Game 4.

Qualifications to be a postseason hero, by Jon Heyman

- Reggie Jackson talked about you
- You sometimes remind people of Omar Vizquel
- Mark Teixeira thinks you're good
- You've played in the playoffs before

15. Juan Uribe. Bad wrist and all, he has delivered at the plate and in the field. Has timed a very good all-around season with impending free agency.

Ugh, Juan Uribe? This is a bucket of wrong. First off, Uribe is hitting .214 this postseason, and actually in a not-too-terribly small sample size, he is hitting .220 and OPSing .631 in 92 postseason plate appearances. This guy sucks. Also, what part of this season was "very good all-around?" The 99 OPS+?

In my estimation, hitters are judged on the following criteria:

Hitting
Defense
Speed
Power
Getting on base

Now let's see how Juan Uribe did in his "very good all-around season":

Hitting: He hit .248 this season. That's not good.
Defense: Zone rating puts his runs saved above average at a whopping: 0. That seems average to me.
Speed: Obviously not known for his feet, but he somehow managed get caught stealing 2/3 times he ran.
Power: 24 HR, which is good. .440 SLG, which is alright, isn't it?
Getting on base: .310 OBP = NOT GOOD.

So Juan Uribe, who was good in one facet of the game, average in one, and bad at everything else, and who has never been good in the postseason (unless you count the 10 ABs in the 2005 ALDS), is a "postseason hero." Jon Heyman gets paid to make this claim based on: nothing.

16. Ryan Madson. He has looked dominant in the setup role, with eight K's in 5 2/3 scoreless innings.

Two days later, Madson gave up the series-winning run. Obviously Heyman isn't a fortune teller but this is what happens when you list 25 people as "playoff heroes."

17 is Kinsler, fine. 18 is Cole Hamels, who actually pitched really well. It must be that Ryan Madson reminds Heyman of Goose Gossage, whereas Brett Myers said Hamels only reminds him of Curt Schilling.

This is a waste of time.

There are still SEVEN more people on this list.

19. Aubrey Huff. Had a reputation as a snarky guy who played for losers. But here he is batting third for a team one game from the World Series, and he's one of their stand-up guys in the clubhouse.

Qualifications to be a postseason hero, by Jon Heyman

- Reggie Jackson talked about you
- You sometimes remind people of Omar Vizquel
- Mark Teixeira thinks you're good
- You've played in the playoffs before
- Bat third for the Giants

20. Mike Maddux. Rangers pitching coach has done a nice job once again with a young staff.

Mike Maddux. Postseason hero. The basketball coach that pulled a guy from a burning car, and Mike Maddux for making C.J. Wilson a starter.

21. Travis Wood. Talented Reds youngster outpitched Aroldis Chapman in the NLDS, throwing 3 1/3 scoreless innings. He was also the only one to hit the ball hard vs. Halladay in his no-hitter.

Guh.

22. Jonny Venters. Some suspected that Bobby Cox overused him, but he came through with 5 1/3 scoreless postseason innings that included eight strikeouts.

You might think that Wood should be below Venters because this arbitrary hero ranking list because Venters has two more scoreless innings, but you're forgetting to factor in the +3.54 HERO factor (HERO stands for HEyman Rating Order) that Wood's hard hit added to his overall numbers.

23. Jayson Werth. Carl Crawford will still probably be favored by most teams because he's three years younger and an even better runner. But five-tool outfielders who come up with big hits like Werth has fare well in free agency. He's hitting only .214 in the postseason but showing power, defense and speed.

Seriously, he's a "hero."

The last two are Dave Righetti and Jose Contreras. I have no fight left in me. This was stupid.

No one will ever do this as well as FJM.

2010-10-21T08:46:00.004-04:00

But Goddamnit, I've got to try.

This post, which will only be read by Nick, is in response to two things:

(1) There used to be a really good meta-critical-sports-journo blog written by successful people from their mothers' basements called Fire Joe Morgan, which I read every day still, like a puppy looking out the window of an abandoned house hoping the family will come home and talk about how much Woody Paige sucks at journalism.

(2) Holy shit, there's still a lot of really bad sports journalism out there, which I also read every day, from my job in my mother's basement.

So here come the FJM-style posts, which again, won't be anywhere near as funny or insightful as what they did, and just to sort of differentiate myself, my first subject will be this nonsense I read a couple days ago from the front page of NFL.com: Cowboys QB gets raw deal in Romo-Rodgers comparison. Take it away, Elliot Harrison!

and have been in the news a lot this week -- Rodgers because of a concussion that puts his status for this week in some doubt, and Romo because he's the face of Super Bowl contender that is sitting at 1-3.

I like this column because it makes a lot of unsubstantiated arguments and alleges that it's what everyone's talking about. "Man, two of the most famous people at the most famous position in the most famous sport in the country have been in the news! Wonder why?!?!"

For some odd reason, these two get linked together quite often by fans, broadcasters and analysts, including NBC's Tony Dungy this week.

So the whole column from here on out is based on this little nugget. These two get linked together. They're in the news. They're quarterbacks. I mean, look, they might have been born within three years of each other, in California, considered to be in at least the top half of quarterbacks in the league, starters in the NFC, leaders of teams that were predicted before the season to be championship contenders but instead have struggled, and I mean at the very least, they're quarterbacks in the NFL so like, they pretty much all get compared to one another, but that's no reason to go linking these two together, now is it?

Dungy said "part of being a leader at the quarterback position is protecting the football. You've got to do that to be a great quarterback."

That comment is emblematic of what people don't like about Romo, and the unfavorable comparisons to Rodgers always seem to appear a few sentences later. It's easy to see why. Both are NFC quarterbacks in their early prime who had to sit on the bench for three years before getting a shot. They also play for two of the NFL's flagship franchises.

Dungy said a thing about quarterbacks. These two players are quarterbacks. I also like how he scoffs at how the "comment is emblematic of what people don't like about Romo." As if people shouldn't be so quick to dislike a guy for fumbling.

But the bigger slight is somehow not that Romo gets wrongly criticized for fumbling, but that when people talk about him and Rodgers (all the time), they always criticize Romo first, and then Rodgers...?

Also, Elliot touches on a few points that would show why people would link the two, about 15 seconds after wondering what "odd reasons" link the two.

And Romo is 30. Somehow that's the "early prime" for a man whose job it is to get eaten by Julius Peppers.

Hey, you know who gets linked to everyone else for the MOST odd reasons?

Perhaps the biggest reason lies in the fact that Romo reminds so many people of the guy Rodgers replaced: . He's a fun-loving gunslinger, who sometimes throws hairbrained interceptions. He comes off as somewhat of a diva, and they say he's not as good as A-Rodg.

Oh, people hate Romo because he loves fun. No sir, not for me. Give me "A-Rodg" (an un-fun nickname that reminds us of the least fun athlete ever) because he HATES fun. One time, Greg Jennings was celebrating after a touchdown pass and Rodgers threatened to cut him. He fucking hates it. That's my kind of QB.

Too bad the latter is totally wrong.

Oh, thank God, because I thought you were arguing that people think Rodgers is better because Romo has more fun, and that's just nonsen--

Ain't no way Rodgers is better than Romo. No way.

--oh, we're just making that point and moving on. Okay, cool, let's come up with some stats.

This is not to say Rodgers isn't a great quarterback. He has a sterling career passer rating of 96.4, while having thrown 68 touchdowns to only 27 interceptions. He also averages 7.7 yards every time the ball leaves his hands. Those are great numbers.

Here's where I'd like to point out that this column is based on the "odd link" between the two, and the people who say that Rodgers is definitely better than Romo (which he is), and responding that Romo is DEFINITELY the better quarterback. Remember that.

Let's take a look at that "gunslinger" Romo: 95.3 passer rating, with 114 touchdowns and only 60 interceptions -- very close to Rodgers.

YOU called him a gunslinger. No one called him that. You said that. Also, QB Rating is a quirky stat but it's generally accepted as a solid metric of how good a QB is. Which is confusing when you argue that since Romo's rating is "very close" to Rodgers's, that helps your argument that Romo is better.

Now, let's just get silly.

But Romo gets more bang for his buck, averaging 8.1 yards per attempt during his career. That's higher than any quarterback in the NFL. Higher than Peyton Manning, Tom Brady, Drew Brees, Philip Rivers, Ben Roethlisberger, and yes, Rodgers. Give me a quarterback who throws the ball down the field over a dink-and-dunker any day of the week.

Okay, so a high yards-per-attempt average, that's cool. But... that's what you're using to make your argument? He has the highest YPA? I mean, keep in mind, Rodgers had a pretty shitty '08 Green Bay team, which was also his first season starting, and he still had a great season. Romo's had a winning record all four of his starting seasons, which to me indicates he played with a better team around him. He also hasn't been sacked 50 times in a season like Rodgers, meaning he has more time to let plays develop and get more yards per attempt. Also this argument is stupid when we click two buttons:

2009 "Dink and dunker" Aaron Rodgers: 8.7 YPA
2009 Gunslinging YPA master Tony Romo: 8.2 YPA

Still, Rodgers and Romo have nearly identical numbers. That said, stats have never been the measure of a great quarterback. Wins have. Surely, Rodgers must blow away Romo in this category, right? Wrong. Romo has won two out of every three starts, while Rodgers is hovering around .500.

No, wins are the measure of a good team. Like, you know how Rodgers' first season, his team sucked? He had a 93+ QB rating and his team won six games. Or like that playoff game he gets blamed for when he fumbled in overtime but it was like 150-150 at the time and if the defense had made one stop, ever, he wouldn't have been in that position.

Besides, Romo has played in ~twice as many games as Rodgers, so it's horribly disingenuous to compare their numbers straight up.

Romo: 55 starts, 16,611 yards, 117 touchdowns, 62 interceptions
Rodgers: 32 starts, 10,347 yards, 69 touchdowns, 28 interceptions.
Rodgers prorated to 55 starts: 17,783 yards, 119 touchdowns, 48 interceptions.

Romo throws an interception 3% of the time. Rodgers throws an interception 2% of the time. With how much guys throw now, that's an extra interception every two games.

Or, you know, you could blindly call those numbers "nearly identical."

So Romo's stats are comparable to Rodgers,

-- No, they're not --

and he's won a far higher percentage of his games.

Yes, over the past few seasons, Dallas has been overall better than Green Bay. But how much are we really awarding him for Barber and Jones combining for 1600 yards and 12 touchdowns on the ground in 2007? He also had a T.O. popcorn year (81/1355/15) to help him out, and one of the best seasons ever by a tight end (Witten: 96/1145/7).

Also, DeMarcus Ware had 14 sacks.

But whatever, all of these wins created only and solely by Romo aren't even the point. The point is:

That's great, but it still might not be enough for his detractors. The all-too-common epitaph on Romo's career was this Einstein-esque factoid: Romo hasn't been a winner in the playoffs. True that. He's 1-3 as a starter in the postseason. But Rodgers hasn't won any.

True that. Word. 'Cept homes, I got beef with that. Romo is a playoff choker who blew an easy hold. Rodgers has started two seasons: One year, his team sucked, last year he went 28/42 for 423 yards (!!!), four touchdowns, one interception, 13 yards rushing and a touchdown (!!!!!!!). Christ. How did he lose this game?

Oh right, he doesn't play defense and Kurt Warner threw five touchdowns. I think we can all agree that that lose is not the fault of one Master Aaron "A-Rodg" Rodgers.

Of course, Rodgers has only played in one playoff game.

Right, 423 yards and four touchdowns.

But that brings up another point of contention:

This thing I said is another very good point:

Part of being a great quarterback is getting your team to the playoffs, or at the very least, having a winning season. Rodgers went 6-10 in his first season as a starter, after having all offseason and training camp to prepare. Romo went 6-4 his first season as a starter, despite being thrust into the lineup when Bill Parcells decided to bench Drew Bledsoe at halftime against the Michael Strahan-led Giants. To that point of the season, Romo might've gotten 10 percent of the snaps to prepare, as opposed to Rodgers, who had an entire playbook built to his strengths.

Yikes. Okay. So first off: no.

Second, come on, man. I know a great QB helps his team win, but A-Rodgey wasn't going to take the helm and start winning right away. And even still, GB lost games in '08 where they put up 24, 27, 29 and 31 points. With an average defense, that team goes 10-6. Oh, also, the 29 was in a loss to the Saints when Rodgers gave up 51 on defense. How dare he!

The success of Romo's initial season and Rodgers' first has little to do with the talent around them. Those 2008 Packers had , and . Green Bay went 13-3 the prior year under Favre's direction, before going 6-10 with Rodgers. Can you imagine if that had been Tony Romo? Lieutenant Aldo Raine would've taken a cheesegrater to his head.

(A) Lt. Aldo Raine is a year-old reference to "Inglorious Basterds." This was written in 2010. Also: What?

(B) Do you even bother to look back and do research? Rodgers keeps losing games where his offense puts up 30+ points because his defense sucks. He doesn't play defense. Stop writing.

(C) Aldo Raine?!?!?!?!

Same deal with the playoffs. Rodgers put up very impressive stats in his one and only playoff game vs. Arizona last season, throwing for 423 yards and four touchdowns. But he missed a wide-open Greg Jennings in overtime on a play that easily could've gone for a touchdown, and his fumble deep in Green Bay territory lost the game. Few fans pinned the loss on A-Rodg, blaming the Packers secondary instead for not covering anyone all game -- rightly so. But what if that had been Romo? He could have Marino'd the Cardinals into oblivion with 600 yards passing and nine touchdowns, but if he committed the same mistakes Rodgers made, he would've gotten a plyboard to the face from David Spade and NFL analysts alike. Their situations are totally different.

"What about that time Rodgers played great but the defense blew it? Yeah, it was the defense's fault. But Romo would have thrown for 600 yards!!!! David Spade."

Yeah, he played a great game, but what about that time in overtime when he'd already accounted for five touchdowns but his defense couldn't stop anyone and he missed one pass? That's MUCH worse than botching a hold on a gimme field goal.

And of course, no one has ever thrown for more than 527 yards or 6 touchdowns in a game, but Romo could have thrown for 600/9 (!?!?!!?!?!?!?).

What's with adding a random, strange entertainment reference into these? Even Abe Vigoda thinks it's weird!!!

Situation, or the environment in which these two great players started their career, has everything to do with why Rodgers is perceived so positively and Romo lukewarmly (at best). When Favre retired for the 37th time, fans were so ready to move on that they gave the likeable, polite, Rodgers a free pass. Despite being a first-round pick, and given every chance to succeed, fans were pleased as punch when Rodgers proved to be a productive quarterback in 2008.

EVERYTHING. I SPEAK IN ABSOLUTES AND I'LL BE GOD DAMNED IF YOU TAKE ME LITERALLY.

Also, LOL Favre retired a lot, didn't he? Isn't his about how Romo is unequivocally better than Rodgers?

So people wanted Rodgers to succeed = Romo is better?

Conversely, Romo was given every chance to get cut. In fact, had Quincy Carter not failed a drug test, Romo would've likely been released in 2004. The Cowboys already had Carter (the starter), Vinny Testaverde (a Parcells guy), and Drew Henson (a highly touted prospect). Romo was the odd man out. But history played out as it did, and Romo outplayed everyone. The undrafted free agent out of Eastern Illinois took the team to the playoffs and made the Pro Bowl, setting the bar so high that he ensured himself of never getting a free pass.

God bless America.

He took his team to the playoffs (Rodgers did too) and made the Pro Bowl (a useless popularity contest), setting the bar so high (for: ???) and "never getting a free pass," which is gobbledeegook.

The dropped snap in the wild-card game vs. Seattle in the 2006 season didn't help. Nor did going to Mexico with Jessica Simpson the weekend before the divisional playoffs. But how many starting quarterbacks are asked to hold for kicks these days? And no one would care if Rodgers started hanging out with Meryl Streep, or Merril Hoge for that matter.

Blowing a playoff game didn't help, but it did make him a better playoff qb than Aaron Rodgers. I'd like to imagine that Elliot Harrison had a brain aneurysm halfway through this column and just couldn't stop himself.

Random entertainment references in this column now: 3 (Merril Hoge doesn't count as an entertainment reference, in case anyone was wondering).

Dating Simpson is where a lot of the Romo-hating started, with much of the venom coming from fans who have the vacation time but no Jessica to spend it with. But don't forget, Dallas had a bye that weekend, and Romo had to spend it listening to Jessica talk about Golden Retrievers and Prada bags. Not exactly a vacation.

Elliot Harrison, who was there at the time [citation needed], thinks it was OK, because Jessica spent the entire time talking about dogs and purses. So it wasn't a real vacation. This is nonsense.

And wasn't this about why Romo is better than Rodgers?

That said, everything but Romo's performance as a quarterback on the field sticks to him.

Which is unfair because: ???

He has the same numbers as Rodgers,

Not true.

has won a sizably larger percentage of his games,

Not really true.

and like his Packers contemporary, makes unbelievable plays.

And this was talked about when?

These guys should be spoken of together, but only in the sense that they are two of the top 10 quarterbacks in the NFL, with plenty of good days ahead of them.

This article should be thrown out, but only in the sense that it should be lit on fire and used to wipe a butt first.

The Bad Lieutenant: Port Call of New Orleans

2009-11-20T22:02:00.003-05:00

When Movies Go Bad

This is a new section where I will be showing you trailers of upcoming movies breaking down the plot, then rating the movie based on beer, shot of hard liquor or spirits as the upper class calls them, or whatever drug I'm experimenting with at the time. Oh by the way I'm Matt Hanratty or as the Puerto Ricans call me . . . Mr. IMDB, sorry I just saw a commercial for Barcardi.

00:30- The movie is heading in a Training Day direction, bad cop(s), the scene is dark and ominous. Wait . . . is that a washed up Val Kilmer playing the partner of a washed up Nick Cage, oh great this movie is already at rock bottom. Will the story help carry the film?

00:44- We find out that Nick Cage has a bad back, too bad its not paralyzing, and that he "Was a good cop." So basically he was a good cop (and actor) but now the times they are a changing. Oh and he's gonna be in severe pain, serves him right after Knowing and Next.

00:57- Oh great the list of actors for this is a who's who of B-List or soon to be B-List and now we throw in rapper turned actor proof that 1 + 1 = 3

01:04- Nick cage has a gun in his pants, no not his dick but a revovler resembling a Colt .44 Magnum, the gun that Eastwood uses in the Dirty Harry films. So now Cage is trying to be a bad-ass cop. In real life his captain would put his foot so far up his ass that Cage would have to learn to tie shoes with his tounge. But will let it continue on the grounds that it brings back the edge that the movie lost when Xzibit showed up.

01:11- Oh come on don't tell me you didn't see the drug use coming, the title of the movie is The Bad Lieutenant so you know he's not a good guy. Also back pain, come one tell me how many of you have taken pain killers when you weren't even in pain, yes you in the back. So the movie has been laid out for us good cop gone bad.

02:23- I would like to let you know that this scene was improvised by Cage himself after massive drug use preparing for the role. Oh yeah everything that happened over the last minute or so was extremely pointless to even describe. When a cop goes bad he either steals from crooks, uses drugs, abuses his/her power or a combination of the prior.

How the movie plays out . . .
Cage slowly slips farther and farther into madness over the duration of the film. The first quarter will be seeing him control his illegal activities but it will also so the temptations to go further. By halfway he will have slipped and be forced to get the money back that he stole. 3/4 of the way in Cage will be so surrounded by crime that he will have lost contact with his girl, the lovely Eva Mendes, and his friends in the police. In the last quarter of the film Cage's downward spiral will have hit rock bottom and will most likely lead to his death, which by my guess, and hopes, will be violent. Leaving the audience with a message don't watch Nick Cage movies.

Rating: In order to enjoy this I say have yourself a case of your favorite beer ready it's gonna be a long night.

The Clipped Wing Award: 2009

2009-10-21T13:19:00.000-04:00

To the Oriole that demonstrates outstanding ability in fucking up the game.

t1.	Jeremy Guthrie	6
	David Hernandez	6
t2.	Rich Hill	5
	Jim Johnson	5
	Jason Berken	5
	Douchey Matt Albers	5
	Aubrey Huff	5
t3.	Bob McCrory	4
	Melvin Mora	4
	Chris Ray	4
	Peter Angelos	4
	Cesar Izturis	4
t4.	Mark Hendrickson	3
	George Sherrill	3
	Ty Wigginton	3
	Luke Scott	3
	Matt Wieters	3
	Nick Markakis	3
	Brian Bass	3
	Chris Tillman	3
	Adam Eaton	3
t5.	Brian Roberts	2
	Danys Baez	2
	Adam Jones	2
t6.	Gregg Zaun	1
	Angel Hernandez	1
	Koji Uehara	1
	Brian Matusz	1
	Chad Moeller	1
	Nolan Reimold	1
	Sean Henn	1
	Felix Pie	1

2009 Orioles Season Recap.

2009-10-11T17:33:00.002-04:00

This picture sums up the O's season rather nicely.

So there you have it. The O's finished the 2009 season with a 64-98 record. That is 5 more losses than the previous season and it makes for a 12th straight losing season. Overall, it was season of disappointment. In the end it was the pitching that did the Orioles in.

Looking at the BWP Clipped Wing Award leaderboard, 6 of the 7 top award winners were pitchers. Jeremy Guthrie and David Hernandez tied for the CWA championship, fucking up 6 games apiece. Guthrie entered the season as the staff "ace" and finished the season with 17 losses and a 5.04 ERA so I give him the nod as the ultimate winner (or loser).

Looking forward to 2010, Brian Matusz and Chris Tillman must make noticeable strides in their sophomore seasons and show that they are capable of taking the reigns as the top 2 pitchers on the O's staff. It will be interesting to see what the O's do in the offseason to improve their bullpen and the team as a whole.

With Matt Wieters, Nick Markakis, Adam Jones, Nolan Reimold and the young O's pitching there is some hope for the O's future. But when you are in the same division with the Red Sox, Yankees, and Rays, it is always going to be an uphill battle. Unfortunately I feel that things might be pretty bleak for the O's until Peter Angelos is killed in a bloody coup.

See you again next season (maybe).

Alright Let's Get This O's Season Over With.

2009-10-11T16:10:00.003-04:00

Let's be honest. This blog is dead. I doubt we will continue to write for it much more in the future. But I feel like I owe it to myself to finish off this O's season.

Here's the deal. I'm going to do the rest of the recaps in this post and then I'm going to make another post with a full season recap. I hope you enjoy. I am depressed about the Ravens so it will actually be nice to write about the O's one last time before next year (I can't believe I just said that).

Anyways, lets rewind back to the end of September.

9/28: The O's got a decent starting pitching effort from Mark Hendrickson, as he surrendered 3 runs in 6 innings. Melvin Mora and Brian Roberts each drove in 2 runs for the O's, but the bullpen sucked yet again, as the O's were handed a 7-6 loss at the hands of the Tampa Bay Rays.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Douchey Matt Albers!

Douchey! It's been awhile. A stint in the minors wasn't enough to straighten out his below average abilities. He gave up 3 earned runs in 2/3 of an inning.

9/29: Jeremy Guthrie was handed his 17th loss of the season as the O's lost 3-1. Not much to say about this one. The O's bats were silenced by Wade Davis and the Rays squeaked out enough runs to get the win.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Peter Angelos!

God I hate this guy so much. Thanks for making baseball depressing.

9/30: David Hernandez continued his spectacular season, surrendering 5 runs in 4 1/3 innings as the O's lost 5-3. Ty Wigginton drove in 2 runs with a pinch hit home run.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... David Hernandez!

Yup.

10/1: The O's avoided the sweep as they won 3-1. Jeff Fiorentino, Melvin Mora, and Nick Markakis drove in the O's runs and Chris Waters threw 5 solid innings, surrendering 1 earned run. Jim Johnson earned his 9th save of the season.

10/2: Jason Berken pitched horribly, but the O's pounded David Purcey for 7 runs as the O's won 13-7. Michael Aubrey had 2 homers and Matt Wieters had a HR as well for the O's.

10/3: Mark Hendrickson turned in another decent outing, giving up 3 runs in 6 1/3 innings to earn a 6-3 win for the O's. Jeff Fiorentino drove in 2 runs for the O's.

10/4: The O's earned the series sweep and ended the season on a positive note with a 5-4 victory. Jeremy Guthrie threw 7 2/3 solid innings and the Blue Jays committed 2 errors, allowing the O's to score the game winner in the bottom of the 11th inning.

And with that, the O's season mercifully came to a close. Stay tuned for a season recap. Yikes, Baltimore sports are depressing right now.

That Stench You Smell Is The Baltimore Orioles.

2009-09-29T16:32:00.004-04:00

There have been 6 games since I have last updated. The Orioles have lost all of them. Let's hand out some awards.

On Monday, the O's opened a 3 game series with the Blue Jays. Chris Tillman turned in a poor effort (4 earned runs in 5 innings) to earn his 4th loss as the Jays won 9-2. Felix Pie drove in both runs for the O's.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Bob McCrory!

McCrory is making a late season push up the CWA leaderboard with his poor pitching performances. He pitched 2/3 of an inning and gave up 4 earned runs in this game.

On Tuesday, the O's carried a 5-2 lead going into the 8th inning. Naturally their bullpen blew it and they lost 6-5 in 11 innings. Brian Roberts drove in 2 runs for the O's

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Jim Johnson!

He blew the save, he gets the award.

On Wednesday, the Blue Jays won 7-3 to finish off the sweep. Jeremy Guthrie pitched poorly giving up 7 runs in 7 innings. Michael Aubrey and Matt Wieters homered for the O's.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Jeremy Guthrie!

He now has the CWA lead!

On Friday, the O's opened up a weekend series against the Cleveland Indians. David Hernandez pitched well enough to keep the O's in the game, allowing 2 earned runs in 6 innings. However a fielding mistake by Melvin Mora and some untimely hitting by the O's helped the Indians pull out a 4-2 victory. Nick Markakis homered for the O's.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Cesar Izturis!

Izturis went 1/4 with a strikeout while leaving 6 men on base.

On Saturday, Jason Berken sucked, the bullpen sucked, and the O's lost 9-8. Luke Scott homered and drove in 3 runs for the O's.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Sean Henn!

No clue who he is but he gave up 3 runs without recording an out. WOOOOOO!

On Sunday, Chris Tillman got shelled and the O's bats were stifled as they lost 9-0. Luke Scott had 2 hits for the Orioles.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Chris Tillman!

6 ER in 2 IP.

So there you have it. With one week left in the season, the O's are playing some of the worst baseball I have ever seen. My updates have gotten progressively worse and I apologize for that. I'm not going to make excuses. No one reads anyway.

The Only Good Thing That Came Of The PSU v. Iowa Game This Weekend.

2009-09-28T01:52:00.003-04:00

O's Swept By Red Sox... Again.

2009-09-23T01:20:00.004-04:00

Emperor Angelos is here to laugh at those of you who actually paid to see the Orioles play this year (Unfortunately I was stupid enough to attend Camden Yards several times this season).

Well.

Yeah.

Um.

Alright. The O's beat the Red Sox 2 times this season. They played eachother 18 times and the O's could only manage to win 2 of them. I don't even know how to respond to that. The Sox should send Peter Angelos a fruit basket or something. If we had won 5 of those 16 games that we lost, the Sox would have a 2 game lead in the AL Wild Card race instead of a 7 game lead. You're welcome Beantown.

On Friday, Jeremy Guthrie (3 earned runs in 5 2/3 innings) kept the Orioles in the game. Unfortunately, the O's were once again baffled by the pitching of Clay Buchholz as they lost 3-1. Luke Scott drove in the O's lone run with a solo home run.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Peter Angelos!

There wasn't a clear winner from the game due to all O's players sucking equally, so why not give another award to this fuck face?

On Saturday, David Hernandez pitched decently (3 earned runs in 6 innings) only to see it ruined by what the Orioles like to call their "bullpen". The O's relievers gave up 8 runs in 3 innings to turn the game into an 11-5 blowout. Ty Wigginton hit 2 home runs and Matt Wieters went 3/5 with and RBI.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Bob McCrory!

McCrory gave up 5 runs in 2/3 of an inning. All of the runs were unearned due to an error by Wigginton, but I don't care, Bobby still gave up 2 home runs. Man, we suck.

On Sunday, the Red Sox completed the clean sweep as they won 9-3. Jason Berken got lit up (6 earned runs in 3 innings) and Dice-K held the O's to 3 runs. Luke Scott homered for the O's.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Jason Berken!

Obviously.

See you soon with more depressing news from Baltimore!

O's Split Series With The Rays.

2009-09-18T13:59:00.003-04:00

The O's finished up a 4 game series with the Tampa Bay Rays yesterday. Here is a recap of the games, full of people I didn't even realize were on the Orioles:

On Monday, the Rays beat the Orioles 8-4 to end their 11 game losing streak. David Hernandez continued his recent streak of bad outings allowing 5 runs in 3 innings. Melvin Mora, Matt Wieters, and Luke Scott each drove in 1 run for the Orioles.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Davis Hernandez!

The long ball continues to kill the O's pitchers. Hernandez has given up 23 HRs on the season and his ERA is now 5.40.

On Tuesday, the Orioles pounded Jeff Niemann as they won 10-5. Jason Berken pitched well enough to earn his fifth win of the season (although his ERA is now 6.08). Matt Wieters had a big day at the plate, going 3/4 with a home run and 5 RBIs. Luke Scott also homered for the O's.

Wednesday's game was an exciting one, as Matt Wieters hit a walk off 2 run home run in the bottom of the 9th to give the O's a 4-2 win. He also threw two runners out at second base earlier in the game. Chris Tillman pitched extremely well for the O's, surrendering only 1 run in 6 2/3 innings.

Yesterday, the O's bats were silenced by Wade Davis as he pitched a complete game shutout to give the Rays a 3-0 victory. Davis struck out 10 batters while only surrendering 4 hits and 2 walks. Mark Hendrickson only lasted 3 1/3 innings as he surrendered 2 runs in his first start since May 12.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Nick Markakis!

Markakis went 0/4 with a strikeout and 4 men left on base.

Tonight the O's open up a weekend series vs. Boston. The Sox are 13-2 against the O's this year. Dear lord that is depressing. I'll be back with plenty of CWAs on Monday.

The O's Still Have A Little Fight Left In Them!?

2009-09-15T23:33:00.002-04:00

The O's went into Yankee Stadium this past weekend and actually put together a decent series. This is how it went down:

On Friday, the Orioles pounded out 10 runs on 16 hits as they earned a 10-4 victory. Chris Tillman struck out 8 Yankees in 5 innings, earning his 2nd victory of the year. Brian Roberts led the Orioles with 3 RBIs. On a weird side note, Mark Hendrickson pitched 3 innings for his first career save.

On Saturday, Brian Roberts tore apart Yankees pitching for the second straight game as he went 3/4 with a HR and 4 RBIs. Nolan Reimold also added a HR for the O's as they won 7-3. Brian Matusz had as strong outing, allowing 1 run in 7 innings.

On Sunday, the O's lost 13-3. It was 5-3 going into the bottom of the 8th inning until Chris Waters and Bob McCrory surrendered 8 runs (O's bullpen! woooo). Justin Turner, Chad Moeller, and Jeff Fiorentino (3 future Hall of Famers) each drove in a run for the O's.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Bob McCrory!

McCrory surrendered 4 runs in the bottom of the 8th without recording an out.

Stay tuned later this week for more O's updates and Week 2 NFL Power Rankings.

Stupid mascots make for bad football teams...

2009-09-13T14:49:00.002-04:00

Sorry, but it's just an undeniable fact of sports.

Just watch this clip of "Cavman" (from before yesterday's Virginia game vs. TCU).

Cavman is a guy who dresses up as a Cavalier for Virginia football games. I mean, I guess that's cool, but that's not really the point.

Check out some important moments from this video:

:35 seconds - Computer generated Cavman on Scott Stadium jumbotron gets angry after seeing a computer generated horned frog prancing around Virginia's campus. Cavman goes to get his computer generated horse.

1:17 - Cavman (still computer generated) punches horned frog off highway overpass.

1:29- A truck runs over horned frog on said highway. Cavman is driving the truck.

1:51- Real life Cavman rides real life horse onto the field as real life Cavalier football players run to their sideline.

1:59- Camera pans to Cavman, on the ground, after having fallen off of his horse. Cavman unsuccessfully attempts to get back on horse.

Oh, then the football team lost, 30-14.

Theory proven. Thank you Cavman.

Aaron Kraut is a senior journalism major at the University of Maryland. Hire him.

BWP Preseason NFL Power Rankings

2009-09-13T00:11:00.009-04:00

I guess the NFL season technically started on Thursday, but I don't like to acknowledge the two teams that played in that game. So tomorrow is the official start of the NFL season. We can now officially put the Orioles season behind us (even though it seems everyone in the O's organization put the season behind them about 2 months ago).

But I digress. I am proud to present a new BWP feature! NFL Power Rankings! Each week, the BWP writers will get together and agree on rankings for each NFL team based on overall performance from the previous week and our opinions on the likelihood of each team making the playoffs.

This week you will get mine and John's take on the preseason rankings because the other writers (the supposed "founders" of this site) are lazy shitheads who can't spare 5 minutes to send me their rankings.

But enough about them. Let's do this!

1. Steelers - As much as I hate to do this, they are the defending champs and they didn't lose any key members from last year's team. Fuck.

2. Patriots - As long as Tom Brady stays healthy, they win the division with ease.

3. Chargers - I have a strong feeling that Tomlinson rebounds from a disappointing 2008 and Shawne Merriman puts the competition in a sleeper hold.

4. Titans - Strong defense and a good running game. Sounds like a recipe for playoff success.

5. Giants - Losing Burress was huge. Who is going to catch Eli Manning's wildly thrown passes?

6. Colts - They are getting older at key positions, but Peyton Manning consistently keeps them in games.

7. Ravens - I'm expecting big things this year from Joe Flacco and the Ravens, who are a year removed from an AFC Championship Game appearance. In a stacked AFC, the Ravens defense gives them a chance to beat any opponent.

8. Eagles - They have built an exciting offense with the additions of WR Jeremy Maclin and PI (prison inmate) Mike Vick.

9. Vikings - Brett Favre! As long as he doesn't fuck it up, the Vikings D and running game have the potential to lead them to the playoffs.

10. Falcons - Matt Ryan is looking to have a successful sophomore campaign

11. Bears - Jay Cutler is an improvement over Kyle Orton.

12. Packers - The NFC North is an interesting division this year. A lot of contenders. The Packers should compete for the division title as long as their D shows improvements from last year.

13. Panthers - Jake Delhomme shit himself in the playoffs. If he can put that behind him, the Panthers have the pieces to make the playoffs again.

14. Cardinals - There is no way Kurt Warner stays healthy two seasons in a row

15. Texans - Everyone's favorite sleeper pick this season. Matt Schaub needs to prove he can stay healthy before the Texans can be considered a serious threat.

16. Saints - The offense is downright scary. The defense, not so much.

17. Cowboys - They got rid of T.O. but the off field distractions continue. How do people actually like this team?

18. Dolphins - Chad Pennington played well last year, but the team is preparing to slowly hand the reigns over to Chad Henne. Defenses are starting to figure out the Wildcat. Sorry Ronnie Brown.

19. Redskins - I can't figure this team out. They could be good or they could suck. Is Jason Campbell good? Judging by what happened this offseason, Dan Snyder doesn't seem to think so.

20. Seahawks - The addition of Houshmandzadeh is big for Matt Hasselbeck but they don't have much to offer at the RB position.

21. Jets - Rex Ryan brings a breath of fresh air to a team that was under the power of dominatrix Eric Mangini last year. This team is heading in the right direction (as long as Mark Sanchez isn't a bust).

22. Jaguars - This team is boring.

23. Bills - T.O. will rip Trent Edwards arm off and beat him senseless with it by Week 6. Put money on it.

24. 49ers - Shaun Hill? Sounds like a long term QB solution to me

25. Bengals - Hard Knocks revealed to me that the Bengals are a poorly run franchise. Marvin Lewis will not have a job at this time next year.

26. Chiefs - Matt Cassell better be good or things could be ugly in KC for years to come.

27. Broncos - Kyle Orton was a slight downgrade from Jay Cutler.

28. Buccaneers - I don't know too much about this team. I think they fired their offensive coordinator last week. This isn't a good sign

29. Browns - Mangenious to the rescue! Jamal Lewis is washed up! Brady Quinn is gay!! Braylon Edwards can't catch! The Browns are fucked!

30. Rams - Hey Rams fans! You are a Marc Bulger injury (very likely) away from Kyle Boller becoming your starting QB. Good luck!

31. Raiders - There is no way Al Davis is still alive. This franchise is embarrassing.

32. Lions - There's nowhere to go but up!

Enjoy Week 1 of the NFL tomorrow. Go Ravens!

Please Just End The Misery Already!

2009-09-10T23:28:00.003-04:00

The O's were spared tons of embarrassment this week by only having to play a 2 game series against the Red Sox.

On Tuesday, the O's were blanked for the second game in a row as they lost 10-0. Clay Buchholz continued his wizardry against the O's as he pitched 7 scoreless innings. David Hernandez got lit up as he lasted only 2 2/3 innings.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... David Hernandez!

Hernandez gave up 6 earned runs in 2 2/3 innings.

On Wednesday, the O's lost 7-5. Berken was mediocre. Boston is better than us. It is sad to write about.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Melvin Mora!

0/5 with a strikeout and 5 left on base.

The O's play the Yankees this weekend. It's gonna be a bloodbath.

Walker Texas Ranger Ain't Got Shit On The Orioles.

2009-09-10T23:04:00.003-04:00

The Orioles did good against the Texas Rangers this past weekend. Let me tell you about it.

On Friday, Chris Tillman (5 ER in 6 IP) pitched poorly and the Orioles lost 5-1 as a result of this poor performance. Brian Roberts drove in the only run for the O's.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Chris Tillman!

See stats above.

On Saturday, Brian Matusz settled down after giving up 4 early runs and he pitched 7 strong innings as the O's won 5-4. Nolan Reimold homered and Melvin Mora homered and drove in 3 runs for the O's.

On Sunday, the O's earned the series win 7-0 behind the right arm of Jeremy Guthrie (7 IP 6 Ks). Brian Roberts, Chad Moeller, and Jeff Fiorentino (who?) each drove in 2 runs for the O's.

You Are Still Fat and Ugly, the Facebook Hand on Hip Pose Isn't Going to Change That

2009-09-09T01:39:00.005-04:00

I've started to notice a trend at parties, facebook, through my binoculars across the street from a slumber party, etc. that more and more girls are posing for pictures like they are modeling for Vogue. I think you all know what I'm talking about; that stupid shot where the bitch with the dress on so short that it makes her fallopian tubes more accessible to the human eye than her make up ridden coke face turns to the side ever so slightly (her good side of course, lol!)and puts her hand on her hip.

Why do droves and droves of whores do this might you ask? It's simple, they know their slut friend Jenny who has to take 450 pictures each time someone takes a shot of their Bacardi Razz is going to put them in an album on Facebook with a name similar to "The Times We'll Never Remember With the Friends We'll Never Forget!!! Love You girlsies, lolz!" or "BlackOut '09: We Pregame Harder Than You Party!! Whoo!." I'd rather get choked out by Shawn Merriman Tila Tequila style than see another one of these albums again.

What infuriates me the most is that ugly chicks actually think this shit works. Like, people will think you're hotter if your hand is on your hip. Either you're hot, or you're fat and ugly and there's not any amount of cloth or posing that will change this. Putting your hand on your hip in some attempt to look skinnier and sexy isn't going to hide your Krispy Kreme diet. YOU ARE STILL A FAT WHORE THAT NO ONE WANTS TO HAVE SEX WITH. Do us all a favor and go to College Pizza, chow down on your X-Large sausage by yourself like you do every Friday and Saturday while your hot roommates go back home with their boyfriends and eat your fat self to death.

Shawne Merriman: Unsung Hero

2009-09-06T16:08:00.006-04:00

Shawne Merriman (allegedly) did the world a favor and choked out Tila Tequila. John Wayne can roll through town, kill everyone in it, and leave a hero, but Shawne Merriman is some kind of asshole? I don't like it. They should erect a statue of this incident on Maryland's campus next to Jim Henson.

Let's look at the resume:

Went to Maryland, so nobody really cared
Took steroids, but it's not baseball so nobody cared
Out for the entire 2008 season with a knee injury, but then Brady went down
Choked out Tila Tequila, but Michael Vick killed a few dogs

Shawne Merriman, you are the Van Gough of Line Backers. This world was not meant for someone as beautiful as you.

Fuck the Yankees.

2009-09-04T00:15:00.010-04:00

This season has been horrible. It isn't fun to watch the Orioles anymore and I don't understand why anyone would waste their time or money to see them in person (and judging by attendance numbers, most people aren't). I understand the team is rebuilding, and for the most part I like the way it is going. With that being said, it seems like the team is just rolling over and dying.

Which to me points to one thing: coaching. I don't know whether Trembley is qualified to be a competitive coach in the MLB. He simply hasn't had enough time with these young players for me to decide one way or the other. And to be honest, Joe Torre wouldn't be able to do much with the pitching that we had this year.

But, with the prospects and young pitching talent we have, the O's better finish at .500 or better next season or Trembley will probably be looking for a new job. It isn't that hard of an accomplishment and with the (supposed) talent that the O's have in the majors now, .500 is not an unrealistic goal.

That ends my O's rant for the day. Lets get to the shit show that was the Yankees series...

On Monday, the O's didn't get a hit until the 7th inning. Needless to say, they didn't win. Jeremy Guthrie pitched 6 innings, giving up 2 runs as the O's lost 5-1. Melvin Mora drove in the O's lone run with a solo homer.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Nolan Reimold!

Reimold went 0/4 with 3 strikeouts and he left 4 men on base.

On Tuesday, David Hernandez pitched like shit (5 ER in 5 IP with 6 walks) but was still in line for the win as the O's scored 6 runs off of A.J. Burnett. However, Chris Ray took matters into his own hands and gave up 3 runs in the 7th inning while only recording 1 out and the O's went on to lose 9-6. Luke Scott and Felix Pie homered for the O's.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Chris Ray!

For the above mentioned reasons.

Wednesday, the O's and Yankees found themselves in the midst of a pitchers duel... until the 9th inning. Jason Berken (1 ER in 5 1/3 IP) and CC Sabathia (1 ER in 7 IP) both turned in quality starts, but the Yankees bullpen proved to be superior. The O's bullpen surrendered 9 runs over 3 2/3 innings, with 7 of those runs coming in the 9th inning. Nolan Reimold and Nick Markakis drove in the O's runs.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Jim Johnson!

5 earned runs without recording an out. Sounds like a long term solution for our closer position. Yikes.

The O's open a 3 game series with Texas on Friday. Is the season over yet?

Cleveland Rocks!

2009-08-31T13:56:00.006-04:00

The Orioles split a 4 game series with the Indians this past weekend to prove that both teams are equally horrible at the game of baseball.

On Thursday, Jim Johnson recorded his 4th blown save of the season as the Indians rallied to win 5-4. David Hernandez pitched well enough to win as he went 6 innings while giving up 2 earned runs. Matt Wieters and Melvin Mora each homered for the Orioles.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Jim Johnson!

You blow the save, you get the award.

On Friday, the O's beat up on the Indians pitching as they easily won 13-4. Nick Markakis and Felix Pie each homered and drove in 3 runs for the O's and Matt Wieters went 3/4 with 4 RBIs. Jason Berken earned the win for the O's.

On Saturday, Chris Tillman was pitching well (1 run in 5 innings) until a 1 hour 37 minute rain delay forced him to exit the game early. The Orioles bullpen (specifically Chris Ray) took this opportunity to screw up royally as the O's lost 5-3. Cesar Izturis, Chad Moeller, and Nolan Reimold each drove in a run for the O's

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Chris Ray!

Ray gave up 3 earned runs in 1 inning pitched to earn the loss.

Yesterday, Brian Matusz turned in the best outing of his young MLB career as he allowed 1 run on 4 hits and 1 walk in 7 strong innings while striking out 8. Felix Pie homered for the O's to drive in 2 runs, and Brian Roberts and Luke Scott each had an RBI as the O's won 5-2.

Today the O's open up a series against the Yankees so expect plenty of CWAs in my next update. Until then, enjoy the losing!

O's Lose Series To Twins.

2009-08-31T11:22:00.008-04:00

Yeah, yeah. I know this series was a week ago. The O's are just so depressing, it is getting tough to get excited about writing game recaps. But I am dedicated to the select few of you who still check this site regularly so that is why I will keep chugging along until the end of the season (hopefully I can do them in a more timely manner).

And as for the other BWP writers, I can't speak for them, but I find it very unlikely that they will be back writing regularly (despite multiple promises for frequent updates once school started). If that is indeed the case, I will make this blog my own and I will continue to write witty and inspiring posts while I should be doing school work.

To the recaps!

On Monday, the O's were shut down by Scott Baker as they lost 2-1. Chris Tillman pitched decently, giving up 2 runs in 5 1/3 innings. He walked 3 and gave up 6 hits while only striking out 2. Brian Roberts drove in the lone run for the Orioles.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Matt Wieters!

Wieters went 1/4 while striking out 3 times and leaving 2 men on base.

On Tuesday, the Orioles bullpen blew a 6-3 lead in the 6th inning as Brian Bass gave up 3 runs without recording an out. Kam Mickolio gave up a run in the bottom of the 9th as the O's lost 7-6. Michael Aubrey drove in 3 runs for the O's

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Brian Bass!

Bass pitched like shit.

On Wednesday, the O's avoided the sweep as they won 5-1 thanks to a good outing by Jeremy Guthrie (1 ER in 7 IP with 5 strike outs and no walks). Chad Moeller drove in 2 runs and Felix Pie homered to lead the O's offense.

Stay tuned for an update on the Cleveland series coming up soon.

Orioles Win A Series!!!

2009-08-23T23:39:00.005-04:00

The Orioles opened their series against the White Sox on Friday with a rare stellar pitching performance from Jeremy Guthrie (7 IP allowing 1 ER) as the O's won 5-1. Brian Roberts hit 2 home runs in the game while driving in 3 runs. Nick Markakis and Ty Wigginton drove in the other runs for the O's.

On Saturday, the O's bats were silenced by John Danks as the White Sox won 4-1. Danks wasn't spectacular as he walked 6 batters, but he pitched out of several jams and allowed only 1 run in 6 1/3 innings. David Hernandez lasted only 4 innings, giving up 3 runs on 3 hits and 3 walks.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Adam Jones!

Jones has cooled off recently since his impressive first half. In this game he went 0/4, leaving 5 men on base.

Today the O's earned the series win as they beat the Sox 5-4. Jason Berken pitched well enough (2 earned runs in 5 2/3 innings) to earn is 3rd win of the season. Nolan Reimold and Felix Pie each homered and drove in 2 runs to lead the O's offense.

Tomorrow the O's open a 3 game series against the Minnesota Twins. Go Brett Favre!

O's Avoid Sweep Against Rays.

2009-08-22T01:26:00.002-04:00

On Tuesday, the O's opened up a 3 game series with the Tampa Bay Rays with a disappointing 5-4 loss. Jason Berken gave up 11 hits and 3 home runs in 5 1/3 innings to earn his 11th loss of the season. Matt Wieters homered for the Orioles.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Melvin Mora!

Mora went 0/5 with 3 strike outs and 7 (!!!!) men left on base. No wonder Shatner benched him.

On Wednesday, the O's wasted a decent pitching performance by Chris Tillman as they lost 3-1. Tillman allowed 3 runs in 6 innings, but home runs continued to be a problem for the rookie as all 3 runs were solo homers. Brian Roberts provided the only O's RBI.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Cesar Izturis!

Izturis went 0/3 while leaving 3 men on base. This was a tough one to pick. All of the O's hitters sucked.

The O's salvaged the last game of the series on Thursday as they won 8-7. Brian Roberts hit a grand slam and Nolan Reimold hit a 3 run HR for provide the majority of the O's offense. Brian Matusz (5 1/3 innings, 4 ER) was cruising through 5 innings but was eventually forced out of the game by a Ben Zobrist 3 run homer in the 6th. Kam Mickolio (my new favorite Oriole) continued his scoreless streak (8 1/3 scoreless innings this year) working 1 2/3 innings in relief.

Today the O's opened up a series against the Chicago White Sox. I will update that series on Sunday. Suck it Barack Obama.

O's Continue Push For First Overall Draft Pick.

2009-08-20T02:05:00.008-04:00

A weekend series against the AL West leading LA Angels is the last thing the struggling O's wanted to see.

On Friday, the O's put a beat down on Angels' starting pitcher Jered Weaver (8 ER in 3 1/3 IP) as they cruised to a 16-6 victory. Felix Pie went 4/5 and drove in 4 runs as he became probably the worst player to ever hit for the cycle. Chris Tillman pitched well and earned his first major league win.

And then the losing began...

On Saturday, Brian Matusz had one bad inning as he was roughed up for 5 runs in the 3rd. That was all the Angels needed as John Lackey pitched 7 strong innings to earn a 5-1 victory. Nick Markakis drove in the lone Orioles' run.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Adam Jones!

Jones has had a stellar season but he went 1/5 in this game, leaving 3 men on base and committing an error in center field that led to an Angels run.

On Sunday, the O's accomplished something I have never seen before. With the game tied 8-8 in the 13th inning, Brian Bass and Douchey Matt Albers combined to give up 9 runs as the O's lost 17-8. I don't even want to talk anymore about this game. It is the epitome of this joke of an O's season.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Douchey Matt Albers!

Ol' Douchey, we meet again. He allowed all 3 of his inherited runners to score PLUS he gave up 5 more runs. I could have done better. (Douchey was sent down to the minors after this. Hooray!)

On Monday, the O's hopes to gain a series tie were quickly squashed as Vlad Guerrero hit 2 homer runs and drove in 5. Nick Markakis and Melvin Mora in drove in 2 runs in the O's 8-5 loss.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... David Hernandez!

Hernandez gave up 5 runs in 5 1/3 innings while surrendering 3 home runs.

I'll be back soon with news from the Rays series. Orioles Magic!

This is a bad week for Noted Blazing With Phelps Supporters

2009-08-18T17:29:00.017-04:00

Saturday, Matt Cain decided to make further mockery of the Mets' season by nailing David Wright in the head, possibly ending his season. He must not like the O's Updates. Today, Brett Favre joined the Vikings. This ends any shot of Sage Rosenfels landing the starting job. Watch yourself, Eddie Royal.

Favre gets the start Friday against the Chiefs. Plan accordingly.

My mom's reaction to Nick's post below:

2009-08-17T18:06:00.001-04:00

Oh my god, why are there naked people?!?!???!!!

Abrupt Trade Of Aubrey Huff Ends Slugger's Chances Of Earning CWA Crown.

2009-08-17T16:08:00.009-04:00

The fun in Baltimore is over for Aubrey Huff, after his trade to the Tigers this afternoon. By the way, it should go without saying but that website in the picture is NSFW (I checked it out myself).

Injuries and trades are making the race for the coveted BWP Clipped Wing Award championship interesting as the O's come down the homestretch of another miserable season. Today Aubrey Huff's chances of winning the award sadly ended as he was traded to the Tigers for minor league right handed pitcher Brett Jacobson (more on him in a second).

Huff's time in Baltimore was interesting to say the least. He was named the "Most Valuable Oriole" for the 2008 season (quite an accomplishment LOL!), but perhaps his most memorable moment (at least for me), was his appearance on the radio talk show, "Bubba, The Love Sponge Show". Huff discussed hard-hitting subjects, such as jacking off on road trips and being hungover and horny, and he topped it all off by calling the city of Baltimore "horseshit".

These comments pissed fans off for awhile, but it seems as time passed, they were willing to forgive Aubrey (probably because they realized the city of Baltimore is actually pretty shitty). It is a shame to see him go, but he is just another casualty of the O's youth movement (let's pray to God that it works). Have fun playing for a contender Aubrey!

Now more on the pitcher that the O's got in the Huff deal. Brett Jacobson seems like an interesting player. He was drafted by the Tigers in the 4th round in the 2008 MLB Draft and he has good size at 6' 6" and 205 lbs.

In 2008, Jacobson posted a 1.52 ERA in 29 2/3 innings pitched while striking out 31 and walking only 5 in A ball. In 2009, he has posted a 3.74 ERA in 55 1/3 innings with 44 strike outs and 17 walks as he recorded 6 saves with the High A Lakeland Flying Tigers (sweet team name).

Jacobson boasts a mid-90's fastball with a "devastating" slider when he is on.

I could see him becoming the O's closer of the future, but that is pure speculation by me at this point.

Either way, Andy McPhail continues to trade away aging veterans for young, highly touted prospects, and with the way the Bedard trade worked out, we have no reason not to trust him.

Pitching Shaky Again As O's Lose Series To Athletics.

2009-08-15T17:10:00.003-04:00

Alright, let's do this.

Jeremy Guthrie's woes continued on Monday as he gave up 5 runs on 11 hits in 4 2/3 innings. This poor performance, coupled with a lackluster offensive showing from the O's, led to a rout as they lost 9-1.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Jeremy Guthrie!

He sure isn't pitching like a staff ace.

On Tuesday, David Hernandez pitched well (2 earned runs in 6 2/3 innings) and the O's scored just enough runs to earn him the 3-2 victory. The 3 O's runs were driven in by Brian Roberts, Adam Jones, and Melvin Mora.

On Wednesday, Jason Berken pitched better than normal (3 earned runs in 5 innings) but the O's still fell to the A's 6-3, as Cla Meredith and Mark Hendrickson each gave up a run late to put the game out of reach.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Ty Wigginton!

Wigginton went 0/4 while leaving 4 men on base.

The O's opened up a weekend series against the Angels yesterday with a little Felix Pie magic that I will talk about tomorrow. Until then, enjoy the losing O's fans.

The O's Go North Of The Border, Go South In The Win Column.

2009-08-11T18:53:00.008-04:00

The O's started the Jays series on a good note with a 7-5 win on Friday. Jason Berken earned his first win since his Major League debut, going 6 innings while surrendering 3 runs. Nolan Reimold and Matt Wieters led the O's with 2 RBIs apiece.

On Saturday, Chris Tillman pitched a good game (6 2/3 innings, 2 earned runs) but did not factor into the decision. The O's bullpen failed them again as Danys Baez gave up the game winning run in the bottom of the 10th inning and the O's lost 3-2. The O's runs were driven in by Aubrey Huff and Nolan Reimold.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game was... Matt Wieters!

Wieters went 0/4 with 2 strikeouts and left 5 men on base.

On Sunday, Brian Matusz got shelled. The O's lost 7-3. That is all I have to say.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game was... Brian Matusz!

5 earned runs in 2 2/3 innings will do that for you.

The O's opened a 3 game series against the A's yesterday. It didn't turn out well. I will update you on Thursday.

Detroit Suck City.

2009-08-07T12:17:00.004-04:00

Blazing With Phelps and rooting for the Orioles go hand in hand.

Another O's series, another pathetic performance. Pack up your bags and start thinking about next season (I'm pretty sure most O's fans did this at the beginning of the season).

On Monday, the O's jumped out to a 5-0 lead on Justin Verlander in the 1st inning and never looked back as they won... JUST KIDDING! They did jump out to an early lead but highly touted rookie Chris Tillman did his best Jeremy Guthrie impression, surrendering 5 runs in 6 innings. Clete Thomas homered in the bottom of the 9th off of Danys Baez to complete the O's meltdown. Final score: 6-5 Tigers.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Chris Tillman!

Welcome to the big board Chris. Hopefully this is your last award this season.

On Tuesday. the O's jumped all over the newly acquired Jarrod Washburn (6 ER in 5 1/3 innings), as they won 8-2. Nick Markakis and Cesar Izturis each had a home run and 3 RBIs to lead the O's offensive attack. Brian Matusz became the 5th Orioles' starter to win his MLB debut this season, as he only surrendered 1 run in 5 innings.

On Wednesday, Edwin Jackson shut the O's down 4-2 as Jeremy Guthrie was the tough luck loser, giving up 3 runs in 7 1/3 innings. Adam Jones hit a 2 run homer in the 9th to drive in the O's only runs.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Melvin Mora!

Mora went 0/4 while leaving 2 men on base. This, coupled with his crazy remarks about not getting enough playing time, are enough to earn him the award.

Yesterday, the Tigers wrapped up the series with a 7-3 victory over the O's. David Hernandez lasted only 3 innings while giving up 5 earned runs. Ty Wigginton, Feliz Pie, and Aubrey Huff each had an RBI for the O's.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... David Hernandez!

Not good.

Tonight the O's open up a 3 game series against the Blue Jays. This is our best chance for a series win in a long time. Can we do it? Probably not.

A very special quasi-end of summer post to you and yours.

2009-08-04T09:31:00.004-04:00

Hello there, the ~28 people who somehow still read this site.

As you may have realized, our grandiose plans to post fast and easy this summer were dashed by the fact that, you know, nothing the fuck goes on during the summer. Also, a quick run-down of personal reasons why we all stopped writing:

Rob: Worked two jobs and lost a general zest for life
John: Lost fingers in an horrific pie-eating snafu
Greg: Died
Rich: Died
Nick: Actually didn't stop writing. This is like in 10th grade Algebra when we all got in trouble because we stopped working in class and bombed a test, and while the teacher was reaming us out, Nick was like, "dude, I got an A." Fuck you, Nick.

But as summer winds down, we actually are going to pick things back up, because it's senior year of college, and screw it. Here's some things you can expect:

We're Aren't Experts Football Previews
Great State Hate Debate '09 ('10?)
Rob Gindes Unplugged
Blazing With Phelps Rewrites History

And the discontinuation of ideas that sucked, like News From the Real World. Which I think had a certain zest to it, but ultimately was sort of terrible. You try coming up with stuff during the summer.

Anyways, school is starting for all of us within, like, the month. So we're all going to start writing again. And maybe taking on new authors and firing Rich and stuff. So keep checking back as we slowly--but surely--get back into gear 'n stuff.

Happy holidays
Rob

Well. That Went About How I Thought It Would.

2009-08-02T16:46:00.015-04:00

I'm sure this douche was at the game. Every other Red Sox fan was.

The Red Sox and their fans invaded Camden Yards for a three game series this weekend and the O's pretty much rolled over and died as they were easily swept.

On Friday, Jeremy Guthrie pitched like a staff ace should, giving up 6 runs in 6 2/3 innings, as he allowed 3 home runs (he has now given up 26 HRs on the season, leading the MLB). Nolan Reimold and Aubrey Huff each drove in 2 runs but it wasn't enough as the O's lost 6-5.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Jeremy Guthrie!

Yup.

On Saturday, the O's could not muster any kind of offense as they were blanked by Josh Beckett 4-0. David Hernandez pitched okay for the O's, giving up 2 runs in 4 1/3 innings (why can't our pitchers ever last longer than 5 innings?). Every hitter in the O's lineup had a lackluster day at the plate. As a team, the O's had 8 hits and were 0/7 with runners in scoring position.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Aubrey Huff!

Huff led the O's offense in futility, going 0/4 and leaving 5 men on base. Sounds about right.

Today's game; where do I even start with this game? The O's pounded out 15 hits and 10 runs. Enough for a win, right? Not when you have the O's pitching. The Red Sox pummelled starter Jason Berken (6 earned runs in 1 1/3 innings) and his crew of bullpen pitching flunkies to beat the O's 18-10.

Adam Jones was a triple shy of the cycle, going 3/4 with 3 runs scored while driving in 3 runs. Every other O's hitter had at least one hit except for Wieters and Zaun (damn catchers). I guess when you give up 23 hits, you don't have a very good shot at winning, no matter how well your offense does.

The BWP Clipped Wind Award winner for this game is... Douchey Matt Albers!

It's been awhile since ol' Douchey has won the award, but he earned it today, giving up 4 runs in 1/3 of an inning. Yikes.

The O's travel to Detroit tomorrow to open up a 4 game series where they will face Verlander, Washburn, Jackson, and Porcello. Sounds like another sweep to me. This is getting pretty old.

O's Split Series With Royals, No One Pays Attention.

2009-07-30T17:26:00.007-04:00

So long George! Thanks for looking goofy as shit!

Before we get started on the O's Recap, I just want to address the trade that took place a few hours ago. George Sherrill was traded to the Dodgers for 3B prospect Josh Bell and LHP Steve Johnson. It is sad to see Sherrill go, as he has been a great closer for the O's for over a year and a half now and I really enjoy the way he wears his flat brimmed cap and calls himself the Brim Reaper.

With that being said, I'm sure Sherrill will be happy to play for a winning team, and it is no secret that the O's are building for the future. With this trade, we were able to move a player at his peak in order to continue our quest to replenish our farm system.

I have a feeling that Steve Johnson will turn out to be just a run of the mill bullpen guy in the majors, but I have a good feeling about Josh Bell. He has exhibited good power in the minors and he looks to be the eventual replacement at third base for Melvin Mora. His only knock is his weak defensive play, but hopefully he can straighten that out and contribute for the big league club for years to come.

Now without further ado, here is your recap:

In a series that no one cared about (including most people in Baltimore and Kansas City), the Orioles and Royals proved that they are equally horrible by winning 2 games apiece.

Monday was the Billy Butler show. Butler went 5/5 with 3 RBIs to lead the Royals to a 5-3 victory. Rich Hill lasted only 2 1/3 innings while giving up 3 runs, all but ending his opportunity to remain in the O's starting rotation this season (he is now on the DL).

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Rich Hill!

I hate to do it, but he deserves it. His continual short outings put pressure on the bullpen, and leave all of the other pitchers tired for other games. This puts him in the lead in the CWA standings. Damn you Rich! So senseless!

On Tuesday, the O's wasted a rare good outing by Jason Berken (2 ER in 6 innings) as they lost 4-3 in 11 innings. The O's were up 3-2 going into the 8th inning until Jim Johnson gave up a solo home run to Willie Bloomquist (8 career home runs in 7 full MLB seasons coming into the game). Danys Baez gave up a run in the 11th to close out the collapse. Matt Wieters had his first career 4 hit game in the loss.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Nick Markakis!

Markakis went 0/4 with 1 strike out while leaving 5 men on base. Not the finest game from Nick.

On Wednesday, Chris Tillman made his long awaited MLB debut and his nerves seemed to get the best of him. Tillman gave up 3 runs (all solo HRs) in 4 2/3 innings and did not recieve a decision as the O's won 7-3. Tillman has great stuff, but he left a few pitches up and they were absolutely crushed by the Royals. It will be fun to see how he matures over the rest of the season. Adam Jones had a home run and 3 RBIs, and Nick Markakis also had 3 RBIs to lead the O's offense.

Today, Brad Bergesen shut down the Royals to earn a 7-3 victory. Bergesen pitched 7 strong innings, giving up 1 earned run and striking out 6 before he was forced to leave the game after a line drive struck him in the knee (x-rays were negative). Ty Wigginton homered for the O's and Aubrey Huff continued to heat up, driving in 3 runs.

Tomorrow the O's open a weekend series against the David Ortiz steroid crew. Hopefully we don't get embarrassed.

John Madden Must Be Turning In His Grave

2009-07-28T17:27:00.004-04:00

No Favre this year. Oh well, that would have been fun. At least Sage Rosenfels gets his chance to shine this year. He is undoubtedly the Trent Dilfer of the new millennium, at least until Adrian Peterson hurts himself. I'll go back in my cave now. Get off my lawn.

O's vs. Red Sox. Who Do You Think Is Going To Win This One?

2009-07-27T21:13:00.003-04:00

The O's opened up a 3 game weekend series against the Red Sox and they picked up right where they left off in the Yankees series losing 2 of 3 games against the Sox.

On Friday, Brad Bergesen pitched well, giving up 3 runs in 6 innings, but the offense was pitched into submission by Brad Penny (he isn't good, but neither are the O's) as they lost 3-1. It is getting really old watching Bergesen pitch his heart out as his offense continually lets him down. We suck.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Luke Scott!

Scott went 0/4 with a strike out, while leaving 6 runners on base.

On Saturday, Jeremy Guthrie pitched like a little punk, giving up 5 runs in 6 2/3 innings as the O's lost 7-2. Red Sox pitcher Jon Lester mowed down the O's hitters, striking out 9 in 7 1/3 innings.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Jeremy Guthrie!

Makes sense.

On Sunday, the O's won! I was starting to forget what it felt like. David Hernandez pitched a gem, allowing only 1 earned run in 7 innings as the O's won 6-2. Nick Markakis led the O's offense going 2/4 with a home run and 3 RBIs.

The O's opened a 4 game series against the Royals tonight. They are currently losing 5-3 and it looks like Rich Hill is poised to take the lead in the CWA standings. I'll have another update when I get a chance. Orioles Magic!

The O's Suck.

2009-07-27T20:26:00.005-04:00

Yeah I know. I've been horrible with these lately. But no one besides my family and a select few of my friends still read this site, so screw all of you.

The O's had a miserable showing against the Yankees early last week. If you were fortunate enough to be doing something else while these games were going on, here's what you missed (hint: not much):

On Monday, the O's wasted a great pitching performance by David Hernandez (6 IP, 1 ER, 3 H, 4 Ks) as Andy Pettitte used his pitching wizardry to hold the O's to 1 run in 7 1/3 innings. As a team, the Orioles left 16 runners on base and this eventually caught up to them, as Hideki Matsui hit a walk off homer off of Jim Johnson in the 9th inning, giving the Yanks a 2-1 victory.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Cesar Izturis!

Izturis went 1/3 with 2 strike outs, while leaving 3 men on base.

On Tuesday, the O's outhit the Yankees nine to six, but still lost 6-4, as Rich Hill pitched miserably again, giving up 5 runs in 3 innings. Melvin Mora led the O's with 2 RBIs.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Rich Hill!

Obviously.

On Wednesday, the Orioles starting pitching failed them again as Jason Berken gave up 5 earned in 6 innings. The O's surged late, scoring 2 runs in the 7th and 2 in the 9th, but it was too little too late as they were swept by the Yankees 6-4.

The BWP Clipped Wing Award winner for this game is... Jason Berken!

Duh.

Stay tuned for a post recapping the Red Sox series.