Second Effort

OK, last baseball post for the foreseeable future, I almost promise.

Steve Stone made it official that he is leaving WGN for what I hope are greener pastures. And I am left thinking, Are the Cubs the biggest bunch of crybabie pussies in baseball? Dusty Baker and his henchmen, the guys that actually listen to the SOB, have their color commentator and their play by play guy jumping ship. What do you think the chances of signing Nomar or the other free agents are? What do you think the chances of bringing in a quality free agent fromn outside the organization are? Zilch. And still, because they have the best four man rotation in basball (Clement is as good as gone, and he may have been the best on the team with some run support last year) in Wood, Zambrano, Prior and Maddux and about 5 guys on the roster coming back than can hit in vicinity of 30 homeruns per year (Minus Moises, sorry Sara, looks like Alooooo is headed elsewhere), the Cubs will be in the hunt for a playoff spot no matter how fucked up things are in the clubhouse. I still think Hendry is doing a good job, but Baker won’t bitch slap this bunch of pussies and tell them to suck it up and play baseball, like they are paid way too much to do.

Stone wasn’t the best color man, and Chip wasn’t great in the box either. But they were good at their jobs, knew the Cubs inside out, can called it honestly, now the Tribune Co. just chased them away. What are they going to bring in? If they put Ryno in the box I’ll forgive them, otherwise, I think this is just sad.

What did Stone say that got the Cubs up in arms? Here it is:

“You want the truth. You can’t handle the truth,” Stone said at the time. “The truth of this situation is an extremely talented bunch of guys who want to look at all directions except where they should really look and kind of make excuses for what happened.

“At the end of the day, boys, don’t tell me how rough the water is, you bring in the ship.”

Gee, sounds like he was pointing to personal responsibility, what a prick. I bet Stone votes Democrat.

Roughly an hour left in the Thursday workday and I have yet to post this week, so I better get after it. I have a ton of thoughts that I could make individual posts out of, but instead I will try to keep it punchy.

First of all, the boys over at Stew Hansen’s Dodge City have been waiting all week for me to bash Mr. Cory Morris and his Cardinals. Now, truth of it is, I’m glad the Cards flamed out like the flash in the pan that they are , but I did some research on Gina Jr., as he is affectionately known around his office, and I’m not sure this is the kind of guy I want on my bad side. I mean, the rape and murder of a bunch of prostitutes is one thing, but “part-time karaoke disc-jockey,” who wants to fuck with that? Jesus, I just can’t get over that. At least Robbin (another alias for the murderous bastard) got off the hook and moved on to a career in changing oil and sucking Stew Hansen’s balls and no longer has to rely on the wages of a PART-TIME karaoke disc jockey. Part-time, I’m asking you, could there be anything more pathetic? Well, I guess being a part-time karaoke disc jockey that lures hookers to your motor home, strangles them with their own hair extensions and then jerks off to a poster of Albert Pujols is probably a little more pathetic.

By the way, a quote from the St. Louis newspaper, “As they became the 16th team to be swept in a four-game World Series Wednesday night, the Cardinals also did something – or didn’t do something – that only three other World Series teams out of 200 had done. They never led in any game in the Series for even as much as one-half inning.”

Ouch.

Moving on, and hopefully upward, I got a call from longtime friend Mike Loveless the other day which isn’t as rare an occurrence as it is some of my so-called long-time friends. I figured he was calling to try one more time to get me up to Minnesota for the Iowa game next month, but no, it was a far more self-important call than that. He was calling to ask ME if he was in MY wedding or not. I don’t know if he already has a conflict or what, but the fucker was impatient with me not coming and asking him to be an usher, and apparently Mike has to have his plans set in stone a year in advance. Either that, or, you know, Kelly Loveless made him call and find out, that remains to be seen.

Now in Mike’s defense, I was an usher in his wedding and it is, of course, a regular practice to return that honor when it comes your turn. Problem is, Sara and I aren’t exactly doing the same type of thing many of our friends have done, and probably won’t have ushers at all. So I had to tell poor deflated Mike that he is not, in fact, in the wedding. But if he isn’t there, I will fucking kill him.

It struck me as funny when I got that call, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he already has a conflict and that’s why he was asking. See, Randy Boldt and his newly betrothed woman, the always tasteful and sweet Jennifer (I just got pictures developed of her fellating a bratwurst), got engaged a few month ago and scheduled their wedding for one week before ours. That shouldn’t be too much of a problem, except I know all of our mutual friends are going to throw fits about having to come to beautiful Cedar Rapids, Iowa two weeks in a row for weddings. But fuck them, they will just get drunk and piss in the hotel pool, so what do I care? And then I hear from Trent a couple weeks ago that a friend of his asked him to be a groomsman in his wedding and Trent, being up to his eyeballs in shady Afghanis right now, was pretty excited about it. His wife e-mailed me a few minutes later and confirmed that the weddings were on the same date. October is hot for weddings right now I guess.

OK, if I delve into another topic I’ll be here way past quittin’ time, and I only get to leave at a normal hour so many times a week. Big football finale for my teams tomorrow. I will miss the fall season, now its back to that basketball shit.

Ok, I haven’t touched much on this post season, and I doubt I could add much that hasn’t already been written. Obviously the Red Sox comeback was one of the best is sports history. Last night’s capper was thoroughly enjoyed, too much by some. It is too bad the other series has been overshadowed, Rich has a legitimate complaint in that regard. Both arguments are summed up with brevity here. My opinion…the Yanks-Sox series takes the cake based on history, but that whole ordeal with the cops in riot gear almost ruined it for me. Unless Osama was in the building, that shit was regoddamndiculous.

All I can say is, a week ago I thought this post-season was the biggest suckfest ever. Yanks-Cards World Series? What decent human being could appreciate that? Now I foresee a Rocket return to Boston, as the Asstros should kick the ever-loving shit out of St. Louis tonight. Why? Well, because Clemens starts on regular rest, Julian Tavarez is a worthless piece of shit, Carlos Beltran is the best future Cub in Major League Baseball, and because I honestly believe that Tony LaRussa is going to lose this game for the Cards. Go ahead you hawk-nosed little bastard, keep giving the B’s intentional passes, you’re playing right into the hands of the ’stros.

How powerful has this post season been? It changed my outlook on the game. I am now officially a fanatic for long-lost brother David Ortiz, and especially Curt Schilling after reading what he went through to get back on the mound. Curt Schilling is a man. He has proven himself the antithesis of everything a professional athlete is supposed to be. Sports fans, read that link, it will revive your fervor for the game of baseball. At the same time, I have to say this: I will be behind the Bosox in the Series, but it ends there. For years, especially recent years, there has been a sense of camaraderie between the wicked hahd core Boston believers and the perennially depressed North Siders. But their curse has been broken; they made it to the series. Now the Cubs are a lonely troupe, and after the ’04 series, the Bosox join the ranks of the Bronx Bastards in my mind.

I think the Twinkies will be my team from ‘that other league.’ Granted, they’ve had their share of success, but I’ve already got an affinity for the cities, they have classy gear, they have one of the lowest payrolls in baseball, and like the Cubs, they play in a broke-down palace. I can get behind that group.

Weird combination of topics, right? Well, as I was checking out the latest notes on my fantasy football team this morning, I hit Rotowire for some thoughts on the surprisingly successful Duce Staley. This is what I came up with:

Oct 19 Staley is third in the AFC with 582 yards rushing. He has a 4.6-yard average per carry, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports.

Recommendation: Staley’s performance has been a critical factor in the Steelers’ 5-1 start. To all those detractors that thought he was past his prime Staley’s play reminds us of Matt Damon’s line in “Good Will Hunting” when he tells a Harvard student that he got Minny Driver’s phone number, “How do you like those apples?”

No shit, some guy was sitting in his office in this reputable online source and thought to himself, “You know, I think I’ll quote Matt Damon today in my effort to accurately report the latest news on Duce Staley.” I realize I am still just the sports editor of the Tipton Conservative, but if I can’t do that guy’s job better than he can, someone please castrate me.

If I were composing the notes on Staley for Rotowire, it would probably include something more original about he gets repeatedly fucked in the ass by a Bus and seems to like it. You can decide which take you like more.

I don’t want to give the impression that it bothers me when I read that kind of bullshit. On the contrary, It just makes me a little more confident that when I go in search of a job down the line, I can rest assured that half the people with whom I am in competition are complete fucking morons. Also, I do have a record to uphold, I’ve never interviewed for a job and not gotten it. “So I have that going for me, which is nice.”

Reassuring stuff like this comes up on a regular basis, and in case you haven’t picked up on it yet, I’m inserting some quotes from other mediocre movies from my lifetime, without insulting my readers with attributions like Rotowire Retard above. And it’s especially reassuring because I know “I am not a smart man.” At least not a brilliant one.

I’ll give you another example, this past week the new high school football movie, a requisite 4-5-year happening, was rolled out in the form of what is truly a very good story. Friday Night Lights was a book before it was a movie, and some assclown reviewers are making like they are geniuses for connecting the fanaticism of high school football in some small towns to organized religion. I got news for ya, bitches, when I was a 19 year-old undergrad at the U of I taking my first religions course without ever having anything to do with church, I read H.G. Bissinger’s Friday Night Lights and wrote a paper comparing it to Christianity. After being initially skeptical after I told him about my project, my prof flipped out when he read it, made copies for the rest of my section as an example, minus my name because he “didn’t want to embarrass me.” Are you shitting me? I wanted to autograph the sonzabitches.

Shortly thereafter I decided I “loved” to write and got my first such job at the Waterloo Courier. It should be noted that my only respectable high school English teacher (and golf coach), Jim Berry, got me that job because he played golf on occasion with local dickmunch and Courier Sports Editor, Kevin Evans.

So what am I getting at? Well, take what you like from my rant today, but I’ll tell you this, if I’ve got to quote an actor in a movie to get my point across, it sure as hell isn’t gonna be Matt Damon, and “People who speak in metaphors should shampoo my crotch.”

I love it when you call me big Papi. REVERSE THE CURSE!

Sorry that’s all I have to offer, but I tried to write something more and it just became incredibly offensive before I knew it. Yes, so offensive I wouldn’t post it here.

Anyway, 2:00 in the p.m., I am on my way home after yet another work bender. Granted, those baseball games put a dent in my productivity for, what was it? 5 hours and 50 minutes last night? But I turned out a good issue and in the interest of keeping the blog as popular as it has been over the last week with an influx of new material, I am going to again post my column here. Enjoy, unless you attend or have any affiliation with a University that forces you to pronounce the word THEE before it’s location. If that’s your situation, I hope you die of rectal fungus.

It’s still Ohio State.

That’s what I kept repeating to myself over the Iowa bye week after the Buckeyes lost their Big Ten opener. Then they lost again, in overtime, to Northwestern? But it’s still Ohio State. Even after Iowa was up by more than 20 and THE Ohio State University had yet to break the 100-yard mark in offense well into the third quarter, I couldn’t help thinking Jim Tressel was going to release the hounds on the Iowa secondary and treat me to yet another miserable Saturday.

But it didn’t happen, the Hawks came away with a dominating win behind another 300 yard passing game by Drew Tate, and I’m still not sure I believe it.

You see, I, like many Hawkeye fans have a long history with OSU. The first game I ever attended at Kinnick Stadium about 15 or so years ago was the Ohio State game. My dad splurged on tickets we couldn’t really afford right on the 50 yard line about ten rows up behind the Buckeye bench.

It was a great game, I don’t remember many of the details, but you couldn’t ask for a much better introduction to college football in person. My dad fondly reflects on some choice words he had for coach John Cooper. Something about going down in history like Woody Hayes; he swears that got Cooper’s attention.

On the other hand, all I remember is a receiver by the name of Olive catching a last second touchdown pass in the back of the south endzone to beat the Hawks. I swear, the guy was upside down in the middle of a cartwheel when he caught that ball.

It would end in a 27-26 Hawkeye loss, and I have never forgiven that team.

I saw OSU once more at Kinnick before this past Saturday. That game amounted to an Orlando Pace highlight reel. I think it was that game that had college football statisticians come up with the idea of counting the so-called pancake block.

There have been other reasons to despise the Buckeyes over the years. A prominent one comes from the new addition of taped introductions for NFL starting line-ups, you know, the ones where they sit there with a football, say their name, position and school from which they most likely didn’t graduate. Some of you already know what I’m talking about, OSU players make a point of saying they went to “THEE” Ohio State University. I realize that the title of the school does include the word, but there’s no real confusion. I mean, even the name of the school is egotistical.

Also, when they reached the Fiesta Bowl two years ago I was bound by nature to root against them, which meant I had to root for Miami. And I never, ever, cheer for any school out of Florida. Of course, the Buckeyes won that game on a bad call in overtime and became perhaps the worst National Championship team in history. This was a team that beat Miami of Ohio by just four points, a bad Purdue team by four points and played the softest conference and non-conference schedule of any Big Ten team, ever. If Iowa had gotten a shot at them that year, I am convinced the Hawks would have won by 20 points if Nate Kaeding had started at running back.

So while I may not have waited as long as some of you Hawkeye faithful out there, I was certainly due some payback and I reveled in it.

It was disappointing to miss the incredible Tiger win on Friday night, but all in all it was a good weekend for this football fan. I got to watch Mitch Sander demolish the North Linn Lynx with a little help from a 94-yard touchdown by Luke Bader. I got to listen to the Tigers win the most exciting game of the season over the fifth ranked and previously undefeated Starmont Stars. I came home to find Durant-Bennett rolled up another impressive win against L&M, and my Union Knights stayed in Class 2A District 4 playoff contention with a 23-20 win.

Excitement over the football season should reach a fever pitch in Tipton this Friday night for the face off with Clayton Ridge. A win could, emphasis on the word could, lock up a playoff birth for the Tigers. But beware of the Knights in two weeks, Coach Crittenden has one of those teams that could rise up and shock any team they face. And I for one will very much look forward to seeing Chad Geary and Mitch Sander line up across from one another. Biggest hitters I’ve seen all year, bar none, even Mahmens.

Except that Matt Roth, that guy is an animal.

Well, we’ll see if this goes anywhere. I’m sure it will end in settlement regardless of the actual truth, but it’s nice to see Bill O’Reilly get some bad pub. Check out the Smoking Gun for some of the more juicy details on Bill’s fantasies. I’m skeptical as I am anytime these kind of accusations surface, but given the detail of the documentation in these documents, it sounds like Ms. Mackris may have invested in a tape recorder. Now to start pulling out all those clips from the Clinton era and just what Mr. O had to say about that incident.