Baseball In The Daytime: 5-15-08

It's payday, so you're lucky you caught me early--by noon I'll be nipple deep in a glass of pinot grigio. I mean whiskey, damnit. No one around here drinks white whine, only brown liquor. In fact, make mine "whisky," without the "e," it's more frontiersman that way.

Rejoice, fellow drunkards, for there are nine, count 'em nine day games on tap today. They involve a wide spectrum of major league teams as well as the Kansas City Royals. And speaking of the Royals, Banky was kind enough yesterday to give us a clip from Hal McRae's infamous tirade. It's pretty good, and I like the fact that one of the reporters came out of it bleeding, but I have two major issues with Hal's rant. One is that all the curse words are bleeped out, and that is f***ing bulls***. The other is that Hal goes after a bunch of reporters. Everybody hates reporters anyway, except other reporters. Sportswriters are like lawyers or politicians or bloggers, the scum of the scum.

Which is why, in the comments, I linked to Lee Elia's postgame press conference from 1983. Now this is how you do it, folks (if you're at work or around children turn down the audio):

But I'm not simply trying to one-up Banky by posting a juicier clip. Lee Elia makes an important point:

That's the criteria of them dumb 15 motherfuckin' percent that come out to day baseball. The other 85 percent are earning a living.

That's us, friends! We are that 15 percent! The number is lower now, of course--even in these scary economic times less than 10 percent of the American workforce is unemployed. But even those of us with jobs can slack hard and enjoy day baseball with our laid-off, lazy and retarded brothers and sisters! Lee Elia is our patron saint, and his words give us hope and inspiration. PRINT IT.

Oakland @ Cleveland, 10:05 Mountain Somebody has to win the Central, and it may as well be the Cleveland Indians. Their superior pitching depth is starting to exert itself, and most think it will only be a matter of time until their lineup starts scoring more runs. Rookie Greg Smith is charged with holding back those bats today, while Aaron Laffey applies his humorous array of pitches to the Athletics.

LA Dodgers @ Milwaukee, 11:05 These two transplanted franchises meet today in what was once the parking lot of old County Stadium. It was 50 years ago this season that Walter O'Malley uprooted his Bums from Brooklyn and shipped them west to Los Angeles. And back in 1969, Major League Baseball granted an expansion franchise to Seattle, the Pilots. They lasted one year before they closed up shop and moved east to Milwaukee, where they became the property of a car salesman named Allan H. "Bud" Selig. I sincerely hope that this history is firmly planted in the minds of today's starting pitchers, Chad Billinsgley and Ben Sheets. Because those scouting reports they normally have to read are boring.

Toronto @ Minnesota, 11:10 Local media loves the hometown-boy-makes-good story, so I'm sure they are all over this Glen Perkins character. The Twins pitcher, who'll start today versus the Blue Jays, was born in St. Paul and matriculated at the University of Gopher Hockey. Does this mean he'll throw more strikes today? Or that the strikes he does manage to throw will be jacked off to by an adoring reporter from the Pioneer Press? You'll have to tune in to find out. Dustin McGown, from parts unknown, pitches for the Jays.

Washington @ NY Mets, 1:10 One of the things I like about baseball are the little rituals. Every player wears their pants and socks a little differently. Some guys won't step on the foul line between innings, and some guys will only eat chicken as a pregame meal. Mike Pelfrey used to wear a mouthguard, and between pitches he would spit that thing out, chew it from six different angles, and then suck it back in before dealing. I tell you, it was a disgusting spectacle, and it made me want to watch Mets games on the radio. But Pelfrey has ditched the mouthguard, because apparently the way he sucked it would indicate which pitch was coming. Wow. Jason Bergmann starts for the Nats, and he sucks in entirely different ways.

Pittsburgh @ St. Louis, 11:15 From New Busch comes this showdown between the Pirates and cards, represented on the mound by Ian Snell and Joel Piniero. Neither of these guys wear a mouthguard either.

Detroit @ Kansas City, 12:10 Head on down to Kauffman Stadium today, Kansas City residents. Parking is ample, and instead of paying for a bat in the lineup the team instead bought you a big ol' scoreboard. If the game is boring, I'm sure they'll show your favorite soap operas on that thing. Kenny Rogers and Gil Meche hope to hold off The Young And The Restless for the duration of the afternoon.

San Diego @ Chicago Cubs, 12:20 Greg Maddux is old, but I'm pretty sure he never played under Lee Elia. He did make his major league debut for the Cubbies, though, and today he returns to the Friendly Confines in search of career win No. 351. Ryan Dempster will try to prevent that from happening, but he's from Canada.

Houston @ San Francisco, 1:45 In the Bible, we read a story about a man named Sampson who lost his mighty powers when his hair was shorn. I'm pretty sure that story was true, because the Grateful Dead wrote a song about it. Today another Sampson, whose first name may or may not be Chris, tries to slay the mighty Giants and Tim Lincecum. I have no idea how long this Sampson's hair is, this ain't Us Magazine.

NY Yankees @ Tampa, 2:10 The Yankees finally manned up last night and put an end to the preposterous 11-game home winning streak the Bay Rays had been surfing. Tampa still sits alone in first in the AL East, and that's a sentence I have never typed before and may never type again. Little Ian Kenndey gets the call once again for the pitching-desperate Yankees, who would give anything for a Carl Pavano start right now. But who wouldn't? I'm more of a Scott Kazmir man myself, because he throws hard strikes from the port side of the boat when he's not suffering gruesome injuries.

Well, that's your schedule today, folks. I do have to say that I've never worked so hard, so get your ass to the tavern and Play Ball!