We've never claimed to be cutting edge, so I'm unsure how old this video is, but I saw it on Sunday and decided that you should peep it, too:
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Just when the Broncos seem to show a little life, and a little heart, with a come-from-behind road victory in Cleveland...the wheels come off the train.
Take a look.
No, not at the many, many chins of Bill Williamson. Check out the news he reports. Desperate for any help at RB following injuries to, well, everyone, they signed an old hand. When I saw the ESPN headline "Broncos agree to contract terms with RB Bell" I thought, wow, Mike Bell, huh? Where's he been? Then I saw it was not Mike, but--I can't even say the name.
Who needs running backs in this offense? We can't run the ball anyway, and no one buys the play action or the boot anymore. The most effective, highest-percentage running plays are a quick slant to Brandon Marshall and a bubble screen with Eddie Royal. What's wrong with giving Peyton Hillis 60 snaps a game? The kid's tough, and he can catch the ball.
So now--sigh--we've got this suitcase-stealing shitbag back on the club. So much for the complete break from the near past. Oh, and Happy Veteran's Day! Go hug a one-legged drunk.
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I know the Dodgers don't play this afternoon--they're scheduled to face the Rockies tonight at Chavez Ravine. I still want to use this space to bash Jeff Kent.
Jeff Kent is one of the finest second basemen ever to play this game. Go ahead, look up his numbers. Few at his position have ever hit like he has. Unfortunately, Jeff Kent is also a huge giant piece of shit as a person. This goes far beyond his moustache, which is actually pretty awesome. No, Kent's doucheness is acute and long-lasting. It's pretty hard to have a feud with Barry Bonds and have folks take Barry's side, but that's Jeff Kent. Bigger fuckstick than Barry Bonds.
Jeff Kent once wrecked his motorcycle in the offseason, which is a bad enough deal for a ballplayer. The bigger problem was that Kent had recently signed an enormous contract, a contract that specifically forbade him from riding motorcycles. Faced with the prospect of voiding the contract and losing millions, Kent did what any dipshit asshole would do, he lied and said he broke his leg whilst washing his truck. Which is totally probable. Jeff Kent does not like it when I go to games and yell at him, asking him how clean his truck is. But fuck him.
I could go on and on about how shitty a teammate Jeff Kent is, how he has singlehandedly tried to ruin the impressive youth movement the Dodgers are in the midst of, how he got Grady Little fired (actually a plus), and how in his spare time he adopts cats and then drowns them in his hot tub. I'll let that go, because that moustache is pretty awesome.
But this I can't let stand. Now Jeff Kent has committed an even greater sin upon the dignity of the game of baseball. Since the Dodgers acquired Manny Ramirez, merely one of the 20 best hitters ever to hold a bat, Kent has been killing it. One could draw the logical conclusion that Kent, hitting in the prime spot directly in front of Manny, is seeing great pitches and capitalizing on them. No way, says Jeff Kent. Totally unrelated, fuck you and fuck Manny. Or something to that effect. Which is all fine, because everyone knows Jeff Kent is a world class dick. Not content with that, Kent went on and impugned the integrity of Vin Scully, who discussed the connection of Kent's hot streak to Manny's arrival on air.
Jeff Kent criticized Saint Vincent. This can not stand. I've never asked anything of Dodger fans, a species that is below earwigs in my book. But tonight, I implore you, let Jeff Kent have it. With twenty thousand voices, ask him how clean his truck is. Boo his sorry ass. And while I never condone such actions, if someone throws a battery at him I'll smile, on the inside. Don't let us down, Humberto.
Oakland @ Minnesota, 11:10 Mountain While the Twins try to hang with the White Sox in the race for the AL Central flag, the A's are on cruise control to nowhere. You mean trading away our three best pitchers is a bad thing? Shit! Left behind after the purge in Oakland is young Dallas Braden, who'll match wits with Fransico Liriano at the Hube.
Seattle @ Chicago White Sox, 12:05 In another matchup pitting Central contender vs. Western loser, the Mariners take on the Pale Hose at U.S. Cellular. Somehow this season R.A. Dickey made his way from the Rangers to the M's, I'll go ahead and say that's the least important trade of the year. R.A. starts for Seattle, while Gavin Floyd takes the ball for the home team.
Houston @ Milwaukee, 12:05 The Astros have been hot lately, and in fact were the focus of a section-front story in USA Today yesterday concerning their playoff hopes. Playoffs? Cecil hates it when I cite McPaper, but I'll always counter that the multicolored fishwrap is no less accurate than the New York Times. On a dissimilar note, how does a grown man end up with the name Wandy? That's the handle of Houston starter Wandy Rodriguez, who today battles Manny Parra and the Brewers. Play Ball!
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Editor's Note: The remedies included in this post are not intended to fix everything wrong with the sport of baseball. As you may have heard, the professional version of the game has an issue with economic disparity among its clubs. If you haven't heard, please email The Lone Reader and he will send you a daily customized newsletter detailing the reasons baseball sucks, the excuses for small-market teams losing, and some handy pound cake recipes.
We're also ignoring myriad other problems, such as the tendency for fans to boo when the visiting pitcher throws over to first base more than once during an at-bat. I've never understood this, and it makes me furious. I also hate it when batters call timeout. Get your ass in the box. And, yes, I hate it when Manny (or anyone else) stands around and admires his home runs, especially when they aren't home runs.
No, today we're dealing with three issues. One, Canada sucks. Two, everyone's complaining about maple bats (which come from Canada, by the way) splintering and how someone's going to get killed. And three, this season has seen an alarming number of botched home run calls that have led to numerous pleas for instant replay in baseball. I have elegant solutions for all three.
SOLUTION NO. 1: MOVE THE TORONTO BLUE JAYS TO THE UNITED STATES I don't really care where, but the rumor that the Marlins were headed to Las Vegas if they couldn't get a new stadium was intriguing. Seriously, folks, watch this clip (hat tip: Deadspin)and find one good reason to keep a team in the Great White North:
After the jump, the answer to everything else (which, ironically, was inspired by Canada)...
SOLUTION NO. 2: ERECT A PLEXIGLASS WALL AROUND EVERY BASEBALL FIELD Just like the one that surrounds a hockey rink. And I don't know if that fucker is made of Plexiglass, real glass, acrylic or recycled fetuses from Laos. It's clear, it's ten feet tall, and it keeps fans out and pucks in.
I for one don't understand the recent furor over maple bats. When the wood, which is denser and harder than traditional ash, gained popularity a decade or so ago, it seemed like a solution to breakage issues. Batters bragged about their maple sticks lasting months, as opposed to needing dozens of ash bats to get through a season. Now that maple has become the preferred lumber in The Show, hitters are tweaking their bats more and more, trying to make them lighter with more mass at the barrel. Many speculate that because amateur players grow up on light aluminum bats with thin handles and fat barrels, they try to find wood bats that replicate those qualities.
If you've watched any ball this season, it does seem that bats have been breaking a lot more often than normal. And every once in a while a shard will hit either a fielder, umpire, coach or fan or come darn close. There's a lot of speculation that MLB will mandate a uniform minimum handle thickness to counteract the threat of a projectile someday impaling a child. Like everything else, though, the players' union would have to approve such a rule change.
My opinion is that if you step on a ballfield and collect a check, you assume a risk of getting drilled, whether it's by a batted ball or a sliver of maple. Fans in the stands do as well (read the back of your ticket sometime), but it is reasonable to offer paying customers down the foul lines some protection from flying lumber. So put up the hockey boards.
But this will cut down on the number of foul balls collected by fans in the front row, you say. To this I have one word: Good. Actually, I have seven more words: Fuck The Fans In The Front Row. I'm sick of you douchebags and your juvenile shenanigans. I'm sick of you reaching onto the field of play to grab baseballs. I'm sick of you falling onto the tarp and spilling beer and nachos everywhere. I'm sick of you begging the ball girls, the outfielders, the base coaches, to toss you a ball you didn't deserve. If you want a ball at game, you have four options:
1. Buy one.
2. Get lucky as shit and catch a pop foul.
3. Show up early for BP and wait in the bleachers.
4. Attend a Marlins game, where foul balls sit in the empty stands for hours before ushers and janitors throw them away.
Yes, I'm a little bitter, because I've neither sat in the front row nor snagged a foul ball in my lifetime. I've come real close but never sealed the deal. So you assholes that do both on a regular basis can eat the corn out of my shit. I hate that it's not enough for you to have the best seat in the house, you need to affect my enjoyment of the game by interfering with it and pestering on-field personnel. Now I'm supposed to be concerned about you taking a wooden spear to the temple. Fuck you. Get behind the glass.
I needn't tell Cubs fans what this proposal might have meant to your team's fortunes back in 2003. And if Jeter tried to dive into the stands again, he'd look like a bug on a windshield. What could possibly be wrong with eliminating the chance a fan could interfere with a game?
Beyond clearing up the foul lines, you could run the glass all around the outfield as well. Too many new parks have infinite artificial zig-zags and jogs in the outfield, arbitrarily painted yellow lines differentiating a homer from a ball in play. That weirdness, more than umpire incompetence, is what causes a majority of the botched calls that have fans clamoring for replay. Erect the glass, and the ground rules are simple: over the glass is a home run. Off the glass and back onto the field of play--get on your horse and run, Manny.
This has nothing to do with anything, but you could also give ushers Tasers and the authority to nail fans who yap on their cellphones behind home plate and wave at the camera. I doubt the players' union would have any objection to that.
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Today is not that day.
No, kids out there in the HoGosphere, today we sit a mere week away from witnessing an ugly smudge on the storied rivalry that is The Tradition. On Sunday, at venerable old Arrowhead, some 79,451 poor souls will witness about as lousy a matchup as the National Football League can deliver.
Now 79,448 of those saps will not give you premium House of Georges-level predictions and reactions concerning this debacle. But the famed Iron Triangle will be in attendance, and we will all unsheath our swords of footballery and wave them menacingly in the air to produce pronouncements worthy of the Karl Mecklenburgs and Buck Buchanans of yore. Or we'll just drink our old and flabby carcasses into a miserable heap and barely make kickoff. One of the two.
So welcome, misguided fan of AFC West football, to the Week Of Shit (patent Pending).
Fans of our two California representatives in this division, the kid-raping Raiders and pansy-sniffing Chargers, refer to the six days building up to their twice-yearly showdowns as "Hell Week." I used to listen to a lot of Jim Rome radio, back when he merely dabbled in the black arts of television and before he sold his soul to the four-letter network. Rome talked about his days as a jock on a San Diego sports talk affiliate, when Hell Week would come around and Raider Nation and the Chardonnay Merchant Marine would flood his show with calls. Rome always hated Hell Week, and now I know how he feels.
Making this trip is truly the last thing I want to do. These teams both really suck, and this game is going to be terrible. We may watch Patrick Ramsey throw to Glenn Martinez ten times. We may see a touchdown (or two) from some dude named Kolby Smith. We will certainly witness multiple repetitions of The Phony Formerly Known As Priest Holmes. It makes one long for the glory days of not too long ago, when half-ass bastards like Brian Griese, Dante Hall and Clinton Portis' mom roamed the fabled Arrowhead turf. Now those were some slightly-better-than-mediocre teams you could rally behind.
But what am I going to do, bitch? I get to fly to Denver, find a barstool in the B Concourse and knock back a dozen Sam Adams. Then I get to awkwardly hug Cecil and hop on a jet airplane bound for KC. We'll ogle the flight attendants, who will probably be men from Poland. And then we'll spill into the waiting courtesy vehicle piloted by Bankmeister and kill lots of barbecued flesh and canned beer. Good times.
You know who's trade roles with me in a minute? This guy. He's about the most hard core motherfucker I've ever seen. He's rockin the Zubaz, he's throwin down some dope signage, and he's totally up on his Broncohistoricals. Like, when asked who (whom?) his favorite former Bronco is, he drops twelve on yo ass. And one of 'em is Tony Braxton. Yo, corn flake. It's Tyrone Braxton, you fucking moron. Toni Braxton is an R&B singer that once demolished the Dallas Mavericks. Keep it straight.
I know that Broncosapien would kill to go on this trip, and he would keep it real to boot. And so I'm doing it for you, brother. You, the douchebag that makes me ashamed to root for this team (even more than their lousy record and crappy tackling). I will take this bullet for you.
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"If you want to be negative be negative. I'm not a negative person," he said. "You be negative as much as you want. If I stink and I don't pitch well out there, I know I stink. I don't need you tell me that. I have pride in what I do. I'll pull my heart out and set it right there [pointing to the table] for you to see it. When I perform, I've done it. I got that from my mother so if you want to write and these other people want to write negative...everything has to be negative these days. There always had to be a negative. I've always been positive in my life. It won't end. I don't want to be around negative people. So I won't associate myself with those people. So if it makes you feel good to write negative stuff then go ahead but you've never been in the arena. Never been in this arena to understand what it's like. Keep that in mind. People read your column and associate things with me that are not true. I'll answer it as honestly I can so that 10-year old when he reads about won't assume things. You can tell how passionate I am about it. Ok?"
