Monday, April 14, 2008

Tommy's Thoughts #2

New logo, bitches!

I note with disgust that the blog was not updated since I last shared my wisdom with you. What happened, folks?

Surely Bluster Foney must be able to fictionalize some event in Neil Corcoran’s life or the greater zeitgeist into a complicated tapestry of adventure starring Daniel Plainview! (How about “Hanley Ramirez jersey found buried under the locker room of the new Equipe stadium”? Shit writes itself!)

No Shortpants uploads from LaJaquardes N. Pulitzerface? Still working on a pun for the blog post subject? And I can’t remember the last time Leith “Nob Reyer” Kaw or Stayson Jarque chimed in. Basically an all-around pathetic effort in keeping this leaky blog afloat. Shame on you all…

LAST WEEK

Would you believe that halfway through the week I thought we were headed for a narrow defeat? No chance! LM lowered the hammer on Vicious Rumors, winning 13-6. After a few days of back-and-forth, my boys dropped the gloves over the weekend. No offensive category went uncontested, our premium closers exposed VR’s bullpen, and our SPs did just enough to keep us in the game. By Saturday, VR was openly whining. “My heralded infield went a combined 0/20 today. Awesome.

While I wholly understand his frustration with early-season offensive suckage, and in fact sympathize, one thing I will not abide is his pathetic appeals to our owner’s Red Sox allegiance when a key head-to-head matchup is on the line. “I hope you’re happy Wang is throwing a no-no against your beloved Boston Red Sox,” bristled VR.

Thankfully our owner, the wise and powerful Beatonian, was unswayed by this nonsense, and replied in a blistering telegram, “You bet your ass I’m happy. Wang’s career numbers in Fenway are poo, but we trusted him anyway, after crunching all the numbers and top-secret algorithms, and he was one Bob Abreu play away from a CG SO. Meanwhile, I didn’t see you benching Robinson Cano. Sorry the Red Sox lost a game, but my favorite baseball team is Lasorda’s Manicotti.”

This matchup also proved to be an illuminating lesson in the perils and advantages of shit-talking specific players. As the week opened, VR seized upon my trashing of Shane Victorino to call out the Hawaiian speedster, and promptly found himself with a rejuvenated RF opponent hitting over .300. I decided to threaten Ollie Perez before his start against Philly, only to see him utterly baffle Howard and repeatedly peg Utley. But just as it seemed that we had reaped the whirlwind, everything changed. Shane Vic went on the DL with a smacked-up leg; I strongly suspect he might have been mauled by a Jeff Gillooly-like VR henchman while at the club, but is too ashamed to admit it. Perez, meanwhile, went out for his second start on Sunday afternoon against Milwaukee with multiple categories on the line and submitted an absolute stinkbomb. The highlight was Ryan “Judas” Braun’s 2 RBI single: too little, too late for VR’s offense, but the death blow for VR’s pitching staff. Final tally: two players are smacked down on, and two players crumble like stone Buddhas detonated by Taliban iconoclasts. When tempted to slam individual members of your opponents roster in the future, fear not!

Good game, VR. The hits will come soon enough. But will the pitching staff be ready? See you next time around the rotation.

THIS WEEK

Prepare for war. If D’Lucious Bitch Pies and LM had matched up last week, the score would have been 11-10 LM – the only difference would have been Wang’s CG. Not only that, but DLBP would have taken some statistical categories that we virtually consider our birthright. LM has survived two sucky offensive weeks by playing even suckier competition, but that is not going to cut it this week. In addition, we will need to press our advantage on the pitching end to maximize return in an area where we usually just look to break even. No joke, DLBP is scary good.

The reasons start and end with Manny Ramirez. Ever since reading “The Secret” (or maybe just a Cliffs Notes version prepared by Scott Boras’ staff), Manny has self-actualized bushels of XBH and RBI into existence. With his left-side-kicks Rollins and Gordon, Manny has carried the Pies to a 20-15-9 record, only two games behind LM’s meteoric pace. Manny will continue to pile on hits in an epic contract quest – and he will be to DLBP’s 2008 campaign what A-Rod was to Guapo’s 2007 campaign.

But let’s keep things in perspective here. D’Lucious is playing Bobby freaking Crosby at IF. With Scotty Kaz and K-Rod weakened, his pitching staff looks a little suspect. There’s a guy on his DL with a wounded butt hole. And his main claim to fame is catching a fly ball hit by Jose Canseco in a Mexican baseball game.

Let’s show this banjo-playing Los Feliz fruit what is up!! Swing those bats!!

INCISIVE OBSERVATIONS

The call went out for the 2008 LOWV ante today, and it’s a meager $34. Hell, I spent more than that on LM in one random day in January - to convince the groupies that write “On the DL” to tell me which major leaguers have the biggest penises so I could acquire them for my team. (Hint: Joe Nathan.) The financial structure that underlies the LOWV’s prizes is as outdated as a 64MB MP3 player. When the current baseline was set, for example, VR lived in a disgusting Hollywood flophouse, Snatty tooled around in a 10-year-old Honda with 150,000 miles and parking stickers from three different women’s colleges on it, and tBB pumped gas for a living. Today, VR spreads his rumors from a slick West Side lair, Snatty drives an Audi pimpmobile, and tBB is the foremost expert in teaching sexy ladies how to speak English and then flying halfway around the world to maleej them. In short, the league has never been in better financial shape and our GMs have money to burn. Up the ante!

ERdR jinxed itself big time this week. While leading FC by decisive margins throughout the contest, Daniel Plainview asked in his Gchat status message, “Can ERdR pull off the upset?” Plainview, Plainview, Plainview. It’s week two. The season is young. While we can always speculate as to which team is stronger, the idea that a victory here would be a remarkable upset does not say much about the mindset at the ERdR offices. Of course, Equipe fell apart over the weekend and ended up losing 11-8. A respectable loss to the titans of FC, but maybe you might want to consider believing in yourself next time?

My notes on the PMF-LU matchup read in their entirety, “For those of you who persist in denigrating the great Roy Halladay, please stick this right up your ass.”

tBB eked out a face-saving 10-8 victory over Bonomatory this week but continues to struggle with atrocious numbers across the board. Nobody rebuilds better than Rick Kentz, and 2007 showed that this team cannot be counted out until the final bell. But things are not looking good for the lone New Jersey franchise at the moment. On the flip side, how does BI justify losing to a team that didn’t put up a single impressive stat anywhere on the board?? Unless you consider thirteen doubles and one triple impressive, which is a serious reach, you have gotta think that the Commissioner has been accurate in his frequent slams against BI and his Punto-love in the months leading up to the season. Too early to cast a true judgment on either team, but you gotta think there is some major soul-searching going on in Boulder and Chatham today.

Mothership’s rant against tBB on the bulletin board took me aback at first. The Belt has dominated our league for so long in such understated fashion that it was hard for me to dome the level of anger being vented at the defending champ. However, it should be noted that on recent episodes of Shortpants GM Kentz has been more and more boastful about his championships and the greatness of the Belt. Smack begets smack, and it seems that Kentz will have to sleep in a bed drenched in it...

I scouted a Sox/Tigers game this week with the Commish. Man, does that Tiger bullpen smell. In the dictionary, next to the word "stink stank stunk,” there is a picture of Yorman Bazardo.

unBeleaguerable showed what he could do against more modest competition by leveling El Guapo with much the same numbers he had in a defeat to FC last week. While Guapo relies on veterans, unB is infatuated with youngsters, and reaps the decidedly mixed results of that infatuation. Jupton and Geovany crushed everything that came before them, while Phil Hughes and Jered Weaver found themselves unequal to the task.

Meanwhile, unB made the first splash with minor league talent as Johnny Cueto was summoned to the majors for two exceptional starts and a third decent start. On the dark side of prospect development, tBB’s second-round pick Jordan Schafer was nailed for HGH use and will face a lengthy suspension. It seems Schmentz would have fared better with his original draft plans: either “Jumbo” Diaz or Jose Reyes’ first-born son. Schafer was probably snitched out by a teammate or clubby. Maybe he did a bit too much bragging about how great the LOWV team that drafted him is?

Snatty’s pitching looked outstanding this week. Too bad he lost almost every offensive category to Flash and his 10,398 first basemen.

OVERHEARD AROUND THE LEAGUE

Casilla will be the [Oakland] closer by the end of the year. I’m almost guaranteeing it. Street is wonky. The crowd has turned on Street.” When Huston Street saw these remarks by Daniel Plainview of ERdR published in the San Francisco Chronicle, he went on a clubhouse rampage in which he destroyed $15,000 worth of equipment while repeatedly screaming “I’LL SHOW YOU WONKY, MOTHERFUCKER!!” He then went out last week and racked up 3 saves with a 0.00 ERA and 0.90 WHIP.

Note to Plainview: please continue dissing my bullpen to the press. It’s the best motivational tool for baseball players since Alissa Milano started issuing gift cards for BJs.

SHORTPANTS – MY TAKE

Since there’s been no new show in over a week, this section might have been left blank – but I managed to catch up on part 2 of the bounteous opening day edition, so no worries there. What this segment lacked in open hostility it more than made up for in belly laughs. Any edition featuring PMF and tBB is bound to be entertaining, as the latter brings out the best in host Mike Jones while the former has a genius for wholehearted gigglefests inspired by Mr. Jones’ reveries. Excellent performances by both. I laughed so hard I almost drove off the road when Rick measured the progress of his years against Craig Biggio’s quest for 3000 hits: “Biggio is retired? Where did my life go?”

The most entertaining moment was definitely the part in which everyone trained their guns on Equipe. Mikeman regaled the crowd with a most lopsided trade offer. Sahl first hedged on an insult, saying that NCaV/Plainview are difficult to trade with “so I hear,” but then went all out and said he refuses to trade with Equipe. PMF probably stung ERdR the most with his comment that Equipe “has a fetish for eating salary.”

When asked about the episode Neil replied, “I am the tackling dummy of that show.”

LM PENIS/GENIUS

This week’s penis: It’d be easy to pick on Justin Verlander, but in two straight starts his line has been wrecked when Leyland left him in the game after he clearly should have come out, simply because the Detroit bullpen is that bad. If Dave Dombrowski’s total lack of foresight means JV’s season continues in this horrific vein, I have but one request. Do NOT bring Porcello up in a foolhardy attempt to fix this debacle. Otherwise, I may have to go into Day of the Jackal mode on ALL your asses…

No, this week’s penis is Russell Martin, who is playing at the level of his $3 salary. Perhaps he’s bitter that Furcal is making four times more than he is. Well, Russell, if you were 18 for 46, hitting .391 and OPSing 1.165 like your teammate, you might have cause for a grudge. As it is, you almost lost your job to Ryan Doumit! Get it together, man!

This week’s genius: Chien-Ming Wang, who continues to bless LM with his K-less wonders. Here’s an inspirational ad he made for his homeland of Taiwan. Ironically, it ends with him striking someone out. Shouldn’t Anonymous White Baseball Player have grounded out weakly to short instead?

DANK FARM NUGS

Check out this clip of Hershiser’s Heroes badass RHP Phillippe Aumont in an international game against Cuba last year. The movement on his pitches will make you leap from your chair and squeal with delight. That was the effect on me, anyway. As a bonus, at about the 1:00 mark you get to see a big fat Cuban man run like the devil is after him.

ENDQUOTE

“Michael Kay makes my dick hurt.” M. Jones

Until next time, I remain...
LASORDA

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