Slight Rant, Slight Random Post

Hockey season can't come fast enough. Still. Hell, we've already had a goalie fight and the season hasn't started yet. If that doesn't get you fired up for hockey, then you have no pulse.

But hey - at least the last weekend of the baseball season will prove to be VERY interesting and well worth watching. With the Mets and Diamondbacks collapsing (The Mets just kept finding ways to lose to the Nationals...and what's up with the D-backs losing a September series to the Pirates?!) and the Rockies deciding to kick ass and take names and the Padres...uh...yeah, I'm looking forward to watching THIS whole drama unfold.

Well, there's the slight random post. Now, on to the slight rant.

*ahem*

Donovan McNabb posted a "perfect" quarterback rating on the Lions this past Sunday in what had to have been the most entertaining football game since...well...Cincinnati and Cleveland the week before. Which is great - teams posting 40-plus points on each other or turning the ball over five or six times apiece is my kinda football game.

But here's my problem: The "perfect" quarterback rating is 158.3. Where the hell did THAT number come from?! In baseball, a perfect game is the opposing batters going 0 for 27. A perfect game in bowling is 300. A perfect football quarterback rating is 158.3?! What in the world is that decimal doing there? Earth to Football "Experts": If you want a number to associate with perfection in football, please have the decency to make it a whole number, will ya? Preferably a round number. Please? For the sake of humanity. And oh yeah - you don't make your point or "analysis" clearer by yelling it at us. You just make us hate you and mute our TVs. Kinda defeats the purpose of you even talking, let alone yelling, doesn't it?

Well, that felt good. Now, who's up for a little Street Fighter?

Home Field Disadvantage

So here's something odd: Only one American League home team won yesterday...and that took a walk-off home run. This means every AL game yesterday went into the bottom of the ninth inning. Your one AL Home Team winner? The White Sox, winning on Jim Thome's walk-off 500th career home run. Every other AL home team lost.

The National League didn't fare all that better at home, either. Milwaukee, Colorado, Houston, and San Diego are your four NL home team winners.

Add that up, and MLB home teams were 5-10 yesterday. Root, root, root for the home team? I guess not...


And no, I'm not writing about football. Why? 'Cause I didn't watch any. Take that, football!

Spectacular Losing Day

Yesterday - the day after Bastille Day - I witnessed two absolutely spectacular losses on the baseball diamond. I saw a minor league beatdown in person, then a major league milestone on my TV. When it comes to losing, I won yesterday.

Let's start with the afternoon game. Yesterday afternoon, my friend and Journey of Jasmine bandmate Mike and I attended the Rochester Red Wings game against the Indianapolis Indians. The Red Wings got KILLED to the tune of 16-3. Three runs were walked in, one run was plunked in, and a grand slam was hit in the top of the second inning. When the top of the third inning ended with the score 9-0 in favor of Indianapolis, home team devotion quickly turned into morbid fascination for me. That and I almost got the sign language interpreter lady to crack during the singing of "Take Me Out To The Ball Game" by singing one syllable behind everybody else (Mike and I had moved up to the front row in the seventh inning, stealing vacated seats near home plate). All in all, the game was flat-out amazing...and it was Cal Ripken "jersey" night, so I got a free shirt out of it.

But that's not all! There was another team to watch! Last night's baseball game on ESPN (home of Quite Possibly The Dumbest Thing Mankind Has Ever Seen) was the St. Louis Cardinals at the Philadelphia Phillies. The Phillies were going for the sweep and trying to avoid a spectacular milestone in futility: They were just one loss away from 10,000 defeats as a franchise. However, this was not Philadelphia's night. Albert Pujols, fresh from shaking off his massive (for him) home run drought, crushed a pitch to the deepest part of the ballpark. He'd hit another home run later that night, but that first one was spectacular. That and the next batter went deep on the first pitch he saw after that mammoth blast from Uncle Albert. All told, the Cardinals hit six home runs as a team, won 10-2 (giving up Philadelphia's two runs in the ninth inning), and sent the Phillies into previously uncharted territory: 10,000 losses. Sure, I had to sit through a bunch of stupid tie-ins to the ESPYs during the game - for the record, the guys who made "Coming up next, The ESPYs" signs and held them up at the ballpark in Philadelphia should get the crap kicked out of them - but seeing a milestone loss like that was worth the effort. And then I turned off my TV the instant The ESPYs started.

In summary: I witnessed two big losses yesterday. It was amazing. A fun time was had by me.

UPDATE: As I was link hunting for this post, I stumbled onto this: Not only was my local-ish Really Minor League Team, the Batavia Muckdogs, no-hit yesterday, they were at the receiving end of a perfect game! Yet another spectacular loss from Spectacular Losing Day. Life doesn't get much better than this...

...or does it?

OK, Break's Over, Back To Work

How strange was yesterday? No baseball to speak of at all unless you lucked out and found the Triple-A All-Star Game on TV (International League 7, Pacific Coast League 5). But The Most Boring Day In Sports is now behind us, thank God. So, PLAY BALL!

Best record at the break: Boston Red Sox (53-34)
Worst record at the break: Tampa Bay Devil Rays (34-53)

Interestingly enough, the division leaders haven't been able to put much real estate between them and their opponents so far this season. The Red Sox have the biggest division lead at 10 games. The next largest is Milwaukee in the NL Central, 4 and a half games ahead of the Cubs. The other four divisions are much tighter than that - none of those division leaders are ahead by more than 2 and a half games. If this keeps up, then these division titles won't be decided until late September/early October, which is stressful for the teams but great for the fans.

Here's another attention grabber: The Philadelphia Phillies are about to lose their 10,000th game as a franchise. Right now, they're sitting at 9,999. They aren't playing tonight, but that grand defeat could come as early as tomorrow night when they host the St. Louis Cardinals.

Two other intriguing match-ups this weekend:
Colorado at Milwaukee - the NL West's fourth place Rockies would be in third in the NL Central, but only a half-game behind the Cubs.
Detroit at Seattle - four-game set between one of the best teams in the bigs and the team few people expected to be good out of the AL West.

Speaking of Seattle, did you see Ichiro's inside-the-park home run in the All-Star Game? How friggin' cool was that?! That and the bottom of the ninth made that the most watchable All-Star Game in years. But Paula Cole singing "God Bless America"? Talk about 10 years too late. Between her and Counting Crows (?!) playing at the Home Run Derby, I almost thought I went 10 years back in time or something. Hootie and The Blowfish must've been booked solid this week...

Here's your All-Star Snub: Erik Bedard, starting pitcher for the Baltimore Orioles, leads the majors in strikeouts (149) but wasn't invited to San Francisco. His 3.40 ERA is good for 11th in the AL, just behind Chien-Ming Wang and just ahead of Josh Beckett. Incidentally, fellow Oriole Jeremy Guthrie is second in the AL with a 2.74 ERA. Go figure...

You're a kitty!

Requiem For Some Laundry

I'm not the first to say this on the sports blogosphere, but it's worth noting: The Chicago White Sox are bad this year. Really bad. This team merely two years removed from winning a World Series title have aged quickly this season (four everyday players are on the DL right now) and their pitching is not in the same place it was during their championship campaign. Earlier this week, the White Sox took a 6-2 lead into the eighth inning against the Baltimore Orioles. Game over, right? Nope. The Orioles scored three runs in the eighth and two runs in the ninth off of Sox relievers (closer Bobby Jenks officially blew the save in the ninth and took the loss) and won the game 6-5. But here's another scary statistic: The White Sox were 4-14 in interleague play. You know, The National League's Exercise In Futility That The American League Wins Every Year Not Named The All-Star Game. They only won FOUR games against the NL this year! And it's not like they had tough Interleague opponents, either - They played the Cubs (lost five of six, getting swept in the series in their own ballpark), Astros (lost 2 of 3), Phillies (lost all 3), Pirates (lost 2 of 3), and Marlins (lost 2 of 3). Murderers' Row Of Mediocrity right there...

Possibly the scariest statistic of them all: As of today, they only have one more win than the Kansas City Royals. One. That's it.

And then there was yesterday. Yesterday, the Minnesota Twins visited the south side of Chicago for a doubleheader and kicked the crap out of them. The first game was a football score - Minnesota 20, Chicago 14. The Sox committed five errors and the Twins DIDN'T score in the sixth and ninth innings. The scary thing is it would've been more lopsided if a Twins batter didn't ground into an inning-ending double play with the bases loaded in the eighth.

But that was the first game. But what happened in the nightcap? Simply put, the Twins kept hitting but the White Sox stopped. Morneau went deep three times (hat trick?) as the Twins piled up one more home run (six) than Sox hits (five) in game two. Twins 12, Sox 0.

If that wasn't enough, the White Sox will have to deal with BOOF! in today's game. Good luck to 'em. Poor southsiders - they gotta deal with Cubs fans all summer long 'cause the better Chicago team is playing in Wrigleyville this year...

This guy is pretty awesome

Happy Fourth of July!

Woo hoo! It's Independence Day! In honor of America's Founding Fathers, let's celebrate! Drink some beer, cook some meat, watch some baseball, and blow some crap up (or at least watch other people blow crap up)!

Enjoy the holiday.

Happy Canada Day!

Yep, you read that right. July 1st is Canada Day. So crack open a Molson or Labatt and watch hockey highlights on YouTube in honor of our neighbors to the north! Beauty, eh?

Speaking of hockey: Apparently, Daniel Briere is a Flyer. He signed a hefty 8-year deal with a "no-movement clause" to play in Philadelphia. That leaves me to say this: What in the world were they thinking? 8 years?! Don't get me wrong - I'm gonna miss seeing him in a Sabres' uniform and I wish him the best of luck in Flyer Country. BUT, you can almost guarantee he doesn't have 8 full seasons left in him. At least not without him turning fragile and missing at least 30 games a year at the tail end of that deal. Yes, Briere is a good offensive presence and should work well with Simon Gagne, but this is almost DiPietro-like insanity from the Flyers' front office here. I'm still completely confused by the deal...

I just found out Chris Drury and Scott Gomez both signed with the New York Rangers. I'll definitely miss Drury in a Slugs jersey. That dude is simply awesome. These are fantastic pickups for the Blueshirts. I'll leave the rest of the analysis from the Rangers' perspective to McNally...especially since I know full well he's probably having a moral quandary because Gomez used to play for the Devils.

So what's next for the Sabres? Slug Country was hoping that at least one of the two co-captains would stick around in Western New York. But since neither of them stayed - but Adam Mair resigned! - this clearly means the team belongs to guys like Tim Connelly, Ales Kotalik, Thomas Vanek, Maxim Afinogenov, and Jason Pominville. In hindsight, the writing was more than likely on the wall for the co-captains last year - Briere in particular - when Connelly got a contract extension before the beginning of last season. So overall, I have very mixed emotions about today. On one hand, I know full well I will miss watching Chris Drury and Daniel Briere. But on the other hand, Pominville-Afinogenov-Connelly is a REALLY scary line, so I still like this team. I'm personally hoping they can keep Vanek (though he's restricted) and Zubrus right now...

I'm watching baseball right now. Because NOTHING says "Canada Day" like a baseball game in Detroit, Michigan. Though reigning AL MVP Justin Morneau is Canadian...

The new Devin Townsend album is friggin' awesome. Full review coming soon.

Do it again Do it again Do it again Do it again Do it again Do it again Do it again Do it again

...And Another Season Of Interleague Play Is In The Books

2007's round of Interleague Play came to a screeching halt last night with the conclusion of the Tigers/Braves and Astros/Rangers games. I watched the former last night and it turns out the latter was the more interesting game. Sigh...

So once again, the AL beat the NL senseless and took its lunch money. In other shocking news from The Vatican, turns out The Pope is catholic. I broke it down by division, and here's what that looks like:

AL East: 45-45, .500
AL Central: 48-42, .533
AL West: 44-28, .611

NL East: 38-43, .469
NL Central: 43-50, .462
NL West: 34-44, .436

So the AL won 137-115. The shining examples of AL's dominance were the Tigers and Angels, who each went 14-4 in Interleague play this season. Meanwhile, only six NL teams finished interleague play with winning records. The only NL teams to finish more than one game over .500 against the AL were the Cubs and the Rockies. The 8-4 Interleague Cubs clearly took advantage of their limited schedule, winning 5 of 6 against the White Sox (including the sweep this weekend), who had their asses handed to them by the NL this year (4-14). You could point out the fact that the Rockies swept the Yankees earlier this week, but they promptly got swept in Toronto this weekend, so that doesn't explain their 10-8 Interleague record. Series wins against Tampa Bay, Baltimore, and Boston explains it. Though they did lose a series to the Royals. Go figure...

So what now? I'm not really a baseball purist, but I'm thinking Interleague Play should be scrapped. The AL has always won Interleague play (please leave a comment if I'm wrong about this) since its inception. The other sad reality is the lack of intriguing matchups. You have five (Mets/Yankees, Cubs/White Sox, Astros/Rangers, Dodgers/Angels, Giants/Athletics) and that's kinda it. I also don't think it's an accurate representation of how a team fares against the opposing league. Think about it: This season, the Yankees play as many games against the Red Sox - 18 - as they did against the entire National League. AND the Cubs only played 12 games against the American League - half of which were against a horrible White Sox team! So yeah - either add more Interleague games to balance it out a little more or scrap the whole thing.

But at least we got to see a no-hitter during Interleague play this year. We almost had two...

We Have A No-Hitter!

I tuned into ESPN tonight just in time to see whatever they were showing pre-empted by Detroit Tigers pitcher Justin Verlander trying to complete a no-hitter against the Milwaukee Brewers with two outs in the ninth inning. Aaaannnd.... HE DID IT! 112 pitches, 0 hits, 4 walks, 12 strikeouts. The interesting stat line belongs to Brewers center fielder Bill Hall. He went 0 for 0 at the plate, drawing three out of the four walks issued by Verlander. But still, a certainly masterful performance by a HIGHLY promising young pitcher.

And then, hours later, I witnessed three Los Angeles Dodgers hit home runs on consecutive pitches. Not only that, but the third home run hitter was their pitcher! AND, the shortest home run travelled 408 feet, so those baseballs were hit HARD. That was friggin' COOL...

WHERE ARE THE CHEETOS?!?!?!

BergerReview: The Tony Danza Tapdance Extravaganza

Come on - just look at the band name! That was enough to get me interested. The Tony Danza Tapdance Extravaganza is, by far, one of the most amazingly ridiculous band names I've ever seen (in a very good way, I must add). Couple that with a fondness for metal and an ear recently turned on to Dillinger Escape Plan, and I simply had to check these guys out. Sure, the band name can be easily seen as a gimmick, but if that's what draws people to this startlingly good band, then by it's a damn good gimmick. These guys are fantastic.

Clocking in at 10 tracks and a whopping 28:39, TTDTE drives their message home quite clearly in their self-titled album's short time frame. It's confusing, it's aggressive, it's pretty silly in places (come on - could a band with a name like this REALLY take themselves seriously?!), and it's far more in control than one might think. Throughout the album, the guitar work is nimble, vicious, and most importantly, extremely tight. Complimenting that is drummer Mason Crooks, who plays with so much ferocity and speed that I wonder if his hair was on fire during the recording process. The whole band is clearly on the same page, sharply working their way through a ton of time changes, left turns, and sudden starts and stops like it's nothing more than old habit. And oh yeah - the song titles are incredible, too.

In short, a VERY solid album from a new entry into the hardcore/grindcore world. Naturally, this type of music isn't for everybody - Hell, I can tell you at least two of my other band members would flat out hate this - But you can't go wrong with TTDTE if you're into hardcore and metal in the first place. A fine entry into what I call "Music Guaranteed To Piss Off Your Parents", aka "What Is This Crap?!" music (which I think should be a separate section in CD stores just to help metalheads and other kids out - you don't wanna be looking through Toto or Tower of Power just to find The Tony Danza Tapdance Extravaganza, do you?).

The Tony Danza Tapdance Extravaganza (Corrosive Recordings, 2005)
Highlights: "My Bowling Ball's Frozen In A Footlocker In Chicago", "God Ain't Got No Use For No 180 Lb. Bag Of Sugar", "Cliff Burton Surprise"
Berger Rating: Two Angry Parents Up

Upcoming Reviews: Umphrey's McGee, Devin Townsend (whenever I can get my hands on his new album)

Smock is playing a show tonight. It's gonna be fun. But that's all I'm gonna say 'cause I don't wanna use the "Shamless self promotion..." label. Just follow that link there to get some details if ya wanna go, k?

Detroit Tigers 8, New York Mets 3 in the top of the seventh. That's the game I watched as I wrote this. One must wonder if the Tigers are starting to really find their offense here...

Pronger? We Don't Need No Stinking Pronger!

So I caught a bunch of Game Four last night in Ottawa (I wasn't in Ottawa. The game was. I just watched it on my TV.) after I got home from a Red Wings baseball game (more on that later). The Anaheim Ducks, without Chris Pronger, won the game anyway and are heading back to their home building up 3 games to 1. And oh, by the way, they have yet to lose a Stanley Cup Final home game (They were winless on the road in the SCF until last night). But even without that fun little statistic, we can still say the Ottawa Senators are in a highly precarious position. Erasing a 3-1 deficit is definitely possible, but the Ducks just might be playing too well for the Sens to even try it. Hell, Ottawa had major stretches in Game Four where they were dictating play on the ice and they still lost. But really, they lost because Anaheim was able to control traffic in front of Jean-Sebastien Giguere, which wasn't the case on the other end of the rink. Three other things from this game:

1. Anaheim's third goal was friggin' beautiful. Go find a replay of it if you missed it. What looked like a completely busted play at the blue line turned into a 2 on 1 deep in Ottawa territory and the defenseman was too concerned about Teemu Selanne, which left Dustin Penner wide open in front of a vacated net. Penner made no mistakes with that feed...

2. What in the world was Daniel Alfredsson thinking at the end of the second period? The Ducks were on their heels, the momentum was clearly Ottawa's...and he shot the puck right into Scott Neidermeyer. Good going, moron. All that did was fire up the Ducks and give them every reason in the world to come out flying in the third. AND he got lucky that he didn't get called for a penalty in the post-shot scrum 'cause he clearly punched somebody, which was seen by everybody apparently except the referees (though I can't blame 'em - they were busy trying to break up everybody else).

3. Don Cherry ruled in the second intermission. NBC executives had to be SQUIRMING with both Cherry and Brett Hull behind the same desk thingy, but it didn't matter. Don Cherry is awesome.

Before I watched Game Four, I saw last night's Rochester Red Wings game hosting the Scranton Wilkes-Barre Yankees. I saw four or five home runs, two plunkings, and four errors. And oh yeah, Red Wings won 7-2. That game was awesome. My friends and I were loud and obnoxious almost the whole time, which is always fun. And one of them gave me something to try the next time I get to sing "Take Me Out To The Ballgame" - sing one syllable behind everybody else. I can sing one syllable ahead allright, but this could be an interesting challenge...

Armando Benitez Gags Again

I just saw one of the most amazing things I've ever seen in a baseball game. Bottom of the 12th inning, 4-3 San Francisco Giants over the host New York Mets, Giants "closer" Armando Benitez in to try to seal the deal. However, the Mets had the top of their lineup due up in the 12th. Lead-off hitter Jose Reyes drew a walk (always a bad omen for a team trying to hold a lead) to start the inning. But then, things got interesting.

Reyes, a noted threat to steal bases, distracted Benitez enough to draw...a BALK! When the hell was the last time you've seen that?! A nice sacrifice bunt put Reyes - the tying run - on third base with one out. Carlos Beltran screwed up a contact-type play, holding Reyes at third while being rung up for the second out. But then, with Carlos Delgado at bat...Benitez balked again! TWO balks by the same pitcher in the same inning! Not only that, but the second balk sent Reyes home, tying the game and tacking another blown save into Benitez' career statistics. But wait! Carlos Delgado was still at the plate! AND, on a 2-2 pitch...BOOM. Home run to right-center, Mets win 5-4. That was awesome.


Aaron Hill of the Toronto Blue Jays stole home against the Yankees. How cool is that?

Ducks won Game One last night. Sorry, Ottawa, but when you leave ANYBODY wide open in the slot in your defensive zone, it doesn't matter who has the puck - it's more than likely gonna end up in the back of your net. That's exactly what happened when Travis Moen scored the game winning goal with 2:51 left in the third. That and if you wanna win a road game in the Stanley Cup Finals, then find a way to score a goal when you have a two-man advantage for a minute and 35 seconds in the second period. For the Ducks, that was a very solid game overall. They didn't allow an even-strength goal and even their fourth line had some great scoring chances. When Brad May gets quality scoring chances, things are going right for your team.

This band rules.

More Fun From The Pond of Frozenness And Other Places

Game Six of the Western Conference Finals was everything I could've hoped for...and then some. BOTH teams getting called for too many men on the ice, Lotsa goals, chaos with one net empty for the last minute and a half... It just doesn't get better than this. The third period, in particular, was worth the price of admission alone. The Red Wings started the period trailing 3-0 and outshot 26-13 (a 2:1 ratio, for you math nerds out there). Naturally, Detroit did everything they could to take the lead (or at least force overtime) and almost succeeded. Sometimes, outscoring your opponent 3-1 and outshooting them 16-3 in one period just isn't enough. Anaheim won the game 4-3 and the series 4-2. For the record, Detroit goalie Dominik Hasek had a .667 save percentage in the third period tonight...

Right before the game started, I was able to catch the NBA Draft Lottery. A rather mundane event, but still oddly captivating. What probably helped was the fact that the draft order was announced pretty quickly, with the deputy commissioner rattling off picks 14 through 4 in the span of two or three minutes. Naturally, they cut to commercial to manufacture some "drama" before revealing the top three picks in the draft. Did it work? Well...no, not really, because every friggin' countdown/list show in the universe does that. But hey, thanks for playing, ESPN and NBA. Incidentally, the number one pick in the draft went to the Portland Trail Blazers, which means that the Boston Celtics' little tanking strategy DIDN'T WORK!

And the Yankees lost to the Red Sox. Whoopty crap. But hey, the Twins won! Woo hoo!

Altanta Braves center fielder Andruw Jones went 0 for 5 at the plate with 5 strikeouts Sunday afternoon in Boston. Now THAT takes talent.

Words really can't describe this.

The End Of A Season, The Start Of A New One

Well, there we have it. Sabres lost in overtime today. The Senators won The Prince Of Wales Trophy That Nobody Touches Out Of Severe Superstition and the right to play for the Stanley Cup. Tough loss for the Sabres, perhaps poetic justice for Ottawa. Last season, fourth seeded Buffalo eliminated top seeded Ottawa in five games, winning all three contests in ScotiaBank Place. This season, the exact opposite happened - fourth seeded Ottawa eliminated top seeded Buffalo in five games, winning all three contests in HSBC Arena. But it's not like this Sabres team was worse than last year. The problem this year was the fact that the Senators were a much tougher defensive team than I ever remember. In my opinion (and I know I share this one), Ryan Miller is still a better goaltender than Ray Emery, but Emery played well enough to win and his defensemen frustrated Buffalo every night.

Now, with that out of the way: I thoroughly enjoyed watching the Buffalo Sabres this season. This team was fast, aggressive, lethal with the puck, and a LOT of fun to watch. When a team finishes a regular season with six 30 goal scorers, you know they're good. This team fully captivated the Western New York region from October 'til May and certainly made many new hockey fans in this area. I'm a little concerned about the pending free agencies of both Daniel Briere and Chris Drury, I must admit. But otherwise, I'm looking forward to seeing how well this team rebounds next season.
BUT since the Sabres are done...it's baseball season! As I was typing this, I saw the conclusion of today's Yankees / Mets game. Mets won. I saw two errors. I was happy. Unfortunately, Tim McCarver was in the broadcast booth. He sucks.

"But what team does Berger follow?", you might be asking. Well, I follow two: the Minnesota Twins and the Milwaukee Brewers. I have my reasons, but that's another post.

And no, I have no idea who's gonna win the Red Wings / Ducks series. But I'll keep watching it. Go sports!

My band made a music video. It's completely ridiculous, but that's the point.

Baseball. Beautiful, Beautiful Baseball...

I’ve felt so dejected from baseball the last couple of weeks. The Yankee’s suck, as it’s finally sunk in that the rebuilding years are upon us. I mean, I know Clemens is going to win 22 games and yet another Cy Young, but still… Boston is doing well, probably going to win another championship, making that two in one decade. By the way that’s “Sign of the Apocalypse # 47”. It’s in Revelations, I swear. For the record, # 46 was Rosie O’Donnell getting back on television. Sadly, the only enjoyment I have been able to muster thus far this season has been following the Milwaukee Brewers.

Yet neither the Hypocritical Red Sox, nor the AARP Yankees are what truly make me feel disconsolate this year. I have become absolutely LIVID at ESPN’s coverage of “Chasing Aaron”, as Barry “I obviously did steroids “Bonds closes in on the record. It actually makes me nauseous. What’s worse is there are actually people who still believe that Bonds was entirely clean. Bonds’ defense is the baseball equivalent to OJ “finding the real killers”. Actually that might be next. “No, I did not do steroids. But I will not rest until I out every doper in MLB”. It’s just unbelievable. The only thing that could make this situation worse is if Aaron were not African-American. Nothing infuriates me more than race issues in sports.

As for the solution to the steroid problem? I say give it to them all. Let everybody do it, no, MAKE everybody do it. I mean everybody. Players, Managers (Lou Pinnella anyone?), Umpires, General Managers, Owners, Ball Boys, even the Announcers. Can you imagine John Sterling on steroids?

Wait, I think I just have. Ok, here is a hypothetical Steroid John Sterling commentary-

Susan- Well John, I think the Yankee fans are somewhat justified in booing Alex Rodriguez. He makes an awful lot of money to not produce and-

John- LET ME TELL YOU SOMETHING SUSAN! If I ever caught a Yankee fan booing A-Rod, I’d crack them across the mouth. I’m telling you, he’s gonna do something here, he’s gonna fu****** nail one.

Susan- We’ll see John, he’s down 0-2 in the count, and 0 for the century against this guy, I-

John- You watch Susan. High fastball and swing- THAT BALL IS HIGH! IT IS FAR! IT IS…GONE! GONE BI***. AND IT’S A GODDAMN A-BOMB… FROM GODDAMN A-ROD!!! I FU***** TOLD YOU SUSAN!!!!!

Oh my god this needs to happen…

Meanwhile, enjoy this....

More Blowouts, Please

Maybe I'm sick, but I like to see blowouts. If I tune to a baseball game where one team is down by 10 runs, I tend to stick around 'cause I wanna see how bad it gets. Hell, I stuck around in the stands for the whole game where a local minor league team lost 16-3. So, imagine my joy when I saw "Texas 14, NY Yankees 2" and "Oakland 17, Kansas City 3" from yesterday's action. Too bad I wasn't able to actually watch either of those games...

Oh yeah - Sabres lost last night. Bummer. Sabres just weren't together - especially on the power play - and the Senators took advantage of that. But if Toni Lydman's goal is any indication - they just let him walk into the front of the net! - I'm not too worried. At least not for now...

In the meantime, enjoy THIS.