Ryan Dempster, clearly a man with the mental acuity of a turnip, did the unthinkable. He bought what Pinella is selling and admitted as much in spring training. That’s right, he believed in himself and his teammates. Our little Darling of the Dirty Depends immediately began sharpening his knives.
We’re only 96 days from Game 1 of the World Series, 14 weeks from the unspeakable Cubbie dream, and I’ve yet to make fun of Ryan Dempster. I thought zingers would be a staple all season after he declared so wildly, “I think we’re going to win the World Series. I really do. Enough of the curse this, the curse that, the goat this, the black cat, the 100 years.”
Beyond finding out that the Cut and Paste Queen did not spawn from a mutant form of meiosis, “hi, mom”, we learn that he* now anoints Dempster with an unusual role; Wrigleyville’s version of the Oracle of Delphi;
Not only do the Cubs have baseball’s best record, they’ve also convinced the cynics long accustomed to doubting and mocking them—hi, mom—that there actually is more to like about their October chances than dislike. So when Dempster launched a commentary during All-Star Game festivities about Cubdom, slightly scolding fans and media for not believing as firmly as the players believe, I did nothing this time but sit back and listen. Until further notice, he’s the great Wrigleyville orator.
But, since this article* is about things going well for the Cubs and all about the love being showered on the team by the faithful and the bandwagon jumpers, there is something you need to know;
.... the Cubs have sporadically flirted with glory. They did five years ago, four years ago, last year. Each time, there was a saboteur, whether it was Bartman, the petty clubhouse preoccupation with The Evil Stoney or a combination of Alfonso Soriano’s lousy series, Lou Piniella’s call in Game 1 to yank Carlos Zambrano and Ted Lilly’s re-enactment of Tanner Boyle’s glove-throwing tantrum in “Bad News Bears.”
Yes, this is the third time he* has used the Tanner Boyle reference when talking about the Cubs. But you don’t read him* for the original thoughts, do you? Plus, by limiting himself* to pop culture bullet points he* avoids having to look at what actually happened in each of those series. The fact that there were a total of 32 more outs available to the Cubs to win AFTER the Bartman – I hate saying that name - incident, the fact that there were 8 other players who sucked just as bad as Soriano or the fact that it was not Lou’s fault that the Cubs’ bullpen picked a playoff game to try throwing underhand, and so on. Those facts would require a knowledge of what actually happened and why, and that is clearly far too much effort to ask of our Liza Minelli wannabe.
On and on it goes, somewhere very far over the rainbow. The Cubs are good enough to win it all. Oh, but they need another reliever. There is no competition in the NL except for the Cards and the Brewers and maybe the Philles and possibly the Mets and ......
So, in an effort to tie things together, he* closes with this .... zinger.
Try to enjoy the joyride, Cubdom. If that is humanly possible.
Well, The Chronek, certified human and a man who is more lucid after a three day bender than Mariotti is after his* first latte, has already started a thread, so CLICK HERE TO JOIN THE FUN!
Well we have to since Jay’s article* today is, while ostensibly, about the Chicago Blackhawks playing an outdoor game at Wrigley Field on January 1, 2009 it tends to wander a bit. Here are the hockey related items of interest brought forth by Jay;
Wrigley is where Babe Ruth called his shot, where Ryne Sandberg had his famous game, where Gabby Hartnett hit his “Homer in the Gloamin’,” where Billy Sianis’ goat wasn’t allowed inside during the 1945 World Series. Wrigley is where Papa Bear Halas relocated from Decatur, where Bronko Nagurski cracked his skull on the bricks, where the Bears won NFL titles, where Mike Ditka walked across Clark Street and drank, where Gale Sayers ran for six touchdowns and blew out his knee. Wrigley is where Elwood Blues listed his home address as 1060 W. Addison, where Ferris Bueller took his day off, where Madonna made a sports movie long before she knew Alex Rodriguez. Wrigley is where baseball first was televised overseas via satellite. Wrigley is where lights finally beamed in 1988, three years after Pete Rose tied Ty Cobb with his 4,191st hit—my first assignment ever in the place. Wrigley is where a National Register of Historic Places plaque hangs, where Jimmy Buffett wasted away and the Police trashed the outfield grass and left Lou Piniella driven to tears. Wrigley is where Steve Bartman reached for a foul ball and Sammy Sosa corked his bat. Wrigley is a shrine, a museum or, to hear some envious White Sox fans, a urine-soaked dump.
Yesterday only New York had tangible history. Today, we get this muck. Now, tell me what any of this has to do with hockey.
That’s okay, I can wait.
All right, time’s up. Obviously nothing. He* goes on to bust out his*, well worn, kneepads and drops down to praise the work of John McDonough (deservedly so) and to remind the teeming masses that it is cold in Chicago in January and that Wrigley is not your prototypical hockey rink.
That actually takes him* about 5 paragraphs and then we get some closure, for all the drunken hockey fans. Actually, in Jay’s hands that statement almost seems redundant despite the fact that it is woefully inaccurate. Or, at least has been inaccurate since the mid 80’s.
The usual 41,160 tickets go on sale soon. It’s just a guess, but the wise buyer will opt for the first few rows of the upper deck. You want the panoramaic view for this day, Hawkdom, an overhang for the hangover.
Yes, panoramic is spelled wrong, but did you really expect the Sun Times to pop for Spell Check when they have masterpieces like this to foist on Chicago readers? Also, “Hawkdom” is usually used to refer to the Iowa Hawkeyes and not the Chicago Blackhawks, but I guess asking an actual hockey fan for information was far too much trouble for today.
Oh well, both TomD and The Chronek, two guys who can read AND write above the 3rd grade level, have started a thread so CLICK HERE TO JOIN THE FUN!
It is no secret to any regular readers of this blog or Mariotti’s columns* that he* desperately wants to be a reporter in New York. However, he* has a problem. He* is not stupid enough to work for The Sun and not good enough to work anywhere else.
That leaves him* little room to do anything but slam Chicago fans and make fun of Rick Morrisey’s column which compared Joe Crede as a team player versus Alex Rodriguez.
The Chicago way, of course, would be to mock the closing of Yankee Stadium, ridicule New Yorkers as insufferable louts and write that I prefer Joe Crede over drama queen Alex Rodriguez. Sorry, I must rise above those petty whims.
Well, it is good to know there are some petty whims he* can rise above. Until now I would have doubted that assumption.
If you care about sports, a slice of your soul dies when a baseball cathedral shuts down, even when it’s located on 161st Street in the town Chicagoans are instructed to loathe out of the womb.
I am not sure what wombs our Demented Dwarf has been hanging around, but he needs to find some of higher quality. Cubs fans do not loathe Mets fans. Although I do know a Rosemont police officer who is a Mets’ fan and he is doing his damnedest to correct that situation. Sox fans do not loathe New York. They are not fond of Yankee’s fans, but even they will admit that the reason the team won so many (profanity, profanity, profanity) World Series is because they beat everyone else. So we can, and occasionally do, get a tad irked at their pompous attitudes even though they may be deserved. But loathe? We have lives to live and they are not spent dwelling on the Yankees.
After slogging through some Hallmark quality treacle about families, I note that he* never once mentions mothers in his* screed about who takes whom to baseball games, we get to the meat of it. Yankees stadium is the only place in America where legitimate history has happened.
Yankee Stadium is where every lad in the land aspired to play, even if he didn’t like the Yankees or cantankerous owner George Steinbrenner, who openly wept when he was introduced and transported onto the field in a cart. If you listened closely Tuesday night, you could hear Lou Gehrig calling himself “the luckiest man on the face of this earth” and see Nelson Mandela and various Popes delivering speeches. Ali and Louis fought here. Bono and Billy Joel serenaded here. Most of all, Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Joe DiMaggio, Mickey Mantle, Reggie Jackson and Derek Jeter played here.
Memo to Jay, Jeter still does play there.
As to the rest, the column* is just plain bad. After one of the best opening ceremonies in my memory and the longest game in All Star history; one in which actual defense was displayed, one in which bad plays were countered with great plays, a game that guarantees the National League will have lost home field advantage again, we find out that none of that mattered.
But the All-Stars, for once, were mere props. The Stadium was the star.
To quote The Chronek, the author of today’s thread that I am linking to, “Blah blah syphallitic blah.”
Josh Hamilton is a recovering drug addict. You knew that. You knew that because every sports show in the country has mentioned it. Twice. Or more. He is also a professional baseball player. You knew that too. He was drafted by the Rays (formerly Devil Rays) and is currently on the Texas Rangers’ roster. You knew that also. In fact, if you went nuts and spent a minute of your busy day on Google you would also know he credits his grandmother, Mary Holt, and his faith in God for helping him turn his life around. You probably would know that the Rangers play “Saved The Day” by Christian group Phillips, Craig & Dean when he bats. Heck, you might even know that he was a rule 5 player for the Cubs for a minute or so.
Actually, it would appear that I have now given you more information than Jay’s column* of today.
However, in an effort to maintain some brevity and retain our sense of fair play, I will now list the things that Jay writes about today that you did not know.
**crickets chirping**
Okay, to be sportsmanlike, I will still list all of the quotes that Jay used which were not part of last night’s ESPN programming and not cobbled from actual journalists.
**crickets chirping**
Josh Hamilton’s story is a rare and wonderful thing. We can count more overdoses than survivors due to drug addiction. His strength should be an inspiration to others. I should know. I have been a recovering cocaine addict for 16 years. I know exactly how hard it is to stay clean. How tough it is to function without the rush. But that is not the only part of my life that dictates who I am or what I have become. Nor is it the only thing you need to know about Josh.
For the most part, his recovery and faith have become footnotes to his career and his accomplishments. They are one part of a larger whole. That is fine and that is the way it should be. In keeping with that thought I will spare you the dribbling hyperbole that besmirches the back page of today’s Sun Times.
TomD has already started a thread, so CLICK HERE TO JOIN THE CONVERSATION.
Having pronounced the Cubs “The Kings of New York,” our Artless Amnesiac begins to wa-wa-wa-wa-wonder who doubted this year’s Chicago Cubs. Well, besides him* of course and he* never really doubted them since, except for those times where he* did doubt every single player on the team, he* has been their biggest (athletic) supporter.
Who knew the Cubbies would commandeer the Midsummer Classic? Who knew they would own the best record in the majors at 57-38, the highest run differential in the majors at plus-106 and the gathering passions of a sporting nation that senses this finally could be Next Year? Who knew they’d have to approach the All-Star Game not as an exhibition but a mission, a chance to secure home-field advantage for the NL and, yes, for themselves if they were to ride their blurry 37-12 record at Wrigley Field to a p-p-p-pennant?
There is some good news for Cubs fans today. The last time he* flipped and flopped this much, not counting the unfortunate and legendary “Spongebob incident,” was over the 2005 White Sox. Last I checked that team did okay.
OK, so two players won’t be in uniform Tuesday night: blister-fingered Kerry Wood and wounded-handed Alfonso Soriano. And Ryan Dempster, who pitched Sunday afternoon, likely will sit and spectate as he did in his only other All-Star appointment. And Kosuke Fukudome, who is battling a mean sanraku (slump), is no worthier of starting in the outfield than Len Kasper. And Carlos Marmol, who replaces Wood, would be better off resting and nursing an ERA that has soared almost two runs over the last month. Still, they’ll all be there, talking up the Cubs at the media conferences. The predominant presence in Yankee Stadium, home of 26 World Series championships, will be a blue cap with a ‘C’ that symbolizes the antithetical tortoise trying to win the Series for the first time in 100 years.
Granted, that paragraph should be put out of its misery. And ours. But, since it isn’t, we have to deal with it. “Blister-fingered” would imply that Wood got the blister from being fingered. We won’t even speculate on “wounded-handed.” As to he rest, it’s good to know that Mariotti opened up his copy of the Sun Times to a page other than his* and noted the fun Japanese translations that have been printed throughout the season.
Beyond that, the Cubs are in first place because they beat a lot of teams. The players who made that happen are being honored. It isn’t that big of a stretch to see why. Could Marmol use some down time? Maybe. Could he benefit from being around All Star caliber pitchers and working with their staffs for a day? Also, maybe. The second half will tell.
I have no idea why the tortoise is considered antithetical. I am guessing he* is tying to say that this year they are the ‘hare’ of the story, but that would make them the losers which makes no sense and then .... my brain hurts. So, let’s move on.
All of this is surrounded with the usual cobbling of un-attributed quotes, a bizarre thought that Kerry Woods is cursed and the most meaningless closing paragraph I have read in a long, long time. For you kids at home, the closing paragraph is supposed to summarize your theme or provide closure for the reader. Granted, nothing provides closure more completely than a trip to a cemetery as its permanent guest, but still ....
But then, hasn’t this entire season knocked us over? At the All-Star break, the Chicago Cubs are favored to win a pennant for the first time in 63 years. Were they to win the World Series, a lot of fans would acknowledge they could die a peaceful death, which came into play last week with news of a Wrigley Field-styled cemetery—complete with ivy, bricks and a replica of the wall—being planned five miles away. You can pay $1,200 for one urn, $5,200 for a family of four. Some very weird things are happening, which admittedly has my imagination jumping like never before.
Yours, too?
TomD, who once got drunk and had sex in a cemetery (but, haven’t we all?), has already started a thread, so CLICK HERE TO JOIN THE FUN!