Dropped Third Strike

We’ve been neglecting our duty here at DTS. We know it. We’re sorry. We’ll do better, we promise. Won’t you please take us back? Sure ya will. We know you love us. Now go make us a sandwich. To be honest, we’ve been distracted by a different writing endeavor, and we’re disheartened by the lack of any new A-Rod Shenanigans. We’ve been forced to go old school to get our recommended daily value of purple-lipped goodness. We present: “Young and Sultry: The Alex Rodriguez Story.”

Sexy eyes

Not bad, eh? 

Elsewhere, the R*d S*x have tied the Rays, the Mets are on the verge of another collapse, the Brewers finally told Ned Yost to pack his bags, and various other things happened. A word on Yost. As long time DTS readers will know, we are famed mustache aficionados/enthusiasts/boosters/trimmers. Well take a look at this face. Isn’t it just crying out to be mustached? Bold prediction: had Yostie been the proud owner of a mustache, he would have avoided the axe. 

In Yankee-land, Joe Girardi has been assured of another year at the helm, Brian Cashman has been endorsed and threatened with castration (metaphorically speaking, that is. Only Old Man George would have really contemplated the actual act), and Jorge Posada told Michael Kay that Joba Chamberlain should stay in the bullpen. We fully support keeping Joe Girardi around. On the B-Cash front, we have slightly mixed feelings. On the one hand, Cash is widely respected, has shown himself to be capable of dealing with the Steinbrenners, and is a smart and likable guy. On the other hand, the Yankees have passed on Johan Santana, Dan Haren, Josh Beckett, and other prime-aged ace-quality pitchers. And the lineup, while good, is not as strong as it could be, and without an expensive off-season overhaul, will likely be worse next year than this. We’ll have much, much more to say on this subject when the season ends. We’ll discuss moves that Yankees probably should make, moves they shouldn’t, moves they may make, and moves they must make, holes to be filled, holes that will be created, and what to do with Joba Chamberlain. Speaking of Jobs, we have no problem with Jorge speaking his mind. He’s an established leader, a seasoned veteran, and he’s entitled to his opinions and should have some credence leant him. Nonetheless, considering that Joba has clearly expressed a preference for starting, it seems somewhat thoughtless and brash for Jorge to make his declaration. Can you imagine the outrage if Joba had said something like: “We gotta get Jorgie over to first base. He’s a heck of a talent, but if you ask him to catch 120 games, he’ll get hurt, his body can’t handle it.” It would not be pretty. Not too big of a deal though, and Jorge has certainly earned quite a bit of leeway. 

DTS will now return to fully functional status, bringing you new posts on the regular. Well, at least until we get distracted by something shiny.

As August wears on, it becomes increasingly difficult to write anything meaningful about baseball. With the trade deadline behind us and division races becoming 1 or 2 team affairs, there just isn’t that much to say anymore. The MainStream Media tend to use this time to talk about the MVP and Cy Young award races, and the more intellectually inclined blogs start running flashy statistical analyses, and doing things like predicting play off teams and so forth. Us? We like to use this dull time to run pictures of A-Rod looking incredibly awkward. Today we present Constipated A-Rod. Try some fiber, Tipsy. (Again, hair, not alcohol).

Aside from poking fun at the reigning MVP, we’ve been casting about trying to find the latest example of a baseball player/manager/executive/etc. acting like a spoiled 4 year old. Well we didn’t find one. We found an entire union’s worth. 

[The umpires' union] said their governing board voted Tuesday to boycott a conference call with management intended to discuss implementing replay, angry that their concerns aren’t being addressed.”

Now, even though the umpires finally relented, we can’t allow this sort of shenanigans to go uncommented upon. We should note that here at DTS we are baseball traditionalists. We generally like the human element involved in all aspects of the game, from stadium design and groundskeeping to umpiring, we like the fact that there is some leeway, some freedom, to implement your own standards. Of course when you leave these sorts of things in the hands of simple humans, you tend to get some remarkably horrendous results. (Blown calls on the base paths, missed balls and strikes, the Green Monster, and so on). Nevertheless, we consider these quirks an integral part of baseball. So we are naturally leery of the use of instant replay. (Besides, baseball games are long enough without the added time spent reviewing close plays). But we somehow find it a bit odd (and foolish, immature, ridiculous, idiotic, and typical of the men and women [yes, there are some] who inhabit the baseball universe) that the umpires would boycott a conference call discussing the use of instant replay because their concerns hadn’t been heard. Um, if you want your concerns heard, shouldn’t you join the conversation? What could possibly be gained from not taking part in the phone call? Why not simply say at the start of the call, “look we have some issues, we can either list them now and you can respond and we’ll move forward, or else we can pick another time to have this conversation. But until we have discussed our issues, we’re afraid we won’t be able to move on with the rest of the process.” Of course it’s absurd of us to expect that sort of maturity from a group of men who seem to think that people tune in to baseball games to watch umpires act like morons. It’s mind-blowing the the supposed arbiters of a game engage in such blatant acts of self-aggrandizement and attention-whoring. How is it in anyway appropriate for an umpire to get into a shouting match with a player or coach or manager? If the player/coach/manager is out of line, you should simply inform them that they have been ejected.  But no, instead we see umpires calling players out, baiting them, essentially, and then having invited the player into a confrontation, tossing them out of the game. And when an understandably peeved manager comes out to inquire why exactly this referee has taken it upon himself to pick a fight with his player, the ump runs right up to him, chest puffed out, obscenities at the ready, and starts screaming in the manager’s face. It’s outrageous. 

Look, we like a little theatricality from our umpires. The occasional big fist pump on a pivotal called third strike can be a fun moment in a game. But the big scenes the umpires kick up (both in games and out, as they did with this boycott) are frankly nothing short of pathetic displays of small men using the limited power they have to make themselves feel better. Of course, there are exceptions, mature umpires, cool-headed umpires who call a good game and act like adults. And to those umpires we say, bravo. 

Ugh, that got us so worked up that we’re going to go make a collage of A-Rod’s hairstyles through the ages to calm down.

You may have noticed that we don’t respect too many people here at DTS. There are exceptions (Jon Lester, D-Wright, Mike Piazza’s facial hair), but generally we tend to take the view that, for the most part, the world is made up of fools and tools. So it is particularly important that we give credit where it’s due. In that spirit, we present to you Will from Michigan. Apparently Michigan offers so little in the form of quality entertainment (told you we don’t respect much), that Will decided to take the time to actually write a well-worded and intelligent comment on this site. We’re going to post his comment here because we assume most of you lazy bastards don’t bother to click on the comments section:

When discussing Barry Bonds, the most frustrating part of his career was the 2001 season where he hit 73 home runs. While seeing Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa, and Bonds reach numbers we never thought possible, I actually felt as though I was fully engulfed in baseball history. I thought it was the closest I would ever get to feeling the way the nation felt when DiMaggio was on his hit-streak. They completely robbed me of legitimate childhood memories. As far as I’m concerned, Roger Maris is the single season home run king, and Hammerin’ Hank is the career greatest. Seeing a player like Brett Favre is something we may never witness again, which is why I can’t wait to see him on the field again. Barry Bonds pulled the wool over my eyes for so long that I’m worried I’ll be skeptical of the next baseball great. Thankfully, Favre has taught me that it takes no skill to hustle and has made me keep the faith in the athletes of today.”

Yeah, yeah, OK, “Will,” so you’re right, Bonds, Mac, and Soso did pull the wool over our eyes, and yes we probably should have mentioned that while singing the praise of ol’ Bondsy boy, and yes, pointing out the feeling of historical importance that the home run feats of those three men evoked was apt, and yes the DiMaggio reference was clever and appropriate, and yes Barry’s use of steroids has forced us all to become far too cynical, and yes all this is something we probably should have talked about at least once during our campaign to get the Yankees to sign him, but…well fine we don’t really have a response. When you’re right, you’re right. So perhaps Barry’s exile from baseball is fitting punishment. But we can’t help but feel that Bonds is being treated just a little too harshly. Even now, we’d guess that Bonds is vastly less popular than Roger Clemens, even though Clemens used steroids, lied about using them and on top of that he seduced a teen age girl, cheated on his wife, and gave his kids all names that start with “K” because it stands for strike out. And yet Bonds is still baseball’s number one villain. It doesn’t seem entirely right. Anyway, hopefully you enjoyed your moment in the sun, Will, but keep posting comments that highlight issues we’ve neglected to cover and we’ll ban you from the site. (Who are we kidding, like we can afford to ban ANYONE from the site). 

Anyway, you might be wondering why that picture of A-Rod adorns the top of this post. Well partly we just like to highlight how awkward Tipsy (that’s a comment on his hair style, not his drinking habits) is. But it also has some relevance to Will’s comment about becoming more inclined toward suspicion when it comes to outstanding athletes. We’ve certainly seen that play out during the Olympics, with Michael Phelps being tested over and over for any sort of illegal substance, and it seems to be true in all avenues of sport. Now, other than an unsupported claim by reality-TV star Jose Canseco, very little has been thrown A-Rod’s way in terms of steroid/HGH allegations, but that hasn’t prevented his accomplishments from being greeted with a certain degree of skepticism. It’s not much, just a very low murmur, but expect it to turn into a loud shout as soon as he comes within range of Bonds’ Aaron’s record. Call us naive, but we believe in Rodriguez, and hopefully he’ll turn out squeaky clean and shatter all important  home run records, and we can just put this Bonds ugliness behind us. (Though if the Madonna rumors are true, we won’t have to worry about what will happen when he approaches the home run record, considering her track record of destroying the quality of the work of the men she’s with. Seriously, “Swept Away”? Really? After “Snatch”? Joe Girardi better do something. Soon.)