CY GREINKE

WE all know that this was an easy decision.  But we also know that some in baseball’s elite would have loved to ignore the numbers, and give this to someone from a more successful baseball city.  This is validation for all of us who watched almost every Royals’ debacle last year*.   As we watched Zack dazzle us with upper 90’s fastballs followed by knee-buckling curveballs in the 60’s we knew.  Even though Zack would get no run support, and sometimes even lose a game in which he gave up one or fewer runs, we knew. So to all you so called experts out there, take that.  Now, just wait for the trade…Anyway, there’s an upper…

*Some of us even paid money to watch every one of these train-wrecks last season.

LJ FITS IN

Larry Johnson signs with the Bengals.  Good riddance, I know.  But why couldn’t he have gone somewhere with no hope of being successful?  I mean, there is no doubt that, if there is anywhere that this delinquent could fit in, it would be Cincinnati.  But they have also shown that they can take a seemingly washed up running back, and make him good again.  Exhibit A: Cedric Benson.  Anyone who is playing fantasy football knows that this guy was the steal of the year.  Plus, to make matters worse, LJ now gets to play for an almost sure fire playoff team.  The Bengals have a two game lead, and own the tie breaker against the Steelers in the AFC North.  And who will Cincinnati get to steamroll at home two days after Christmas?  That’s right…downer…

ALL STAR GAME (almost) OFFICIAL

Comcast Sports New England is reporting that Kansas City will officially be announced as the site of the 2012 All Star game.  Again, we pretty much all knew this, but it is still exciting.  Please take a moment to give thanks to MLB for instituting the “every team must have one all-star” rule.  Yeah, Zack’s contract runs out that same year.  You think he won’t be ready to bolt, or most likely traded by then?  I can’t wait to see Wilson Bettemit in that All-Star uniform.  Still, that brings a lot of fanfare to our beloved team.  Maybe we’ll even get a nationally televised game sometime after that.  Good news KC…wait for it…

BOWE HAS DIARRHEA

Dwayne Bowe has been suspended for four games for violating the league’s substance abuse policy.  Apparently, he was trying to lose weight during training camp, and decided that using a banned diuretic would be the best way.  Look, I am not an expert on losing weight, but I do know that all you have to do is burn more calories than you take in. How many calories do you think an average (term used very loosely) wide receiver in the NFL burns a day at training camp??  Way more than I do writing these columns, I can tell you that.  Just don’t eat Dwayne!  You don’t have to give yourself the runs to lose weight.  Just work hard!  I think I am starting to get the picture with Mr. Bowe…bummer…

KU FOOTBALL PLAYERS ARE PUSSIES

So you aren’t living up to expectations.  I understand.  But rather than take your lumps, and move on, definitely tell your mom that your coach yelled at you inappropriately.  My god, is this what it has come to?  You’re adults.  I have been yelled at “inappropriately” by any number of people in my life.  Get over yourselves, and maybe become bowl eligible.  Candy asses…

 KU IN THE LOU

HP and I are headed down to the Scottrade Center tonight for the KU-Memphis matchup.  Stay tuned for a blog about this one.  GO KU!!!  ROCK CHALK!!!

OUT OF OPTIONS

I’ll let you read this for yourself.  Click Here.   I know it’s ridiculous, but that’s just the kind of day KC is having.  Talk to you in a day or two…

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Minnesota Wild.

Minnesota???  Why would I give a shit about Minnesota??

I’ll tell you why.  The Wild fit exactly into the mold of Kansas City sports.  It’s actually kind of creepy.  Not Bellweather-Dushku-obsession creepy.  But creepy.  Allow me to explain.

What are some of the characteristics of a typical sports team in Kansas City?  Let’s list a few:

1. They stink
2. They have very little actual talent
3. They have nice stadiums
4. Their management has run them into the ground
5. They draft poorly
6. They make poor personnel decisions
7. They have new coaches and GM’s
8. They have a loyal and tortured fan base
9. They don’t seem to have anything to look forward to

 I could keep going, but that should cover it for now.  Now, let’s take a look at these in relation to Kansas City and the Minnesota Wild.

1. They stink – We all the know the Chiefs can’t win (they can’t usually even cover), and we’re all very familiar with the epic losing of the other team across the parking lot.  The Wild suck.  They are 1-5-0.  They are currently 0-4 on a 5 game road trip. The one win they have they got by coming back from a 3 goal deficit in the third period in their home opener.  So do they fit?  Um, yeah.  Check.

2. They have very little actual talent – Greinke, Butler, Cassel (I guess), you would keep these guys if you were going to blow up the teams and start over.  But I am having a really tough time coming up with much else.  Same for the Wild.  Their goalie (Niklas Backstrom) came in second in voting for the Vezina Trophy (best goalie in the NHL) last season.  Martin Havlat was their big free agent pickup from the Blackhawks last season.  Brent Burns will be an All-Star defenseman in a year or two. Those are the only three that I think would have legitimate shots at playing any significant minutes on a contending team.  Watch one Wild game, and then tell me differently.  I dare you.  Check.

3. They have nice stadiums – We all love the K and Arrowhead.  They are great places to watch bad sports.  The Wild built the Xcel Energy Center in 2000.  It is regarded as one of the, if not the, nicest places to watch hockey in the league.  The tickets are reasonable, the atmosphere is awesome, the sight lines are all good, and the hockey stinks.  Check

4. Their management has run them into the ground – Following a surprising run to the Western Conference Finals in 2004, the Wild seemed to be on the verge of becoming a perennial contender.  Almost.   The former GM, Doug Risebrough, constantly failed to sign their potential free agents in time, they became free agents, and left for nothing.  Always letting your players leave with nothing in return empties the draft pool for you.  Add to that trading your draft picks for old veterans who don’t have anything left in the tank (Pavol Demitra, I am looking at you) leads you to…

5. They draft poorly – When the Wild have had draft picks, they have bombed.  You look at the stars of the league like Crosby, Malkin, and Ovechkin.  These are draft picks that are supreme talents, and their teams have reaped the rewards of drafting them,  The Wild have picked no one of any value.  Pierre Mark Bouchard??  A.J. Thelen???  Benoit Puliot??  Peter McBonereater??? Try and guess which of those first round pick names I made up.

6. They make poor personnel decisions – Tell me if this sounds familiar: An aging free agent is getting offers from some teams.  He would fill a void in your lineup, but he gets injured a lot, and wants way too much money.  So your team signs him to a ridiculously overpriced contract for 4 years, and it hamstrings your franchise.  Jose Guillen…no Mark Parrish.  He hasn’t played a game in two years, but the Wild are still paying him, and he hits on the salary cap.  Check.

7. They have new coaches and GM’s – The Wild have a new GM named Chuck Fletcher.  I know nothing about him other than if I was an NHL GM, I would go by Charles.  They also have a new coach named Todd Richards.  Chuck and Todd sound like the very nice couple of guys who live in the apartment down the hall from me…if you know what I mean.  Check.

8. Loyal and Tortured Fan base – Minnesota is the “State of Hockey”.  It’s in their blood.  It’s basically Canada.  So the NHL took their franchise and moved it to Dallas.  How is that possible??  How did anyone think that would be okay?  Years later, they are rewarded with an expansion team.  They have suffered through what an expansion team does, and they hate losing, but still sell out EVERY GAME.  Check.

9. They don’t seem to have anything to look forward to – We all know the Royals are not going to be good next year.  It’s been well documented that they have their hands tied this off season.  The Chiefs don’t have much going for them unless they somehow have 20-25 first round picks in April’s draft.  Same for the Wild.  They have absolutely nothing in their minor league system thanks to poor, and a lack of, draft picks.  There is a hard salary cap, and the Wild are right at it.  They have a lot of long term dollars tied up in crappy players.  This season is pretty shot, and next year isn’t looking good either.  Check.

So there you have it.  Look at the Minnesota Wild, and tell me that they don’t fit right in.  Give them a chance.  Get the NHL package and become a fan.  What else are you going to do until March Madness?

 Oh, and the Wild play in Vancouver tonight at 9:00pm central.  What’s nice about the really late games is that you can get good and sauced before the game even starts, then the loss doesn’t hurt as bad.  Go Wild!!!!

Sherron Collins needs to stop banging football player’s girlfriends:

In actuality, I don’t know if it was Collins who was guilty of diddling Dezmon Briscoe’s girlfriend, but it’s sure possible. I haven’t done too much research on the topic, but if I were playing Clue, my first guess would most certainly be: Sherron Collins, in The Elevator, with His Junk.

Again, there could be more details rolling around the blogosphere regarding this story, but until the first jump ball, I’m kind of impervious to most KU Basketball stories that don’t involve raging lunatics. (Though I am told that Brady Morningstar’s role in this whole melee was him talking trash while simultaneously hiding behind the Morris twins, which is just…awesome.)

Still, Tyshawn Taylor dislocated his thumb in one of the fights, which is bad, and twittered about it, which is good, and as long as the fights stay away from being too stabby, well I say it’s just idiots boys being idiots boys .

In the words of Tyshawn: “keep my name out ya’ mouth for you get smacked in it.”

In the words of Frank Reynolds: “I bet that broad was classy as shit.”

Luke Hochevar needs to stop being so bad at baseball:

Royals news these days is ad nauseam: “Zack Greinke is going to get screwed out of the Cy Young.” While it would be a shame to see such a fate befall our one shining star, it doesn’t seem likely, as many many more baseball minds are waking up to the fact that pitcher wins are about as indicative of baseball goodness as Dayton Moore’s scouting ability.

But this section of the post is about our fearless 1st rounder Luke Hochevar. As many of you may know, Luke has been dominant this season to the tune of an 80-pitch complete game against the Reds, 13 strikeouts and no walks against the Rangers, a three-hit shutout against the White Sox etc. So the question is how, how, HOW is his ERA 6.42??

Well, outings like last night might have something to do with it. Luke has been an enigma. He’s been on and off, hot and cold. He was tipping his pitches, then fixing it, then getting bombed.

The good news: at least one guy sees him as the next Chris Carpenter. Let’s hope by the next Chris Carpenter, he doesn’t mean the next Tony Brizzolara. Who?? Exactly.

Sigh…only one more week, then no more Royals until next April…or until Dayton Moore trades Carlos Rosa for Willy Taveras in January.

Rasheed Wallace needs to stop…well nothing. He needs to keep doing shit like this:

If I told you that there were a professional athlete not from or having, on the surface, anything to do with Kansas City, who was seen at the Eagles/Chiefs game wearing a Derrick Thomas jersey and carrying a prosthetic leg, you’d say Rasheed Wallace, right??

Apparently this is was what happened at Lincoln Financial Field in Philladelphia after the game on Sunday, when ‘Sheed was a member of the scene described above. Remarkably, we still have no answer on just who’s leg it was that he was carrying , or why.

Frankly, I don’t want to know. And, personally, I think the crazier thing is rooting for the Chiefs in the first place. I’ve often said I would sell my leg for a Super Bowl Title…unfortunately, somebody took that a little too literally. What I’m not surprised about is that it was Rasheed Wallace.

The Royals look good right now.  After Friday night’s clobbering of the White Sox, they are now 60-87, threatening to climb out of the cellar, 9-2 in their last 11, and have had double digit hits in 6 straight games and 11 of the last 12.  Luke Hochevar looked solid, Zack is Zack, Robinson Tejeda should win the Cy Young Award next season.  And the you see comments like these:

“It seems like every year, that last month, they play their best baseball against teams trying to win the division.  They have a good young team over there.” – Mark Buehrle

Shit!  That will inevitably lead to this comment about March of 2010:

“We weren’t very far off last year.  Look at the way we finished.  That is what we expected all year.  Injuries killed us.  Hopefully that won’t happen again.  We just needed a couple of pieces to be a contender.  That’s why we added former Braves reliever Vladimir Nunez for the next 4 years at $6 million per year.  We’re excited for the season.”

Don’t let Dayton pull the wool over your eyes.  Playing well for the first 29 games and the last 20 games does not mean we get to forget about the other 113 in between.  Now that I have said my peace, here are Logg’s NFL picks for week 2:

Chiefs (-3) over Raiders – Cassel finally makes his debut, and I am not fooled by the “new and improved Raiders”.  Plus, can you really pick against Bobby Wade?

Tennessee (-6.5) over Houston – The Texans have no defense, and thus will yet again have no playoff spot.

New England (-3.5) over NY Jets – Mark Sanchez gets a little dose of reality against a real team.  He’s still my favorite Mexican American quarterback.

Green Bay (-9) over Cincinnati – My god, and I thought Chiefs fans were tortured.  The Bengals are the most pathetic franchise in pro sports…ever.

Detroit (+9.5) over Minnesota – I will never pick the Vikings.  Matt Stafford gets his first win this week.

New Orleans (pk) over Philadelphia – McNabb is out, Westbrook is always hurt, and Brees is unstoppable.

Atlanta (-6) over Carolina – Is Delhomme still the quarterback of the Panthers?  Really?  Really?

St. Louis (+9.5) over Washington – I am guaranteeing the Rams score points this week.

Jacksonville (-3) over Arizona – for the sake of my fantasy teams, please give the ball to Beanie Wells and make me look like a genius.

San Francisco (-1.5) over Seattle – Niners make the playoffs just to spite Crabtree.

Buffalo (-5) over Tampa Bay – I said it last week, and I’ll say it this week; Tampa is bad.

Cleveland (+3) over Denver – The luck runs out this week, Broncos fans.

Baltimore (+3.5) over San Diego – Was Baltimore’s offense as good as last week or was the Chiefs’ defense just that bad?  I say both.

Pittsburgh (-2.5) over Chicago – Cutler blows again. 

NY Giants (+2.5) over Dallas – I am watching this game just for the punts.  Come on scoreboard!!!

Indianapolis (-3) over Miami – Put the house on this one…

Enjoy the games!!!  Go Chiefs!!!!

Last week: 7-9

Season: 7-9

Lefty and the Open:

Thanks to Chris Berman’s astute analysis during day-time ESPN US Open coverage (and where would our knowledge of sport be without him??), I know that people on Long Island loooove Phil Mickelson. I think it’s more like: Long Islanders love beer. They also love Amy Mickelson’s sweet caboose. If that, together with a dash of breast cancer, isn’t an A+ recipe for a Jeremy Schapp Sports Center human interest piece, I don’t know what is. We have long awaited somebody to play Wilt to Tiger’s Russell, and more than anyone, Phil has been, fairly or unfairly, bestowed that mantle. He was given raucous galleries at Bethpage in 2002 because 1.) at that point he was the Anti-Tiger, and 2.) had yet to win a major. Now, back in NY seven years later, he has three, and while he is generally despised by his fellow golfers, the media frenzy leading up to the open was largely about the course and crowd being overwhelmingly pro-Phil. The media fed it, and we ate it up.

I’m sympathetic for the fact that it has to be a difficult time in the Mickelson family these days, and I, like many of you, found myself rooting hard for Lefty down the stretch. But, the man is a professional. My best friend passed away from cancer a year-and-a-half ago. That didn’t stop me from going out there and selling sub-prime mortgages to people who didn’t have a pot to piss in.* These golfers have a remarkable ability to shut out everything other than the task at hand. Ricky Barns wasn’t shaken by anything going on in his personal life. He was shaken by the fact that he had never been there before. (Though I have a feeling we’ll find out that the D-bag hat had something to do with it). I don’t think Phil was shaken by Amy’s diagnosis when he pushed that five-footer by the hole on seventeen. He pushed it because it was the 71^st hole at the US Open, and this is what he does.

But, like he said after the round, he has much more important things to worry about now, and let me be the 20,000,000^th person to wish Amy Mickelson a complete and speedy recovery.

* Yes, that is actually what I did for a job at the time. You’ll be happy to know that even back then, I was a part of the problem.

I’m Taking a Mental Health Day *

* That title, of course, a line taken from Michael Cera’s turn as Nick in Nick and Nora’s Infinite Playlist. Pitch meeting: “We need a vehicle for Michael Cera. How about we cast him as an awkward high schooler? Except instead of enhancing his funny output with raunchy humor, which is only funny because of his awkward delivery, we’re going to give him hacky MTV-esque non-risqué dialogue. Oh, and we need a female lead…is Mandy Moore available?? No?? Hmmm…how about the daughter of the chick in the 40 Year Old Virgin?? …no, the one that looks like Hillary Duff with Gigantism…great!! Shooting starts Wednesday.”

It seems almost cliché these days; a pro athlete shrinking from the spotlight, citing the ever-more popular “anxiety issues.” In the past, our testosterone-fueled sports psyche would encourage the shunning of such concerns as meager and womanly. When I think of the most man-card friendly team of the last half-century, I think of those beer-swillin, mullet-rockin’, son’s-a-bitchin’ ’93 Phillies. Could you really see a DL stint in ’93 for Darren Daulton* re: a case of the “nobody loves me”?? No. A case of the bat shits, maybe, but not a case of the yips. Yet, here, a mere 16 years later, we find ourselves in a different reality.

The trials and tribulations re: mental health have been well documented for the likes of D-Train, Joey Votto, Khalil Greene, ** and especially the journalistic-ly well-worn path of one Zack Greinke.

* If you type Darren Daulton into Google, the first thing it pre-populates is “Darren Daulton Crazy.” I shit you not. Somebody has to christen this phenomenon. Google Fishing, perhaps??

** Apparently the path to mental health is playing the Kansas City Royals. Greene went 4-7 with 3HR last week in KC…Sucks to your Zoloft.

So, to what do we attribute this sudden influx of major leaguers w/ mental problems?? Is this a reflection of society’s growing acceptance of mental disorders?? Is this an increasingly easy to use excuse button for pampered athletes?? Maybe a little bit of all-of-the-above.

Ballclubs have so much time, effort, and money invested in each of their players, that they almost don’t have a choice but to accept a player’s anxiety-related issues, and help them to work their way thru them. I’m not suggesting that those running the ball clubs don’t actually care about the players (much has been written about Greinke’s relationship with Allard Baird and Buddy Bell re: their supportiveness during his ordeal), but if you don’t think their pocketbooks are receiving as close a look as the psyche of the player in question, you’re crazy in need of a mental health day yourself.

Bottom line is that it’s a completely legitimate concern (if you think your boy Bellwether hasn’t contemplated a vaca to the bin, you’d be wrong), and these athletes are human. Nothing but respect to ballplayers who have battled their mental demons and made it back to the ballpark, but the reason for the up-tick in cases is not for me to decide…that’s Outside the Line’s job.

Man, These Guys Suck

Last night’s performance notwithstanding, the Royals have officially turned back into the Royals. Nice to have you back again, boys. You tried your best to trick us: a hot start (18-11), a terrible 30 game stretch (6-23) and, just when you think they have things back on track (winning five of six, pulling within 4 ½ of first place Detroit), they crap the bed and get blown out five games in-a-row.

The path has been well-worn by both Poz and Rany (amongst many others smarter than I), but more than anything, getting crushed like we did is probably worse because of who it happened to. The Cardinals series is always the most populated series of the year. The crowd is usually inhabited by jerky red-clad STL-ers who still hold a Denkinger grudge. Always, the Cardinal series is a chance for us humble Royals servants to see a stadium filled to capacity, albeit with half of it clad in opposing garb. This year was supposed to have been different, though. We’ve been able to ring the turnstiles without the help of our cross-state rivals on a number of different occasions, and this series was supposed to show them that, now armed with a legitimate stadium, we were a legitimate baseball team. WRONG.

Much has been written about how we might have a chance to win the central this year. While many were hoping for the best before the season started, much of our enthusiasm was tempered by a realist approach that there were several things that needed to fall into place. I think it’s pretty clear they haven’t:

- Kyle Farnsworth is not a legitimate bridge to Joakim Soria

- Billy Butler is not the next John Olerud *

- Alex Gordon could not stay healthy

- Coco Crisp could not stay healthy

- Joakim Soria could not stay healthy

- Mike Aviles could not replicate last year’s performance

- Mike Jacobs has not learned how hit lefties

* BR’s top comp to Billy is…drum roll please…Ken Harvey

It goes on-and-on. The Royals do have some of the best starting pitching in the league, and have some good complimentary pieces. It just doesn’t look like they have the big bats coming down the pipe to really put a contending team on the table unless the chips fall exactly where we need them to. I got news for you…the chips never do. At least we’ll be into July before Poz’s annual “Why us?? Why, God, WHY!??!?: Royals’ Season is Officially Over” column this year.

Final bits:

1.) There’s a new Pepsi commercial that they are airing these days during nationally-televised baseball games. It’s a mashup of Bob Dylan’s “Forever Young” that features the BEP’s Will I. Am. The fact that I want to puke when I hear it notwithstanding, the commercial itself shows ole-school footage of baseball icons next to the stars of tomorrow. Included are side-by-side shots of Mr. Met and Sluggerrr, and a pick of Billy Butler pointing a bat at the camera. I know I just kind of dissed Billy, but that’s pretty cool…and here, you thought the rest of the country didn’t know we existed.

2.) The KC Star only archives Posnanski columns back nine months…where are last years Royals columns?? I call shenanigans…

3.) I was looking for a video clip of Darryl Strawberry shedding a tear in the outfield due to a heckler in the “Homer at the Bat” episode of the Simpsons, but couldn’t find a video of the episode anywhere, so I went with a “Gigantism” blast instead. Are we really in the great internet age when I can’t find a Simpsons episode online?? I probably wasn’t looking hard enough…

4.) Thoughts and prayers to the residents of Parkersburg, IA…again…

*Though airing LIVE (!!) from Los Angeles at 3:00 AM local time on a set that looks strikingly similar to the one in Bristol is questionable. I accredit this to ESPN wanting to take full advantage of Neil Everett’s unquenchable coke habit.

** Yes Keith…the winner of the auto-race really IS in a Champagne Supernova in the Sky. You are hilarious.

The most remarkable of all Sports Center innovations, though, has to be the Rundown, which appears on the left side of the screen and tells you the stories that are coming up next. There was a little mix-up today, though, and I’m not just talking about the dubious decision to label the Sammy/Steroids story Say it ISN’T Sosa. (Really?? Say it AIN’T Sosa. C’mon, guys.) No, I’m talking about the fact that SC had the Diamondbacks/Royals due next in the rundown slot behind the NY Giants label. I know we were all enthralled by Osi Unimiora’s take on Plax Burris, but I was really just sitting thru that non-story to get to the goods on Gil Meche’s complete game last night.* Unfortunately, we went to commercial after the story, and when SC and the Rundown returned, we were treated to the story on the 15^th anniversary of the OJ Simpson Bronco chase. What happened to the Royals?? Even worse, I had to wait two more hours before the Royals story returned.

*And congrats to Gil. As UFR reported today, this was, according to Bill Jame’s Game Score, the most impressive start of Meche’s career, and according to ESPN, just out of the top 10 for the year in the AL. This, though, according to ESPN is obviously not as newsworthy as Brandon Marshall being an A-Hole.

This isn’t the first time that a KC Sports story was looked over on the national scene (it happens every day), but one story this week in particular really bugged me. Un-surprisingly, the story in question was from SI.com’s Jon Heyman.

Heyman is a former Yankee’s beat writer, but is mostly know (by me anyways) as a old, crusty baseball purist who doesn’t cater to those stat-heads in their mother’s basements. I could go on about Heyman in this regard, but it’s already been done ad-nauseam by Ken, Junior and Dax at (RIP) FJM. But since they’re not ripping on him anymore, I have decided to take up in their place, at least for the purposes of ripping this story.

Really, there’s not a whole lot to take from it. He goes thru his baseball “surprise performers” from the first two months of the season on both sides of the coin. The good is represented by Raul Ibanez (who’s remarkable season, as pointed out by Poz is not really as surprising as it seems), and the bad is represented by Papi (pre eye-drops, of course). In-between are 28 other players that are listed as either surprising or disappointing using a cherry-pick of useless stats and idiocy that I find nearly unfathomable. One thing is clear though, there is not one Kansas City Royal near important enough to make the list.

On Heyman’s list as surprisingly good?  How about Kosuke Fukudome?  Sure. If you look at Fuku’s last 50 games of last year (.208/.299/.326) compared to the first 50 for this year (.285/.417/.461) you can make that case.  But looking at the first 50 of 2008, (.301/.406/.421), you can see that Fukudome is performing at much the same rate as last year.  Heyman uses HRs, RBI and BA to make his case, but even using those stats(5/22/.296 in ‘09, 2/19/.301 in ‘08) Fukudome’s early season success is nearly identical.  Why not point to Soto’s sophomore slump, or D-Lee’s lack of presence in the order as surprises re: the Cubs offense??  Oh, I know why…Heyman’s an idiot.

Also on Heyman’s list of surprisingly good: Andrew Bailey of the A’s.  A great story out of the pen, but a relief pitcher for the A’s.  And what does Heyman use to make his case for Bailey as sruprising??  His 171 ERA+??  His 1.000 WHIP??  No, his 4-1 record…OUT OF THE PEN.

NOT on Heyman’s list of surprisingly good: Zack Greinke…enough said.

I’ll still read Heyman due to the fact that, because of his tenure, he still breaks an awful lot of baseball news, and has access to those in the know inside baseball’s inter-sanctum, but relying on him to do any kind of objective analysis, especially in the statistical realm is just asking for trouble.

]]> http://kcsportspodcast.com/2009/sports-center-and-jon-heyman-turning-kc-sports-fans-into-rodney-dangerfield/feed/ 0 http://kcsportspodcast.com/2009/let-the-fin-begin/ http://kcsportspodcast.com/2009/let-the-fin-begin/#comments Sat, 09 May 2009 15:21:49 +0000 Bellwether Johnson http://kcsportspodcast.com/?p=236 Greinke’s awesome.  His fiancé is smoking.  The Royals have won six of seven.  They drew 32,000 fans to Tha Kaye on a Thursday afternoon.  BO-RING!!  I wish I could write something about it.  I really do.  And don’t get me wrong.  I love, love, LOVE what our “little team that could” is doing.  I have die-harded-ly followed these guys for the majority of my natural life.  I have the Royals 2005 schedule still to this day in my wallet with every W and L tabulated on the date the game was played.*  So I have decided not to analyze this season up to this point.  The only justice I would end up serving by doing that is dick & fart jokes, and lord knows these guys deserve much more than that.  Rob & Rany I am not.

* with August 9 completely blacked out with ink.  If you’re a true fan, you know why…and you will know because of that fact that I am one too.

Unfortunately, that leaves a little void in this commentarium.  Fortunately, sometimes the gods smile upon you with a little gem like this:

Dolphins home will be LandShark Stadium as part of deal with Buffett

Now I first heard of this crap-tacular stadium name on Wednesday’s edition of PTI.  In-between Wilbon telling me about Racquel Welch and Kornheiser telling me about American Idol (you know…sports), they mentioned the name, and I thought “stupid.” And that was that.  I figured it was some marketing stunt that was bound to fail.  Well, it is.  But the better part is that it is bound to fail more spectacularly that even I could have imagined possible.

Yesterday I clicked on the above link, and while the story was loading, several possibilities of what exactly it meant popped into my head in the form of questions:

1.) What in the hell is Warren Buffett doing purchasing a football stadium?

2.) Is Ajit Jain a really big Dolphins fan, and we just didn’t know it?

3.) Will the Nebraska Furnature Mart that Buffet will most likely replace the stadium with draw more fans than last night’s Marlins game?

Well, it turns out that the Oracle of Omaha is not the Buffett in the story. It’s much more hilarious than that. Nope…we’re talking about Jimmy Buffett. Yes…that one. There are several different things that I learned from reading this story.

- Fans of Jimmy Buffett are called “Parrotheads.” See, and all this time, I was thinking they were called “Slacks-layden douchebags,” and if they were male and under 50, they were called “gay.”

- Buffett penned a new song called “Fins” in tribute to the Dolphins (Get it?). It was better than the first title: “Nick Saban go to hell.”

- Dolphins owner Stephen Ross said, “We’re going to be associated with Jimmy Buffett forever…That’s what the important thing is.” There’s no joke here…I think the quote suffices.

- The stadium is named after Buffet’s beer Slacks-layden Douchebag  Lager LandShark Lager.

Buffet ended his statement to the media by saying “All I can add is, let the Fin begin!” Jimmy Buffet + aquatic puns = winning football. Unless he meant “Fin” in the way they end French films. In which case, the end is nigh…but, of course, that is evidenced by the fact that they are renaming Joe Robbie Stadium after Jimmy Buffett’s beer. What are they going to do at halftime?? Have Garth Brooks sing “Friends in Low Places” on the jumbo-tron??

…and you wonder why the terrorists hate us…

• Grienke throwing lazer beams and toying with Chi-sox batters with some chin music just for the hell of it.
• DeJesus hitting a home run 10 feet high.
• Hearing the phrase, “Olivo in a run down” (thanks Bellwether).
• Multiple sets of homemade “K” signs through out the stadium.
• A loud, energetic, drunken crowd on a Dancing With the Stars TV night or as we say in KC, a Monday night.
• Steven Wright is a Royals fan and is distracting me from the game.

Zach Greinke

Q: Zach Greinke becomes the first Royals player to grace the cover of Sports Illustrated since who?