THE OFFICIAL JOE SEZ BLOG-O-RAMA

WHERE CUBS FANS RULE, AND SOMETIMES DREAM ABOUT SLIPPING EXLAX INTO THE CARDINALS' GATORADE.

GIANTS SHOULD HIRE CHEECH AND CHONG.

· Joe Sez, News · , ,

TIM-LINCECUM-STONER

Hey there snowballs, Joe Schlombowski here, with another “general manager” off season tip.

So, I’m thinking the Giants oughta sign Cheech & Chong. I mean, if an itty-bitty bag of weed can turn Lincecum into a Nolan Ryan/Louis Tiant hybrid … imagine, just imagine what those two could do. Friggin’ lights out, that’s what.

Besides, I think half the San Francisco population has a prescription for medical marijuana, so it’s a natural fit. And think of the cross promotion possibilities with fast food joints. You could have Munchies Night, or Jack in the Bong Night … stuff like that. I’m tellin’ you that ballpark would be packed. Nobody would care about the outcome, but it would be packed.

Anyway, that’s my tip for you, Brian Sabean.

You’re welcome, pal.

Joe

CUBS FILE FOR CHAPTER 11. IT’S ABOUT TIME.

· 2010 Cubs, Joe Sez, News · ,

So, the Cubs filed for Chapter 11. Kinda poetic, don’t ya think? But it’s like Dr. Seuss poetic, not Robert Frost or Robert Service or Shakespeare poetic. Although, this season was a comedy of errors. (Uh, for you White Sox fans … that was one of Shakespeare’s plays.)

Anyway, it just seems fitting that the most pathetic baseball team in the history of history is declaring bankruptcy. I know, I know, it’s just a technicality that will let the Ricketts family take over the club. It’s not like they’re breakin’ up the team and selling off the jock straps. Although, I think I can get maybe two or three hundred thousand people who would agree that may not be such a bad idea.

One thing’s for sure, the Monopoly Guy has got to go. In fact, he oughta go directly to jail without passing Go, and without collecting $7,000,000. That’s right, sports fans, Wiltin’ Milton took home a seven with six zeros after it. And you know what we got for that? A .257 average, a whopping 12 dingers, and the attitude of an abused rottweiler. And who does he blame this on? Us; the fans; Chicago; the best fans and the best city in the world.

Hey, Mr Anger Management, why don’t you just bite me! You ain’t good enough to wear a Cubs uniform. Hell, you ain’t good enough to wear a McDonald’s uniform! (Those guys have to make change, which means they gotta count higher than 2.) I never heard of somebody being sent home early, but if it was cuz you were hurting the team, like Hendry said, you can count your lucky stars that it didn’t happen sooner, pal. (That is, if there are less than three of them.) I mean it’s not like your bat and glove did us any favors. In fact I’ve seen nicer swings in Cabrini-Green! And I don’t give a crispy crap what the Player’s Association says, I think you gotta know how to count to three if you’re gonna play ball at the Major League level. Of course, you weren’t really playing, you were just out there blaming the grass for being green. So I’m sure you’ll sucker some team into giving you a job next season. We’ll know who it is when the truck full of egg shells pulls up to their locker room. Take a hike, pallie.

Sorry. That last paragraph was intended just for the Milt Shake. I gotta go brat-itate, now. That’s where I sit in a dark room and think about eating 3 or 4 brats with the works. Always calms me down.

Ok, I’m back. You should see the calm on my face. I look like I’ve been hypnotized by Kreskin. Anyway, part of me thinks Hendry oughta be on the Monopoly Guy’s bus for making that deal in the first place. Gotta hand it to him, though, for sending the bum home early. It’s like the Major League version of having to stand in the corner during class. Thumbs up on that one, Jimbo.

So what I think is that the Cubs should take this opportunity and sorta Chapter 11 the roster; do a little restructuring, especially with the Ricketts taking over. You know, clean slate and all. To me, that means a closer that does fine at Wrigley, but couldn’t close an umbrella on the road … oughta hit the road. In my most fluent Fukudomese, I say sayonara, Gregg. I’d say sayonara Soriano too, but we’re stuck with that friggin’ contract. Actually, I say it all the time just cuz I like the way it rolls off the tongue.

I could go on, but what’s the point? It’s not like what I think matters a hoot. But, my fellow bleacher bums, you might as well be prepared to make the new drought number “102,” cuz unless a handful of over-paid, under-performing Cubs are replaced (yeah, right after hell freezes) or they somehow turn themselves into Albert Pujols over the winter (sure, and monkeys are gonna fly outta my butt) I don’t think the word ‘postseason’ will be used in the same sentence as ‘the Cubs’ in 2010.

Of course, I could be wrong. But I’m not.

Joe

WHAT’S WRONG WITH LOU PINIELLA?

· 2009 Cubs, Joe Sez · ,

LOU-PINIELLA

Casey Stengel and Yogi Berra proved that you can have one wheel in the sand and still be thought a genius baseball man. This I do not understand. Mostly because baseball is always called “the thinking man’s game.” I don’t see it. At least not in the Cubs dugout. If they’re thinking — and I’m not saying they are — it must be about nail polish or something, cuz it sure as hell isn’t baseball.

I give you exhibit A; Lou Piniella. Now, I love Lou. I mean the guy is right out of central casting and, up until now, I thought he was exactly what we needed. But when I read stuff like I did yesterday, it makes me wonder if Lou wouldn’t be better of with a few jolts of electric sunshine to the temples. Or, perhaps, some other more vital area of his anatomy.

Take the Milton Bradley thing for instance. Lou’s assessment is that the best thing he can do to get the Monopoly guy’s crap .230+ average to a respectable level is to relax. ReLAX?! If he was any more relaxed he’d be on a beach somewhere getting a tan. Instead, how about friggin’ CONCENTRATING?! Ever thought of that? This is a guy who drops routine flies, and turns out number 2 into a souvenir. He doesn’t need to relax, he needs 3 or 4 guys pulling on his shoulders until his head pops out of his ass.

Honestly, I think Lou needs to go off his medication for a while. Is it me, or is he turning into the Dahli Lama? I remember when Lou used to get fired up; put the fear of God in people. Now, when you screw up and you gotta go to the principal’s office, you might as well be having a session with Doogie Howser. In this case, Bradley got a warm and fuzzy personal tutoring session from Lou. Same difference. Last year the Monopoly guy hits .321 for the Rangers. This year he’s hitting about as good as my mother. (No offense, Mom, but you never could hit a curve ball.)

And what does Lou say? “Hitting a baseball is ability, and he’s got ability.” Brilliant, huh? No wonder they paid him so much money to manage us into a World Series. “It’s good eyesight, and he knows the strike zone well.” He does? Stevie friggin’ Wonder knows the strike zone that well. “It’s also good hitting mechanics, and you have to get yourself in good position to swing the bat…” What the hell does that mean? Like, he should stand in the batters box? That’s usually a good place to be to swing the bat. C’mon, Lou! Is this why you’re so revered as a baseball guru? And then there’s the “…adding the relaxation mode to it more than anything else. No tension.” I got news for you pallie, Milton Bradley makes more in one plate appearance than I do in one year. About $25,ooo. So does Soriano. I think it’s time you bulldozed the day care center and brought back a little bit of the fury that made you famous. If we’d wanted milk toast as our manager we’d have hired Joe Torre.

Joe

A-JUICER. JUST $275 MILLION.

· Joe Sez, News · , , ,

A-ROD-JUICER

Lemme get this straight. A-Rod juiced because he had the burden of carrying around a $252 million contract on his shoulders???? Awwww, poor widdle baby. I’ll tell you what this pin cushion needed: a large, economy-size dose of Vito Corleone slapping him in the face and telling him to man-up.

Every friggin’ time I hear one of these pussies whining about the pressures of the money they’re making — to plaaaaay a sport, by the way, for a cruel and unusual 6 months a year — I wonder if they’d like to step into the well-worn shoes of some single mother who cleans hotel rooms for a living. You know, someone who doesn’t have two nickels to rub together for anything more extravagant than an extra helping of Top Ramen. THAT person knows what money pressure is, my friend, not a guy with a car collection.

But hey, I’ll play along. If A-Rod can’t stand the heat in the $250 million dollar kitchen, I got a very simple solution for him. Yeah, yeah, he doesn’t need it anymore — and regrets having juiced and is all very sorry, blah, blah, blah — cuz he supposedly stopped using when he slipped on the pinstripes. Uh huh. Are you telling me that Yankees fan pressure is less than Rangers fan pressure? That $275 million pressure is easier to take than $250 million pressure? That don’t add up, rocket scientists. I figure the guy has become a human voo doo doll since he’s been in the Bronx, and has probably done more juice than Minute Maid.

Of course, I could be wrong. He could be telling the truth. Yeah, and a monkey is gonna fly outta Jeter’s butt. All I’m sayin’ is that he lied to Tom Hicks (the guy who brought A-Rod to Texas). He lied to Katie Couric, which is like a big “so what,” but I’m trying to establish a pattern here. He fabricated all kinds of crap about the SI reporter, Selena Roberts, the woman that broke this story in the first place. And then you got the Madonna thing, and the stripper thing, and the fact that when a guy hits a weak grounder to the pitcher in a crucial situation in the ALCS and then pathetically tries to slap the ball out of the first baseman’s mitt, he simply can’t be trusted.

But like I said, there is an alternative to steroids for guys like A-Rod who can’t handle all that nasty-wasty pressure. Play for the minimum, fruitcakes. Play for the minimum. Otherwise, shut the hell up about how difficult life is while you’re lounging around one of your 9,000 sq. ft. swimming pools fantasizing about material girls. Or material middle-age women, as the case may be.

Joe

BEFORE AND AFTER.

· Joe Sez, News · , , , , ,

BONDS-BEFORE-AFTER-STEROIDS

News flash: Barry Bonds tested positive for three types of steroids.

No freaking kidding.

Guess what else. It rains in Seattle. Yeah. And if you stick your hand in a fire you get burned. And, can you believe this? … Rod Blagojovich, a Chicago politician, is a crook. Yeah, a shocker. Know what else? If you fall out of a boat, you hit water. (Unless your name is Alfonso Sorriano and it’s the playoffs. Then, no.)

I gotta tell you though, all this hullabaloo over Bonds’ cheatin’ heart is starting to get on my nerves. I know it’s against the law and all, but I could give a crap if he lied to a Grand Jury. It’s not like he shot somebody or ‘accidentally’ forgot to pay $140,000 in taxes. Besides, everybody knows he used, so everybody knows he lied. The Grand Jury knows, baseball knows, Greg Anderson certainly knows, hell, even you latte-drinkin’ Giants fans who defend the guy know. I mean you gotta be living on another planet to look at the guy and think he’s clean. Arguing about it is like arguing over who won the game three days after the last out was recorded. The guy did it — look at him — so who gives a crap if he didn’t man-up in front of the Grand Jury?

Now, you wanna argue about something? Let’s talk records. Like the ones Bonds and McGwire misappropriated while at the same time acting like they had so much respect for the guys that set them. How do you honor Hank Aaron, what he went through, and his contribution to the game — and sports in general — when you cheat to break his career home run record? And what are you when you chemically transform your body to belittle the 61 yard shots that Maris hit in 1961? Let’s see … “ass hole” comes to mind.

The way I see it, the only way to know how good, say, A-Rod really is compared to guys like Ruth and Mantle would be to wind the clock back to before Madonna; before Kabbalah; before the $250 million contract; all the way back to the Mariners, and then make him smoke and drink and stay out all night, all season long. And for his whole career. Take a look at his numbers then, pallie. Hey, the guy is gifted, I’ll give you that. But on a level playing field, I think we’d be comparing him to Mickey Hatcher, not Mickey Mantle.

Anyway, as far as Bonds goes, it makes no sense to me to Al Capone the guy and try to hang him for lying to a Grand Jury. The real offense is the desecration of the records; records that were earned through talent and hard work, and in the face of adversity. I say, put the books back where they were before these guys started cooking them in the steroid kitchen. And then, open up a new wing in Cooperstown for Sammy and Barry and Clemens and the like that draws attention to what it is that they really brought to baseball; disgrace.

Joe