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WHY ARE WHITE SOX FANS SO FRIGGIN’ IRRITATING?

· Joe Sez, News · , , ,

The other day, I made a wise crack about the play the White Sox made at first base which, I admit, was pretty awesome. Mark Buehrle chases down a ball up the line and, on a dead run, scoops it to Konerko between his legs to nail Eric Hosmer at first. Highlight reel stuff.

Nonetheless, seeing as how it’s against my religion to say anything nice about the White Sox, I went to their Facebook page and posted the following comment: “BFD. When your right fielder pegs a guy at third with that kinda throw, then pop off. The class of Chicago plays at Clark & Addison my friend.” Figured I’d see if anybody on the South Side had any detectible brain activity. That, and the fact that I absolutely LOVE poking Sox fans cuz they’re so easily agitated. Not sure why that is, but rumor has it it’s the cheap material in those Victoria’s Secret panties they like to wear for good luck.

Anyway, 10 minutes later it’s like December 7th 1941 and my name is Pearl Harbor. It was a major barrage, with the recurring theme of our 108 year drought. (Lot’s of imagination on the South Side of Chicago; about the same as a box of rocks.) I had to just laugh cuz these guys will go all the way to the bottom of the rabbit hole if you play along. So what did I do? Head first, baby! It seemed like my duty to remind them that they root for the one, single, solitary team in the unabridged history of baseball to throw the World Series. I mean, you can root for anyone, right? Why pick a team that put that giant crap stain on the game? That’s like choosing to root for the Nazi’s.

Well, you can imagine how that went over. “Wow, nice jab at us Sox fans. We weren’t around in 1919.” And “What have you won? Oh … that’s right, nothing.” Again, the kind of responses you’d expect from a girly scout. Pathetic … like when they tore down Comiskey Park.

So, to set the record straight for Sox fans (and please do remind them of this fact) the Chicago Cubs have 2 World Series championships; 1907 and 1908. After we win it this year we’ll have 3. That happens to be the same number — as lame as it is — that the White Sox have. But hey, let’s take this year off the table and just consider the 5 wins between us. The White Sox have won 2.7% of the 111 World Series championships that have been played. The Cubs? 1.8%. Wow, that’s such a HUGE friggin’ difference. Hell, no wonder Sox fans have that superior attitude. Sheesh. Oh … and we’ve also been to the damn thing twice as often as they have.

Two more words: Robin Ventura. Whenever I get that mosquito feeling — that irritating, high-pitched buzzing of Sox fans trying to suck my blood — I bring out the fly swatter; White Sox manager, Robin Ventura. I like to think about the time he was head-locked by a guy twice his age and pummeled like a rag doll for trying to act tough. Tip of the Joe lid for that, Nolan Ryan.

Joe

DEJA VU ALL OVER AGAIN.

· 2016 Cubs, Joe Sez, News · ,

BALL-STUCK-IN-LESTERS-MITT

One of my favorite things about baseball is that no matter how long you’ve been following the sport, somethin’ happens in most games that you’ve never ever seen before. I used to think this applied to everyone but the Cubs, cuz year-in and year-out, you could pretty much count on tomorrow’s game being a carbon copy of today’s game, which was a bona fide duplicate of yesterday’s game; another notch in the loss column. Not any more, pal. Last year we took a major detour from the yellow brick road, and this year … well … this year we fired up the John Deere, set the height to “zero” and have been mowing down anyone and everything in our path. In that regard, I guess we’re still sorta monotonous, but in a really friggin’ good way.

So anyway, yesterday I’m watchin’ us against Pittsburgh, right? It’s early — just in the 2nd — so the wheels haven’t come off the Pirate ship yet, when a grounder gets tapped up the middle. Lester grabs it (nice job). But now he’s gotta throw it to first and, as we all know, that can definitely present some things you’ve never seen before … like the ball ending up in Section 134. But this time, it’s so friggin’ jammed in the webbing of Lester’s glove, he can’t get it loose. Unbelievable. But does he panic? Hell no! He wads the whole thing up — mitt and all — and heaves it to Rizzo for the out. Now I’d never seen that before, but here’s what really blew the foam off my medicine: The same two guys (Rizzo and Lester) did the exact same thing last year — almost to the day — at Wrigley. I don’t know how the hell I missed it. I coulda been playin’ hide the salami with the missus, which is about the only thing that can throw me off my Cubs game. Who could blame me?

I’m not sure what this does to my theory about something new happening in every game. For those of you that saw it last season, it doesn’t hold. But for those of us who missed it due to a land slide or tornado or some other force of nature — oh … it was a force of nature, alright — it was new to us this time around. Anyway, it was such a genius move it was worth a little deja vu all over again. In Yogi we trust.

Joe

PS. You wanna see something you’ve never seen before, and that will make you get down on your knees and pray you never ever have to see again? Take a look at Lester’s post game attire. A fashion “don’t” of galactic proportions, it illustrates the single most amazing achievement in all of sport: A blind man can pitch in the Major Leagues. No wonder the guy can’t throw the ball to first base. He can’t friggin’ see it.

WELL, THAT WAS ONE HELL OF AN APRIL.

· 2016 Cubs, Joe Sez, News · ,

CHICAGO-CUBS-INCREDIBLE-APRIL

Hey there, cheese puffs. As I look back on the first month of the season, I think it can best be summed up by channelling a little Harry Caray: HOLY-FRIGGIN-COW! I mean, that was like the Kate Upton of opening months! Sure … maybe there’s a freckle here or a hair slightly outta place there, but pretty much you just wanna sit back and dream about it, and hope you never wake up.

It was the best start we’ve had since 1907. 1907!!! For example, in a measly 84 games ahead of last year’s pace, the Cubs reached 10 games over .500. We outscored our opponents by like 3,000 runs. I exaggerate, but you get the point, right? How about the bats? And the staff! Arrieta was named National League Pitcher of the Month. Duh; 5-0, a 1.00 ERA and a no-hitter (against Cincinnati, which made it all that much sweeter). Go ahead … try and find a weakness, pal. There ain’t one. I’d like to point out that we did nearly all of it Schwarberless. Can you begin to imagine what April woulda been like if Schwarber was healthy? They woulda had to add “Cubs” to the Richter Scale.

If I could point to anything that would benefit from a little of Schwarber’s best Babe Ruth imitation, I’d say it’s Stephen A. Smith. This guys is a wind bag of Bruce Froehming proportions, and proved it beyond any doubt when he accused Arrieta of juicing. (He said he wasn’t ‘accusing’, but then went ahead and put it out there. Call it what you want … that’s a full-on accusation.) What a colossal pin head! If the guy knew anything about Arrieta, his work ethic and the adjustments he’s made to his mechanics — in short, if he’d done ANY research at all before shooting off his pie hole — the thought of juicing would never have crossed his itty-bitty microscopic mind. But that woulda meant actually doing some work, which would take away from running his turbo-charged, noise box. Personally, I don’t think a guy who’s been slammed by his colleagues for sexist comments, and who was suspended by ESPN for essentially saying that some women bring domestic violence on themselves, oughta be throwin’ any stones from his glass house. In fact, how the hell does he have a friggin’ job when Curt Schilling doesn’t? Makes no sense.

So, except for Stephen A. Smith (and, yeah, I think I know what the ‘A’ stands for) trying to piss on our parade, April was about as killer as it gets. Let’s hope May is the same.

Joe

THE WORLD IS FLAT.

· Joe Sez, News · , , ,

CURT-SCHILLING-FIRED

For a loud mouthed guy from Chicago, I’ve been conspicuously silent since Curt Schilling threw his wild pitch the other day. The missus asked me if I could be like that more often … and on stuff that has nothing whatsoever to do with Schilling, or gas station bathrooms in North Carolina. That reminds me: Mets fans, please don’t eat the urinal cookies.

As far as ESPN brooming Schilling, I look at it in kinda the same way the Cubs handled that human IED, Carlos Zambrano; no shortage of talent, but a total friggin’ disaster waiting to happen. And eventually, it did. Ka-BOOM! To ESPN, Schilling had become a problem that had to be dealt with. But ESPN’s real problem is they’ve got too many lawyers, and not enough nuts. What ever happened to “The opinions expressed by whoever are not necessarily those of this station or its management?” Plus, it’s not like he walked onto the Monday Night Baseball set wearing high heels and a pencil skirt to make his point. He reposted a tasteless photo — yes, it was tasteless — on his personal Facebook page, with his own commentary. The hypocrisy at ESPN is staggering. They flush Schilling, but still fawn over serial hole-chaser (of the non-golf course type), Tiger Woods, like he’s the Dali friggin’ Lama.

Still, a really big part of me (no, not the part surrounded by my 44 inch belt) thinks that sportscasters, athletes, movie stars, musicians and the like oughta stick to what they get paid for and keep their friggin’ mouths shut when it comes to other stuff. I mean, just because someone “pretends” for a living, and maybe even got a shinny gold statue for it, doesn’t mean they know ka-ka about global warming. It’s ok that they have opinions, just like everybody else. But using fame to broadcast them is obnoxious. As if all us little people are sittin’ on pins and needles breathlessly waitin’ to hear George Clooney’s thoughts on foreign policy. Clooney oughta concentrate on not sucking as an actor. Likewise, baseball commentators oughta comment on baseball, and stow their wisdom when it comes to health care, the minimum wage and who’s lives matter. Just my 2 cents.

The real crux of the issue here — and why I’m pulling my own “Schilling” — is something no one is talking about. So I’m gonna talk about it, pallie! It’s science; that inconvenient thing that gets in the way of hysteria (and, in my case, going to med school).

I’ll say right here that the sum total of my science knowledge wouldn’t fill a rosin bag. But I know enough to understand why a curve ball curves, what evolution is, and where Pamela Anderson’s body came from. The primary contention in Schilling’s Facebook post — that “a man is a man no matter what they call themselves” — just so happens to be supported by DNA and those annoying little X and Y chromosomes. It is, according to science, biologically impossible to change genders, unless you’re one of those fish I’ve seen on the Nature Channel. Dr Paul McHugh, former psychiatrist in chief at Johns Hopkins Hospital says, “Claiming to be a woman when you have the chromosomal and anatomical structures of a man does not make you such. You’re still a man no matter what you think or how you dress.” 

And on a totally practical note, anyone who’s ever been to the mens room in a ball park would know why you don’t want men going into the ladies room. Men are notoriously bad shots. It’s like they’re trying to christen the floor! And half of ’em don’t wash their hands after. Think about that the next time you’re at Wrigley and there are 7, beer chuggin’ guys between you and the hawkers. Best get your pretzel in the concours, my friend.

To wrap this up, I’d guess the average person coming unglued over Shilling’s controversial Facebook post, is the same one megaphoning about global warming — and defends the position on the latter by saying science backs them up. My question, then, is this: Why doesn’t science matter in Schilling’s case?

Joe

PS. Met’s fans, remember what I said about the urinal cookies.

NOAH’S ARK SURPASSED IN SCALE BY PUIG’S ARCH.

· Joe Sez, News · ,

YASIEL-PUIG-THROW

This play has been making the rounds on social media like Yasiel Puig just cured cancer and balanced the federal budget. On the same day. Most every comment I’ve read makes this throw — which, I admit, did nail the guy at third — into something other-worldly; like God himself breathed some sorta biblical power into Puig’s arm. My charitable side, if I had one, would assume these guys never saw Roberto Clemente, Fred Lynn or Reggie Jackson throw a ball from the wall — not 20 feet inside the warning track— to nail a guy at 3rd or home. Happened all the time, my friend, and I saw plenty of them myself. Even Chicago’s own hero-turned-juicer, Sammy Sosa, woulda made that throw better than Puig.

I saw Puig’s throw the night it happened. Who didn’t? ESPN and every other jock sniffer on the planet ran it to friggin’ death. Hell, Jennifer Aniston could walk down Michigan Avenue stark-friggin-naked and she wouldn’t get that kinda coverage. (By the way, if she ever does that, I’ll be checkin’ off number 3 on by bucket list.) But like I said, I can’t argue with the end result; Puig nailed the guy. It’s the way his throw was characterized — by sportswriters, no less — that’s chaffing my backside. It was called “a laser” to third. A laser? Look … I may be closer to a Christian Scientist than a rocket scientist, but I’ve seen enough Star Trek to know that lasers don’t come in “rainbow”, which is exactly what that throw was, pal. If I didn’t know better, I might have thought the game was in St Louis with that kinda arch.

Anyway, while we’re busy dipping Puig’s arm in bronze and adding a wing to Cooperstown to keep it in, let’s try not to crap all over the guys that perfected the art of the cannon shot from deep right center. Have a little respect for the game, and the guys that made it great by doing the impossible, not just flippin’ bats and shit.

Joe