Can't We Just Work Out A Compromise Where Roger Goodell and the Lawyers Kill Themselves?

Never mind that this piece of shit letter by known piece of shit Roger Goodell reads like one of those shitty Rick Reilly columns where he imagines how terrible baseball would be in some dystopian world where all the players were forced to take steroids and the pitchers were cyborgs or something. Never mind that. Just get a load of this:

For many years, the collectively bargained system—which has given the players union enhanced free agency and capped the amount that owners spend on salaries—has worked enormously well for the NFL, for NFL players, and for NFL fans.

For players, the system allowed player compensation to skyrocket—pay and benefits doubled in the last 10 years alone. The system also offered players comparable economic opportunities throughout the league, from Green Bay and New Orleans to San Francisco and New York. In addition, it fostered conditions that allowed the NFL to expand by four teams, extending careers and creating jobs for hundreds of additional players.

For clubs and fans, the trade-off afforded each team a genuine opportunity to compete for the Super Bowl, greater cost certainty, and incentives to invest in the game. Those incentives translated into two dozen new and renovated stadiums and technological innovations such as the NFL Network and nfl.com.

I almost feel like I'd be insulting your intelligence to explain why the above quote is so intellectually dishonest. After all, anyone following the NFL lockout even casually should be able to see immediately where Goodell is trying to treat us like we're idiots.

However, the risk of not making it clear why Goodell is a living breathing piece of shit is a risk I'm not willing to take.

You see how, above, Goodell outlines everything that is great about the previous CBA? How it is good, not only for the players, but also the league and the fans? Well, Goodell, on behalf of the owners, locked the players out SO HE COULD TEAR UP THAT CBA. The players are not the ones who want to change the CBA. The owners do. The owners want to change the CBA, because that agreement--the one that led to them earning $9 billion in revenues last year--is an agreement that is not financially sustainable for the owners in the NFL.

Holy shit is Roger Goodell--both individually and in his station as spokesperson for the piece of shit owners--a piece of shit

EDIT: Larry wanted me to point out another hypocrisy of this quote that was kind of beyond the purview of my post, but bears mentioning anyway. The thing about owners building stadiums...well they kind of "built" the stadiums the same way as if when you graduate high school your folks take you to the used car lot and let you pick out the one you like, then that means "you bought a car". There are more mendacities and douchebaggeries at the micro level in this letter by Goodell--including the idea that the NFLPA would ever request that there not be an amateur draft (quite the opposite, and you damn well know it, Roger). But that's beyond my scope right now. I'd love to see LB take a crack at it though.

Brief TMTMQR: Gregg Easterbrook is the stupidest person alive

FNL had lots of actuality but not enough football. Through the course of 76 hours of television, surprisingly little was said about football itself: tactics, training, why things are the way they are.

Which is exactly what the majority of viewers want! How could you be so blind, NBC?

Big issues in high school ball -- heat stroke and concussions, abuse of players by coaches, academic ineligibility -- got less air time, if they were mentioned at all, than Julie Taylor's love life. That should have been different.

AND WOULD SOMEONE PLEASE ACKNOWLEDGE THAT SEINFELD DID NOT ACCURATELY DEPICT LIFE AMONG STRUGGLING PROFESSIONALS IN NEW YORK CITY? WHERE WERE THE EXTENDED DISCUSSIONS OF CRIME AND THE CITY'S STAGGERINGLY HIGH COST OF LIVING? WHY WAS SO MUCH TIME SPENT FOCUSING ON GEORGE'S LOVE LIFE? WHAT ARE THESE NETWORKS AND PRODUCERS TRYING TO DO- ENTERTAIN THE MASSES AND MAKE MONEY IN THE PROCESS?

I will try to post more about today's column if I can bring myself to read any more of it. Seems unlikely though.

Dear Selig: This is Not an Appropriate Thing To Say

Bud Selig sez:

“I was talking once with Robin Yount and George Brett and said they were getting to be the exceptions (players who stayed in one place). But they were such big parts of their communities. Their communities were better off that they stayed. And the players said they were better off, too. So, yes, baseball would be better with Albert in St. Louis.”

Jesus Christ Bud. You've said some stupid shit in your time (see: "Abner Doubleday invented baseball as long as we believe hard enough") but when you're the commissioner of a league that has not only been convicted of owner-collusion 3 times in the last 30 years and which has had a major, world-series-canceling work stoppage that almost crashed the sport the cause of which was very largely the players' residual resentment due to owner collusion....well, this is a really really really stupid thing to say, my man.

Does anything sum up deadspin better than this post?

Today, the "Shocking news" that the KKK tried to have an outing at a Cincinnati ballpark...in 1924.

Look, we all hate the KKK except for Dan-Bob who is a member. But does anything sum up Deadspin's

a.) General cluelessness about history/sports
b.) Desire to sensationalize things that aren't sensational

than this post? Look--the KKK is a terrible thing. But anyone who knows anything about baseball or United States history knows that the KKK asking to have a ballpark day in 1924 isn't particularly shocking. I mean, for fuck's sake, you don't really have to even know anything special about baseball and history to know that a racist organization asking to be officially recognized by a public figure or institution pre-1950's isn't that big a deal.

But the more you know about history the stupider it is that Deadspin thinks this is interesting. Let me be brief: in 1924 the KKK was not necessarily known to be the terrorist organization it is today. Between its inception in post-Civil War America as an group to bully newly freed blacks to the height of its murderous prominence in the 1950's and 1960's south, the KKK was really just a social organization. A racist social organization, a la the John Birch society, but nothing the average person--not even the average American would be particularly embarrassed to belong to. It was just a group of men whose intended purpose was American/WASPy "patriotism" which carried with it racist and anti-semitic attitudes. That's shitty, but how many public and private groups and institutions in the 1920's were racist or anti-semitic in some way or another? Many of them. Not to "excuse" the KKK--since we know what they became in the 1950's and 1960's, but let's face it: to the average person in the 1920's the KKK's racist and anti-Jew sentiment was probably looked on about the same as the average "Anti-Immigration" group is looked at now, except without even the whole "beware history or be doomed to repeat it" thing hanging as a stigma over the whole ordeal.

Furthermore baseball itself was full of KKK members, not all of whom were racist. Sure, Cobb was rumored to be a Klan member and was certainly racist, but players like Tris Speaker (who was almost certainly NOT racist, at least not in late-20th century terms) were members because, as said above, it was generally looked at as a social group.

So why is this even worth posting? What is interesting about this, if you have any sort of sense of perspective about US history? Oh, and the comments are, of course, predictably stupid and unfunny. So glad Deadspin is the premiere name in non MSM sports!!!!!

And here's how not to start a piece of sports journalism

Who wrote this intro? I'll be you can figure it out without looking for the name in the labels section of the post.

My son watched a few holes of the Masters with me on Sunday. He's nearly 3 and a half and hasn't figured out how to crap in the toilet yet. He spends most of his time naked or partially naked, barking out orders like "Put on Wow Wow Wubbzy!" and "I want graham crackers!" Every night, he promises us that he won't climb into our bed in the middle of the night, and yet, I always wake up around 4 a.m. because some snoring wildebeest is kicking me in the kidneys. Last week, the stubborn bastard sat still for a haircut for the first time only because we allowed him to play "Angry Birds" on an iPad. He's a man of many quirks. I'm not gonna lie.

I'm not gonna lie- I either think my main audience is new parents (Kids are a handful am I right?), or simply don't give a flying shit about trying to entertain anyone else. Listen, it's all well and good to try to connect with your audience by bringing up something they're familiar with. To start a column about Tiger Woods with 125 words about how your toddler behaves like every toddler in America kinda goes above and beyond that. I hate you with the intensity of a thousand burning suns, mystery writer whose obvious identity I won't reveal yet.

Here, check out how he ends the piece. Eventually he gets around to talking about Tiger and then wants to wrap up by going back to the kid. And how Tiger isn't a role model, or is, or something.

I am supposed to think that he's a poor role model -- that he's an adulterer, that he's selfish, that he's a phony, that he behaves badly on golf courses, that he's someone I wouldn't want my son to emulate some day. That's horses---. I want my son to know that you haven't lived until you've fought back, that you haven't won until you've lost, that you can't understand what it's like to relish something until you've suffered, too.

Hmm. So I guess being married with a kid but fucking everything that moves and then inevitably being caught is somehow equivalent to fighting a terminal disease or something.

I want him to understand that it's the 21st century, that we sit around picking our heroes apart all day, that we expect them to be superhuman at all times, that we get pissed off when they aren't, that it's hypocritical if you really think about it.

Who ISN'T secretly banging at least 15 random broads from all over the country at any point in time, you know?

If my son needs a role model, and he will, that person should be me. I don't need Tiger to teach my child how to behave. I need him to teach my son that it's fun to watch golf. Yesterday was the first lesson. There was a putt, and a roar, and a fist pump, and then my son screaming "Again!" Only Tiger Woods could have made it happen. It's a gift.

I'm so confused. So confused. If the point of this article was "Tiger Woods is fun to watch when he's golfing well" then I'm on board. Unfortunately the point might actually have been anything from "HI I'M CHARLES BARKLEY AND I JUSS WANTED TO REMIND YOU DAT AFLETES ARE NOT ROLE MODELS" to "I have a 3 year old who likes to act like a 3 year old." So I'm just going to turn in for the night.

Did you figure out who the author was? That's right, it was Hunter S. Thompson. Nah, just fucking with you, it was Simmons.

Buck Showalter is made of magic and knows how to create ponies out of thin air

Either that, or he's just another MLB manager who might be able to affect his team's record by a win or two over the course of a season. He's got a career "winning" percentage (quotation marks used because managers almost never win or lose anything) that's above .500 mostly because of a single awesome season with the Diamondbacks in 1999. He's had some ups, some downs, and mostly just talked a lot more than he should. But don't tell any of that to mlb.com's Hal Bodley, who has written a opus to managerial skill that's pretty sad.

Buck Showalter has the Orioles playing better than they have in eons, which reminds me of a conversation I had with George Steinbrenner years ago, discussing the talents of the manager.

Ah, George Steinbrenner, foremost authority on managers and how to handle them.

"I've never seen anybody more prepared, more detailed," Steinbrenner said. "He might be a little intense, but he never leaves anything to chance. He always has a plan and despises mistakes."

"Which is why I ran his ass out of town after four seasons."

Showalter grew up in the Yankees organization, where he spent 19 years. He managed them from 1992 until he resigned in '95,

Yielding the reins to Joe Torre and then seeing the Yankees win 4 of the next 5 World Serieseseses. I don't want to contradict my point by saying that Torre was the reason for all that postseason success, I just wanted to point out the double-wrongness of this article. Not only do managers not do much, but by all appearances Showalter isn't even a very good one.

After that, Showalter had managerial stops with the D-backs

Who won the World Series the year after he left town. Same point.

and Rangers,

Where he did exactly nothing in four years except piss off Ozzie Guillen.

but this assignment with Baltimore could be the most important of his career.

The two game difference he might be worth if he's an awesome manager will mean the most in taking Balitmore from 71 to 73 wins this year!

The numbers have been repeated many times, but after Showalter took over as manager on Aug. 3, he guided the Orioles to a 34-23 record, behind only the Twins and Phillies for the best record in the Majors during that period.

Which is relevant because those three teams went on to face each other in a three-way World Series showdown, the first of its kind. Who won? You guessed it: the Yankees.

The 34 wins in 57 games were more than previous 2010 managers Dave Trembley and Juan Samuel compiled in 105 games.

I'll admit that a midseason switch gives a little insight into managerial skill since most of the players are the same throughout the course of the year. On the other hand 1) the Orioles weren't going to play .300 ball all season, that's almost impossible for any MLB team to do 2) just because they got better under Showalter doesn't mean they wouldn't have gotten better under ANY new manager 3) managers don't do that much 4) Showalter is a loudmouthed idiot.

Showalter has a special managerial magic that has been contagious in the Orioles' clubhouse.

Barf.

Throughout Spring Training, he kept preaching that it was important to build on the success of the last weeks of 2010 -- continue the momentum, so to speak.

TRY TO KEEP WINNING? THIS GUY IS OFF HIS ROCKER! Double barf.

The thing about the Orioles this spring is that all facets of the game have improved. Hitters are driving in runners more frequently with two outs,

That's all Buck right there.

the young pitchers are showing more poise,

Or they're pitching better, which is certainly 100% Buck.

the defense is better

Because of Buck.

and the team is playing with much more confidence.

Non-sarcastically, that might be 20% attributable to Buck.

Showalter should take much of the credit.

Triple barf.

Power Rankings are Whatever But....

Check this out:

Krukie gives the Power Rankings for the league, and shamelessly puts the Cleveland Indians as the third best team in baseball.

The Cleveland Indians.

Karl Ravech tries to put a nice little spin on it to make it not sound as awful as it is....

KR: You seem to do it really on what's going on as we speak, ESPN.com kind of looks at like the potential for these teams

JK: Yeah I don't look at potential. Potential just gets you fired, that's what I've been told by a bunch of managers. I'm not going to get fired because of this.

When the Indians are struggling to hit that 70 win mark in September due to awful pitching and utilizing 3-4 replacement level bats on an everyday basis, I beg of you, ESPN management, watch this video on repeat 60 times like I just did, and teach Mr. I'm-not-going-to-get-fired a little lesson about getting cocky about.....not getting fired.

Morgan Ensberg's Perplexing Rage

Morgan Ensberg lashed out about Manny:

I am a Christian guy. There are a lot of emotions going through my mind as I type this. The most prevalent one is anger. Here is what I would like to say?

How could you? You coward! You are a fake and a cheat and now you want to retire? No way! You get back out there and you take the pain. You stand in front of the cameras and tell us that you are a fake. Tell us that you only care about money. Look directly into the camera and tell us that you don’t give a crap about baseball and that this was always about money! Look into the camera and tell us that you are so stupid and entitled that you are willing to put anything in your body if you think it will help. You took OVULATION MEDICINE DUDE. You were such a fake, that you put medicine in your body that helps you produce eggs for reproduction. You should have eaten raisins. I hear they help you think.

That is how I feel. Those are the feelings that make me want to lash out. But I am not going to say that. I am going to calm down and think before I type. I’m going to step away from the computer and think about what my actions mean. I’m going to walk into the living room and hug Beckett, Chase, and Ava. I’m going to think about my wife Christi and thank God for allowing me to have a wife who loves me. I’ll be right back.

I uh...there's just so much I don't know what to say here...Let's see what the internets have to say.

No hyperbole intended

but this might be the most breathtakingly stupid thing Bill Simmons has ever written. I'm serious, I really feel that way. I want to do a longer Simmons post about his whole NBA power rankings series that's out right now but it's been a rough week. So in anticipation of hopefully writing something over the weekend I give you this as an appetizer (re: Dwight Howard)

I can't give him my MVP vote for one simple reason: he leaves something on the table every night. Dwight Howard should be the league's most dominant player. Physically, there's nobody remotely like him. True story: I was watching SportsCenter the other night. My wife noticed Howard on TV and gasped, "Oh my God, who's that?" the same way you'd comment on the 12 year old in Little League who's six inches taller than everyone else and has the makings of a mustache already. When I told her it was Howard, she said, "Just looking at him, it seems like he should be the best player, right?" Exactly.

Wow. I just.... if you're like me, that leaves you speechless. That's indescribably horrendous. Hats of to you, Bill. Even though you only write four columns a year you still manage to bring the tardfuckery. In bulk.

More to come (I hope).

Rick Sutcliffe Spouts a Gem

Tonight's Twins-Yankees game got rained out. Consequently, ESPN aired a bunch of look-ins at various other games around the league - inspiring one ESPN head to encourage us to "see a few players you wouldn't normally see". Gee, it sure would be nice to see those players in regularly scheduled programming, instead of the usual Yankees-Red Sox-Cubs repetition.

But the best part came later in the broadcast, when Rick Sutcliffe began to describe the way winners help their team win in baseball. He said that these winners go into the dugout and say:

"I don't know if we're going to win this game, but we're not going to lose it"

Ladies and gentlemen, winners acknowledge the possibility of a tie.

Also, what does Rick Sutcliffe know about winning? He spent most of his career on the Cubs.

Ross Douthat...if only I could come up with a clever pun regarding his name vis-a-vis this article!

Maybe something incorporating feminine hygiene products and head apparel? Here is the article, where he niggles and nitpicks a small point in a Bill James article which attempts to argue that America's priority on athletic development has potentially hindered its literary development

I'm going to get right to the point, because I'm hungover as all shit: America is like 100x the size of London of Shakespeare's time and has produced untold hundreds of superstar athletes. It was produced over the past 50 years, very few writers who would be called literary geniuses (Roth, Delillo, McCarthy, Wallace, whatever).

No matter how you nitpick about Andy Sonnastine coming from BFE, America, you still are a douchehat (I finally came up with one!) who has completely missed the point and exposed yourself as a mouthbreather of the reading comprehension set.