IT'S NAWT FAY-UHHHHH!!!

Never before in the history of sports have a city's NBA, NHL, and MLB teams all lost on the same day. Ever. So let's all cut Bill Simmons some slack and let him wallow in self-pity, OK? Or, alternatively, let's review some of his tweets from yesterday and laugh at them.

Tonight: Huge C's home playoff game, B's playing for Conf Finals, big Sox-Yanks Fenway tilt... Are we back in the mid-80's?

He's so excited! Also, other than 1986, there were no seasons during the "mid" 80s (assuming neither 1981 nor 1988 counts) during which both the Red Sox and Yankees finished within 10 games of making the playoffs. Anyways, let's move to the middle of the Cavs/Celtics game.

Early start + awful traffic + late-arriving crowd + Jay-Z + locked-in LeBron + pro-Cle refs + flat Pierce = this sucks.

THE REFS AHHHHH AGAINST US! THE LEAGUE HATES US! Granted, the league probably wants LeBron to win a title. But I doubt they'd shed any tears if the Celtics won the series.

(This exchange sums it up.) My Dad: "Nate gave us a spark." Me: "We're down 26!" Dad: "Yeah, but we were down 30."

I hate you, Bill's dad. You sound like a twatmunch. So how did the day finish up?

It's official: Black Friday in Boston. Glad I flew cross-country to be here. I'm gonna go wander in traffic.

BLACK FRIDAY. WOE IS US. THE BRUINS ARE ONLY UP 3-1 IN THEIR SERIES, THE CELTICS ARE DOWN 2-1, AND THE RED SOX LAWST A SINGLE GAME IN A 162 GAME SEASON. What a fucking loser Bill is. It boggles my mind. This is almost as hilarious as last October, when the Patriots lost and the Red Sox were knocked out of the playoffs on the same day, making it "Black Sunday."

And ate a whole wheel of cheese. I'm not even mad. RT @sehart: LBJ just pooped in your refrigerator.

Like in that movie that everyone has seen and likes to quote!

Bob Nightengale makes generally valid point, chooses terrible examples and sample sizes to make it with

Everyone knows it's anywhere from slightly- to significantly harder to pitch in the AL than in the NL. Period. If you don't believe that, you're wrong. I don't dispute the main thesis of this article by Bob Nightengale. But look at the hilariously awful examples he uses to make his case:

Philadelphia Phillies starter Roy Halladay, out of the AL East, is mowing down the NL as if he were a reincarnation of Bob Gibson. He's 5-1 with a 1.47 ERA, pitching three complete games and two shutouts

Last I checked, Halladay was a pretty exceptional pitcher in the AL. Pitching in the toughest division in the toughest league in baseball, he's certainly had stretches where he's put up similar numbers over 6 starts. Unless Nightengale is suggesting the NL East has transofrmed Halladay into a 1.47 ERA pitcher over an entire season. Which....he's not

Oh, and sample size.

Carlos Silva was 5-18 with a 6.81 ERA the last two years for the Seattle Mariners. Traded for outfielder Milton Bradley, he is 2-0 with a 2.90 ERA in five starts for the Chicago Cubs

Carlos Silva

a.) Is a notoriously fast starter
b.) Put up his best years in the....American League
c.) Bob Nightengale isn't really suggesting that a league change is the difference between going 5-18 with a 6.81 ERA and going undefeated with a 2.90 ERA, is he?

Oh, and sample size.

Javier Vazquez, a 15-game winner with a 2.87 ERA with the Atlanta Braves last year, is 1-3 with a 9.78 ERA for the New York Yankees, who will push back his next start.

Once again, must be the league that accounts for a 7.00 ERA differential. Anyone who has ever followed baseball ever knows that the knock on Vazquez is that he's mentally soft and can't pitch in big games (or for big teams). Terrible example.

Oh, and sample size.

The Los Angeles Angels' Joel Pineiro, a 15-game winner for the St. Louis Cardinals last year, is yielding a .320 batting average and has a 5.76 ERA, allowing 21 hits and 15 earned runs in 9⅓ innings in his last two starts.

Ah yes, Pineiro's regression has everything to do with his league and not the fact that his 2009 was way off his career numbers--and therefore likely to be difficult to maintain--and that he was working with a coach who is renowned for wringing solid years out of shitty pitchers.

Oh, and sample size.

Ben Sheets, after eight years with Milwaukee, is 1-3 with a 7.12 ERA for Oakland. Rich Harden, who left the Cubs, has allowed 44 baserunners in 23⅔ innings for the Texas Rangers.

Not like Sheets isn't coming off a season where he didn't play at all, right? But it must be the AL/NL thing. And Harden? He just threw a gem last night. But that must be because the American Leagues is a notoriously streaky league.

Oh yeah and:

2009 with the Cubs Harden went 9-9 with a 4.09 ERA (and a 1.34 WHIP, and a 2.5 K/BB for those semi nerds among us)

2005, his last full season with the American League Hard To Pitch For A's Harden went 10-5 with a 2.53 ERA (and a 1.06 WHIP and 2.8 K/BB)

Oh and sample s....well you get the point.

Look clearly the AL is more difficult to pitch in than the NL--for one there's the DH. I mean it just intuitively makes sense. And my general impression is that studies show it's about a 1 run difference between leagues, favoring NL pitchers. But if you're going to make that argument, why not use actual evidence. Not just swaths of 5-7 starts from pitchers with myriad other explanations for their success/failure besides "dey switched to day easier/harder league!"

The Phillies Will Pay Ryan Howard $25 MM Per Year During His Age 34, 35, and 36 Seasons

(Apologies to the three of you who read this shitty blog via RSS feed. This is a repost, because some of the HTML in the old version of the post got messed up when I tried to edit something. Since I know nothing about HTML, I figured the best solution was to burn the whole thing to the ground and start over. ANYWAYS- the Phillies will Howard an awful lot of money when he's 34, 35, and 36, and....)

That's kind of dumb. It's roughly what A-Rod (by which I mean PAY-Rod, GAY-Rod, A-ROID, and FISH FILLET-Rod) is making at that age, but 1) A-Rod is the better player 2) A-Rod plays a more valuable position 3) A-Rod keeps himself in peak physical condition and 4) the Phillies aren't the Yankees. With slight modifications, similar arguments apply to the massive contracts currently held by Mark Teixeira (also a 1B, obviously) and Matt Holliday (not a Yankee, obviously). Except for Alfonso Soriano, who holds the worst contract in baseball right now- yes that's right I went out on a limb and said it- no other hitter in the game holds a contract that will pay them that kind of money at that age (Miguel Cabrera and Joe Mauer will be younger during the tail end of the deals they recently signed). It's simply way too much to invest in an aging 1st baseman. Jon Heyman- your poorly formulated thoughts?

Howard's contributions can be overlooked at times because of the overwhelming presence of Pujols, who's clearly the best player in the National League,

Look, I'm pretty sure Ryan Howard is neither overrated nor underrated but properly rated. If anyone's overlooking his contributions, which I don't think anyone in the national media is, it's not because of Pujols. It's because Howard isn't even the most valuable hitter on his own team.

and also because Howard is only part of a fabulous nucleus in Philly that includes Jimmy Rollins, Chase Utley and Jayson Werth.

Unlike Howard, Jimmy Rollins might be the most overrated player in all of baseball right now. If I hear one more announcer or talking head start blabbing about what a SPARKPLUG Rollins is, or how he's Philly's EMOTIONAL LEADER, I'm going to be sick. He's a leadoff hitter with a career .330 OBP. His power is overrated (career best HR totals: 30, 25, 21, 14, 14, 12), his defense is overrated, everything about him is overrated. Wait- what were we talking about again? Oh yeah. So throw Rollins out of that group. But Utley is by far more valuable than Howard, and if Werth backs up his strong 2009 with a strong 2010, you could make an argument that he's more valuable too. So that's just one reason you might not want to pay Ryan Howard $25 MM during his age 36 season; even now, he's not the most valuable hitter on your team.

Howard does have a few negatives, such as his high strikeout totals (an average of 189 the past four seasons),

Kind of a big deal, especially when you're hitting cleanup.

his weakness against left-handed pitchers (last year his OPS was 1.088 vs. right-handers vs .653 vs. lefties),

Definitely a big deal.

his age (30) and the possibility he'll decline during the contract as he gets older.

Oh, the "possibility?" You think he might not hit as well at age 36 as he did at ages 25, 30, or even 32? A bold prediction, Jon. You truly have the wisdom of King Solomon.

But the belief among skeptics of the deal that this was an obvious overpay isn't reflected one bit among baseball people.

Isn't reflected among stupid baseball people.

In fact, a few inside the game remarked that the package was strong though not unreasonably so and one actually opined that it was light.

That guy probably works for another NL East team, and was being sarcastic.

I agree with the prominent competing agent who said, "The $25 million AAV (average annual value) reflects fair market value.''

Oh wow, can you believe it? An agent (who probably represents Adrian Gonzalez, or Pujols, or Prince Fielder) thinks this was a fair deal! COLOR ME SHOCKED. I can't believe it. If you want to evaluate the reasonableness of a contract that will pay a fat first baseman $25 MM when he's 36, that's who you should go to for objectivity- an agent. Well done, Jon. And look, it really doesn't reflect market value. Take Yankees out of the picture, and the contract is one of a kind. Cabrera isn't locked up at that age via his deal. Mauer is, but he's a catcher for the time being. Todd Helton is just now finishing up a contract that certainly paid him too much at those ages, but that was signed in 2001 when money was a little looser. The Rockies (and any team not called the Yankees) won't soon be offering that kind of deal again. The best bet for a current comp to Howard's deal is Holliday's, but it's for less money and at least he plays in the OF (and plays it pretty well). There really isn't a market for fat non-Yankee 34, 35 and 36 year old first basemen. This deal just set it.

As boring as it sounds, it was a good deal for both sides.

Well, it's definitely a good deal for Howard.

There are those suggesting Howard won't be the player at the end of the deal, when he'll be 36, that he is now, and that isn't an unreasonable prediction.

Actually, those people are exactly right unless Howard takes steroids and turns into Barry Bonds. Also- nice sentence, asshole.

But A-Rod, for example, will be 42 when his contract will be up,

I already addressed this. Better player. Different position. More likely to age well. Most importantly, money coming from Yankee coffers.

and besides, that guess can be made about many long-term deals. One GM said five years isn't outrageous at all and actually praised Howard for not being greedy and insisting on seven or eight.

Look, Howard could have done that. And the smart thing for the Phillies to do (and what they should have done here) would be to tell Howard to pound sand. Some other idiot team can overpay him when he hits the FA market after next season. That's the dumbest part about this whole thing, really- the Phillies overpaid Howard a full 18 months before he would have hit free agency. Do they understand what leverage is? You overpay someone when you absolutely need them signed right then. You do not overpay someone when you're already in control of their services for their next 1200 at bats.

That Howard received $2 million more than Teixeira also seems about right under the circumstances.

It doesn't.

Teixeira has a more diverse set of skills,

He's a switch hitter. He hits for both average and power. He plays great defense. All reasons he's more valuable.

is slightly younger and signed in New York as a free agent, but he couldn't make a case that he has the same offensive impact as Howard, a classic slugger.

Yes, Howard piles up the HRs and RBIs better than Teixeira does. That certainly makes him a better fantasy player, but I don't think it speaks to his actual value very well considering his home park. Yankee Stadium may have a short RF porch, but Citizens Bank Park is a fucking joke from foul pole to foul pole. I hope that place burns to the ground tonight. Omar Vizquel could hit 15 HRs this season if he were to start for the Phillies. But there's no way that could happen, because the Phillies already have the best SPARKPLUG OF AN EMOTIONAL LEADER in the game at shortstop.

But here are a few more reasons Howard is worth this investment:

1) He's showed his value by finishing first, fifth, second and third in MVP voting the last four years.

Haha, this is great. Let's see- dipshit MVP voters like Jon Heyman have given Howard a lot of MVP votes. Therefore, dipshit writers like Jon Heyman can cite those votes as a reason to pay Howard $25 MM a season when he's 34, 35, and 36. What a nifty, convenient system.

There is a group of numbers people who think these finishes don't count, but there is no reason to think Howard was vastly overvalued in the voting.

No one thinks Howard is a bad player. No one thinks he isn't one of the best power hitters in MLB. And pretty much no one except Cardinals fans wouldn't want to have Howard on their team. But not at that price, at that age.

2) He also has averaged 49.5 home runs and 143 RBIs over the past four years, far more than anyone else.

OK, again, time for some perspective. He's a great hitter and produces a lot of runs. He's just not worth that amount of money at that age. Also- Phillies lineup + Citizens Bank Park + batting behind Utley = tons of RBIs. But I'm not significantly more impressed with his 143 average than with, say, Lance Berkman's average of 106 over the same span.

Everyone agrees that home runs are an important stat, but to those who believe RBIs are only a reflection of one's teammates, and thus pure luck, here are the top five RBI leaders since 1900: Hank Aaron, Babe Ruth, Barry Bonds, Lou Gehrig and Stan Musial. Five very lucky fellows.

Whoa! Watch out for that straw man! Better tear it down and burn it- make sure it can't hurt anyone. Give me a fucking break. No one with a brain says RBIs are "pure luck." We don't need to get into this. It's like when Joe Morgan waxes poetic about how no one respects stolen bases anymore. Plenty of people respect them- they're just not foolishly overvalued like they used to be.

3) It isn't unreasonable to suggest Howard might decline during his extension.

This is a separate thought, and doesn't belong on a list of reasons Howard is worth what the Phillies will end up paying him.

As a matter of logic, he probably will.

As long as he's not Barry Bonds, he definitely will.

But the evidence isn't strong that he's declining yet, (his 2009 slugging percentage of .571 wasn't significantly different from his .582 career mark), and even if he does suffer a slight drop off, it's from a tremendous height (his 198 home runs over the past four years are 29 more than everyone else).

Right. He's not declining yet. Because he's only 30. This contract doesn't even start until 2012. And it will comically overpay him in 2014, 2015, and 2016. Odds that he's still slugging anything in the neighborhood of .580 then: poor. You know, everyone is saying that the world is going to run out of crude oil at some point, but I went to the gas station yesterday and filled up my car. Therefore: we probably will never run out of crude oil.

Plus, he's shown he's serious about his game and his body. He has lost an estimated 30 pounds and remarkably turned himself into at least an average defensive first baseman from something a lot less than that. So in that way, he's actually on the rise.

On the rise and about to crash into his very low (for a pro athlete) athleticism ceiling.

4) He's a winner and a major part of one of the strongest lineups in baseball. Why mess with a good thing?

Awesome point. You're a fucking idiot.

5) The market could explode.

It won't. If Adrian Gonzalez or Prince Fielder hit the FA market after 2011 and sign contracts that pay them this kind of money when they're 34, 35, and 36, I'll eat my oversized foam cowboy hat.

The economy is improving, baseball is doing great and the appetite for superstars on the free-agent market is always strong, even in down times like the past couple years. "You can't really pinpoint what these guys could be getting on the open market,'' Boggs said, honestly.

Boggs is John Boggs, Gonzalez's agent. HMMMMMM. You think he likes the deal Howard got? In conclusion, don't ever let Jon Heyman run your baseball team.

Again, It's Not Broken

I know we spend a lot of time on this blog bitching about things extraneous to currently-played big-league baseball, like the HOF and the All-Star Game.

But this seems silly.

Changes to the All-Star Game, based on recommendations by the Special Committee for On-Field Matters, were announced by Major League Baseball on Wednesday, furthering efforts to sharpen the competitive edge in baseball's annual Midsummer Classic.

Maybe they should sharpen the edge by telling the National League to win a few goddamn games. Also, none of these changes sharpen anyone's competitive edge, they simply allow more people to be recognized as All-Stars.

Starting with the 81st All-Star Game on July 13 in Anaheim, the changes include:

• The contest always will include a designated hitter no matter where it's played.

Why? This sucks. Like really. Why? I know I'm not really being articulate here because I don't want to get into the whole DH or not DH argument, but can't we just respect our differences as leagues and permit each to play by their rules half the time?

• No pitcher who competes for his team on the previous Sunday will be allowed to pitch in the game.

I recognize the rationale for this, but is it really necessary?

• Rosters have been increased to 34 players, by one slot designated for a position player.

Great. Why don't they call it the All the Kind of Good Players Game?

• A rule will allow one position player re-entry into the game if necessitated by injury.

This rule wouldn't be a problem if we didn't have some sort of pathological love of participation that impels managers to waste a lot of players on pinch-hits and one-out relief appearances just to get them in the game. If MLB really wanted to solve the problem, they wouldn't change the rules, they'd just tell the managers to stop the bullshit.

I wonder if MLB encourages managers to get each team's player in the game to hold the attention of (and the corresponding ratings and ad dollars) fans in weak teams' markets.

The procedural changes, agreed upon by Major League Baseball and the Major League Baseball Players Association, come as the most significant alterations to the sport recommended by the Special Committee to date.

I realize I sound about eighty-eight years old when I say this shit, but really, if it isn't broke, then the Special Committee for On-Field Matters can keep its own Special Nose in its own Special Business.

Chaired by Commissioner Bud Selig and composed of longtime managers, executives and observers of the game, the committee was formed in December.

Thanks, Bud. Knew you were in on this somehow. Also, there is no rationale cited for the formation of this committee.

It previously recommended an off-day be removed from the League Championship rounds to tighten the playoff schedule, and the Commissioner's Office announced that change in March.

Yawn.

These also are the first significant alterations to the All-Star Game format since 2003, when the game was declared the deciding factor for which league hosts the World Series. That change, along with a roster bump from 30 to 32 players, was made in the wake of the 7-7 tie at the 2002 game in Milwaukee.

And which has resulted in a nuclear tsunami volcano of stupidity since then.

The rest of the article is just Joe Girardi just yokeling on about how these rules will make the ASG better.

A Trip Down Memory Lane

Let's take a trip back in time and review the most commented-upon post in FireJay history. While I strongly disagree with Chris W's position (because the NBA playoffs rule and nothing about them should be changed), I will defend to my death his right to say it. Especially if it leads to 50+ comments, some of them not even all that shitty.

Dan Shaughnessy Shows Us How to Win a Non-Argument

Why am I bothering to spend time writing a whole post about a Dan Shaughnessy column? Fuck if I know. I'd rather give Simmons attention than him. But this is pretty wretched. I'm not going to link to it; the whole don't-give-traffic-to-useless-dipshits thing. Here we go.

Welcome to my town, Boston, Massachusetts.

We're not there. We're reading this drivel on the internet, which can be accessed from almost anywhere in the modernized world.

It's quite simply the best sports city in the United States of America.

Ah, a classic non-argument. Can't be debated objectively in any way; can't be settled, ever; appeals to the lowest common denominator ("FACKIN' BEANTOWN IS THE FACKIN' BEST AND IF YOU DON'T THINK SO I'LL KICK YOU IN THE CUNT!"); and most importantly: irrelevant. There is little point in having this argument in a bar with your friends. There is less than no point in writing about it for a major sports website. Thanks, Dan. I'm sure this is only the 50th stupidest thing you've written so far this year though.

Especially this week.

This article is a little old- he means last week.

Care to argue?

Absolutely not.

Bring it on.

OK!

Monday is Patriots' Day in Greater Boston. Oddly enough, the New England Patriots will be the only only Hub team that's out of season.

This is great. I love it. Every single day, sports journalists/talking heads/blithering idiots misidentify irony more times than any of us could begin to count. It's ironic that Albert Pujols struck out, because he's a good hitter. It's ironic that the Saints won the Super Bowl just a few years after hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans. Etc., etc., etc. So here's a great example of something that's actually ironic- but Dan fails to identify it as such. Awesome.

Patriots' Day commemorates the battles of Lexington and Concord and the first shot fired in the Revolutionary War. Patriots' Day is a legal holiday in Maine and Massachusetts, falling annually on the third Monday in April.

Obviously copied and pasted from Wikipedia.

It's one of the great days of every spring in Boston, particularly when the Bruins and Celtics are playoff worthy.

Any day is a great spring day in any city when its NBA and NHL teams are in the playoffs.

Since 1897, Patriots' Day has been celebrated with the running of the Boston Marathon. The Red Sox have been playing on Marathon Monday since 1902 when 35-year-old Cy Young hurled the Sox to a 7-6 victory at the old Huntington Avenue Grounds. Since 1968, the Sox have served baseball breakfast at Fenway on Marathon Monday with games starting at 11:05 a.m. It is the only regularly-scheduled morning start on the big league calendar.

Don't care. You have a baseball game on a Monday in April? Congratulations. You have a marathon? Congratulations. Here's your gold star- try to contain your erection.

At 10 a.m. Monday, the first of approximately 300,000 runners (counting the unofficial entries) left Hopkinton bound for the Back Bay of Boston where they hoped to cross the finish line on Boyleston Street. The 114th running of the Boston Marathon featured almost 10,000 international entrants from more than 70 countries.

Obviously copied and pasted from Wikipedia.

Hundreds of thousands of spectators lined the 26.2-mile course. The runners heard cheers from the co-eds at Wellseley College and ran up Heartbreak Hill after the 90 degree right turn at the fire station in Newton.

Landmarks? On a marathon course? Be still my beating heart.

While the thin people ran toward downtown Boston, more than 37,000 filled Fenway Park for the 557th consecutive time. All the runners were still on the course when John Lackey threw the first pitch long before noon. Citizens of Red Sox Nation

That term alone is enough to disqualify Boston from consideration as best sports city in America, if we were ever to seriously consider that argument. Which we won't. Because it's a non-argument.

were wondering if the staggering Sox (4-9, 1-6 at Fenway) might be hungover from the three-game beatdown sustained over the weekend at the hands of the rabble-rousing Tampa Rays.

AND ALL THEIR BLACK PLAYAHS WHO SUCK AND WOULD NEVER BE WORTHY OF PLAYING IN FRONT OF RED SAWX NATION!

The Sox and Rays were still on the Fenway lawn when the marathon leaders passed through Kenmore Square. Fans sitting atop the Green Monster could turn their heads to see if there were any Americans near the front of the pack. Kenyans and Ethiopians have dominated the Boston course in recent years. The Rays led, 6-0 in the bottom of the third when Kenyan Robert Cheruiyot crossed the finish line in a Boston record time of 2:05:50. Some of the erstwhile Fenway Faithful could be seen running out of Fenway, joining the marathoners to escape the carnage at the ballpark, as the Sox suffered through a 8-2 loss.

This is turning into a middle school book report on what Dan saw/heard happened on Patriots' Day. Still nothing about why Boston is a great (or the greatest) sports city.

Monday night on Causeway Street the Bruins got ready to play the Buffalo Sabres in Game 3 of their first-round NHL playoff series. The goal-challenged B's erupted for five scores in a series-squaring, 5-3 win at Buffalo Saturday afternoon. The Bruins haven't won a Stanley Cup since 1972, back in the days when the Sox were plagued by the Curse of the Bambino and Americans still won the Marathon.

GOOD, HONEST, WHITE-SKINNED AMAHHHHRICANS.

The team that's brought the most glory to Boston, the Celtics, did not play Monday, but the Green Team practiced at their Waltham health club in preparation for Tuesday night's Game 2 at the Garden against the Miami Heat.

Irrelevant. Again, part of a book report. Again, no mention of why Boston is teh bestest.

The Celtics beat the Heat in Game 1 Saturday night, but have been scorned for much of this year because of their chronic underachievement. Two years removed from their 17th World Championship, the Celtics look like they're bound for a second-round showdown with the Cleveland Cavaliers, aka the best team in basketball. The Celtic-Heat series took on some additional juice when it was announced that Kevin Garnett would be suspended for Game 2 as punishment for tossing an elbow in a fracas at the end of Game 1.

Don't care. More book report stuff.

After the Celtics play Tuesday, the famed Boston Garden bull gang will convert the arena from parquet to ice to get ready for the Bruins and Sabres in Game 4 Wednesday night.

An arena used for more than one sport? A basketball floor on top of a hockey rink? Preposterous!

Thursday, the Garden will be dark as the B's and C's hit the road, but New Englanders will turn their eyes toward Foxborough where Bill Belichick will attempt to bolster his roster with the 22nd pick in the NFL draft. Meanwhile, the sagging Sox will attempt to get back on track against the Texas Rangers, then the Baltimore Orioles. No matter how bad the weather gets, Fenway will be filled every night.

Probably the only quasi-point in the whole article that goes to the idea that Boston is a great sports city- the Red Sox always sell out. Of course, so do lots of other teams from a variety of sports in other cities. So...

Truly, sports fans are blessed here in the Hub of the Universe.

Wow, yeah. They have a basketball team in the playoffs, a hockey team in the playoffs, a baseball team that plays during April, and a football team which made picks during the 2010 NFL draft. And a marathon. Truly the "Hub" of the sports universe. Unless you also also count Chicago, Denver, or Phoenix. Not to mention the nine other cities that have teams in all four major sports and a marathon (but didn't have both their NBA and NHL team in the playoffs this year- New York, the Bay Area, Minneapolis, Atlanta, Miami, Dallas, Philadelphia, Detroit, and DC). This article has truly made its point.

We've got shots heard round the world, every day.

That's his closing sentence- anyone have any idea what in the fuck he's talking about? In conclusion, Dan Shaughnessy is the worst sportswriter in America. And I think I've proven that throughout the course of this post.

Rain-Abbreviated Sunday Night Baseball Liveblog

Why not? Not a lot else going on right now and the Reds pulled one out today... maybe Joe Morgan can give me some insights on what he plans to do to pull the Reds out of their lousy start to this season.

Looking at the Sunday Night Baseball schedule is, of course, hardly a national sampling of Major League teams. Really, it's just a way to give big-market fans more of a chance to see their team. Seriously, of the 24 teams featured in the first twelve scheduled games, only the Royals could be considered small-market. But that's business for you. On to the baseball!

Jose Reyes comes up in the bottom of the first. He's recently been moved to the #3 slot in the lineup, a move that has generated a lot of conversation:

Morgan: When you move to the third spot, they pitch you differently than if you're in the leadoff spot.
Really? More on this in a moment, but if there's nobody on base and two out, I don't think your approach changes much based on the lineup slot you're facing.
Miller: You sound like you've expereinced this personally, Joe!
Man, Miller sounds like Morgan's stooge here. He's just here to pad Joe's ego.
Morgan: Actually, I have.
Reference to his playing career #1: 7:27 pm CDT.

Bottom of the 2nd and some French guy at the plate:
Miller: Francouer's always been an aggressive hitter, but his mantra this year is "Be aggressive in the strike zone". Jerry Manuel's been working with him in the cage...
Francoeur: [swings wildly at a curveball in the dirt]
Francoeur: [swings wildly at a slider six inches off the outside half]
dan-bob: Maybe Francoeur should work on not being an aggressive hitter at all.

Luis Castillo at the plate in the bottom of the 3rd:
Morgan: When you've got a runner on second and you're hitting third, like I said before, they're gonna pitch you a lot harder than if you're hitting leadoff.
dan-bob: Why don't pitchers pitch them hard all the time?
[Reyes grounds weakly to short]

Well, shit, the rain in New York has prevented this liveblog from going much farther. Now this "ESPN" is nothing but repeats of baseball highlights and Mel Kiper's last glimpse of sunlight before he goes back to his hidden ice-cave for a long winter's nap.

Presenting: Punchlines That Write Themselves, Vol. 6

Guess who the Reds just hired to help make decisions for them?

I'm so, so, so, SO sorry. Condolences. Your punchlines in the comments.

Jeez Louise, Rob Neyer: LET IT GO

http://espn.go.com/blog/sweetspot/post/_/id/3228/suspending-a-j-pierzynski

I wasn't suggesting that Pierzynski should have been, or should be, punished. I'm arguing that there should be a mechanism to punish players for doing what Pierzynski did. It would be tough for the umpires on the field to levy this punishment, because a player probably wouldn't lie unless he was 95-percent sure the umpires couldn't catch him. What I'm suggesting is a post facto punishment, in the form of a suspension.

Yes, this would require someone at Major League Baseball to watch the replay in super-slow motion, again and again, and determine not only exactly what happened on the field, but also the player's intent.

That's really hard!

And they do it all the time. Every few weeks, a pitcher is suspended for a few games because someone in New York determines the pitcher was trying to throw a pitch at a batter's head. Is it always fair? No. Sometimes the guy in New York gets it wrong. But the judgment's been made that an occasional injustice is a price worth paying if it means fewer hitters getting knocked into the hospital with cranial trauma.

Holy awful logic batman! Do I really even need to comment about all the ways this is ridiculous?

Let it go, Rob Neyer, and get back to writing exceptional baseball articles.

Rob Neyer is a Liar. There. Now we've both made a false accusation

I love Rob Neyer's writing. Absolutely can't do without it. I own every single book he's ever put his name on. But this is absurd.

Romero skipped a pitch in the dirt to Pierzynski leading off the eighth inning -- not a terrible pitch, mind you, because AJ had been hacking at similar offerings all night. But late in the game with his team trailing 4-0, Pierzynski resisted the urge to swing. When the ball hit the ground near his feet, he began hopping as if an anvil had landed on his toe. But in fact, nothing had landed on his toe. Replays were clear. He had not been hit.

I don't want to get into the awesome logistics that would be involved here ... but, ethically speaking, isn't there an argument to be made for punishing Pierzynski? He cheated.

In soccer, don't officials have the power to levy discipline against players who feign injury?

In the aftermath, Steve Stone said, "It's just one of those things." As if cheating (and getting away with it) is like an earthquake, or a tornado that formed quickly and touched down before anyone could sound a warning.

No. It's not just one of those things. It's cheating, and in some quarters there are rules against such things.

I know everyone hates AJ Pierzynski, but last I checked, you can't break the rules if there isn't a rule. And if it ain't breaking the rules it ain't cheating.

Last I checked. Debate the ethics of what he did if you want, but until you can show me the rule he broke, let's hold off on calling people cheaters. Unless you want to call every baseball player who tries to decieve the umpire a cheater--which includes every single catcher who has ever framed a borderline strike. Which is, of course, every catcher ever.