So, I feel that because I am in a general brain-drain where all thoughts I can really muster up consist of my non-existent girlfriend on a pommel horse bathed in rubber cement, I will do something easy… Like boning the eye-liner laden girl on your freshman floor who thinks college is a race against all other female peers to see whose fallopian tubes can be flooded with the man-milk of every dude in her dorm the fastest… I am going to do a division by division break down of the MLB. We’re all excited about it, I know. So come along my STD-infested journey as I pick at that bulbous scab that has taken root above my sweet soul patch (to continue the metaphor) and describe the shear mediocrity that defines the AL East (for right now and maybe tomorrow).
For beginner’s, I’m not going to even go into detail with the Marlins. What a depressing state of affairs for all the “Fish Faithful.” Please. A new stadium? Why? You’re not going to even take the team seriously for another 2-3 years. What a rip to the taxpayers down in the Miami area. “Mr. and Mrs. Lowenstein, I’m afraid you’re going to have to temporarily suspend the down-payment on your new flamed-out Rascal… the Marlins are moving next year into a glittering new place…” Mr. Lowenstein’s Retort: “The Marlins… who are they? They don’t even sound Jewish to me.”
The bottom line: THEY ARE GONNA SUCK! Here’s their pitching rotation (projected): Scott Olsen, Mark Hendrickson, Andrew Miller, Ricky Nolasco, and maybe John VandenHurk. Who are the ad-wizards that came up with this astonishing load of talent to head up your squad? Poor Hanley and Ugly. While they may lead the division now, my money says they are 20 games out by Mid July. It’s only so long before Jacobs stops engorging himself on meaty fastballs and Hendrickson comes back to Earth. Awkward-ass honky.
As for the Nationals, they blew it by not signing the best off-season talent out there: Alexander Ovetchkin. If there’s one NHL’er with no baseball experience that I’m confident could hit .300, it’s the Big O. The guy is gross. His talent almost got the Caps through to the next round against a more physical, more gifted Flyers team. OVIE in Oh-Nine!
For real though, I commend the Nationals on going out and completely re-tooling their OF with young talent. The problem is the young triad of potential studs have an off the field laundry list of “cons,” including a convicted wife-beater in left, a lazy overweight slob in right (and that’s when he’s healthy), and an unproven youngster that certainly can run and catch, but has a rap for being a punk. Oh yeah DC, get ready for your Washington Nattys. Elijah ‘Put Up Your’ Dukes, ‘Not Gonna Last’ings Milledge, and Willy ‘Gimme Some’ Mo Pena round out what appears to be a young, potentially promising, but most likely disastrous outfield.
Also, what the hell did they release John Patterson for? I know the guy is not exactly a shoe-in for a 17 win year, but at the same time, how can you justify letting go your best starter from last year when your pitching isn’t oozing experience? He’s just hitting his peak in terms of pitcher ripeness too at the age of 30. As an aside, I think Pitcher Ripeness should be a new statistic whereby we assign a hurler a type of fruit to describe the stage of his career a la Pacman. Patterson would definitely be some luscious, green grapes because of his sour disposition after he was cut from the Nats tree. Boo for bad metaphors. Hooray for Beer!!
The Braves are almost interesting enough to be considered relevant again, despite their not making the post-season last year for the first time in almost two decades. You can bet Bobby Cox strangled a mallard at the end of last season in frustration. However, the Braves are doing something that the historied franchises with minimal recent success are doing (Dodgers and Cubs come to mind), and only time will tell if it works out. They are grooming a bunch of good, young, mostly home-grown prospects to come up together, and then they are sprinkling some veteran presence throughout the mix and hoping the confection comes out sweet.
Yunel Escobar, Kelly Johnson, Jeff Francouer, Brian McCann are the young studs learning while fixtures like Chipper and Smoltz take them for everything they’re worth in backgammon in the clubhouse. That’s where the real game study goes on. Does swindling rookies who barely have a grip on the rules of the game, let alone English, build camaraderie? I guess you’re forced to listen to everything a balding guy like Smoltz has to say when you owe him nine large. It also helps that he has more hardware in his living room than the IT department has below the stadium. Only pitcher in history with 150 wins and 150 saves. Wow.
What’s puzzling though is signing Kotsay and Glavine to me. Glavine, I suppose I understand because you want the guy to retire with the team he came up with and all that other classical loyalty-driven sentimental hooey that old-school baseball fans chow up. But as for Kotsay… that window of opportunity shut long ago. Especially when you’re trying to fill the void that TEN CONSECUTIVE GOLD GLOVES left in Hotlanta. That’s a lot of weight in high-priced metal leaving a sizeable indentation in center. And you get an injury-prone porcelain doll who could have been awesome 5 years ago? Look, I get that too. The A’s are picking up most of the tab and what do you have to lose? What if the guy has a career resurrection and you end up looking like geniuses? If he doesn’t, well, whatever. He was down and out anyway, and now we kick his ass into the ghetto from a moving Towncar.
Now the real contenders are the Phils and the Mets. After J-Ro started flexing his beak at the beginning of last year, the Phillies did a pretty good job of backing up their now-reigning National League MVP. After one of the most colossally proportioned meltdowns in modern sports history by the Mets, the Phillies went on to the win the East by playing solid ball. They raked from top to bottom and got some pretty decent starts, especially out of the young Hamels who this year leads a mostly mediocre starting rotation. It’s tough to argue that Howard, Utley, and Rollins do not comprise the most potent infield in all of baseball. That’s the baseball equivalent of having Scarlett Johansen, Jessica Biel, and Megan Fox all being in your Fave Five… Serious boner time.
The Phillies also added 20 HR and 80 RBI production with Pete Happy aka Pedro Feliz at 3rd, decent pop in Geoff Jenkins who as an aside has one of the most underrated goatee’s on all of planet earth, and should be pleased with formidable leadoff prowess from Shane Victorino. My biggest concern for the Phils besides Bret Myers dragging his wife through the stands pummeling her face in with a tire iron while horrifed fans and tormented children look on is that Charlie Manuel may not be able to survive the year without having sex with a Godzilla blow-up doll in the dugout after every Flash Gordon blown save. How else are you supposed to deal with continual failure in pressurized situations? Plastic lizard hole, people. It’s all the rage.
And now, introducing your 2007 Depends bed-deucers of the year, the New York Mets! After a sorely disappointing fold-job in the NLCS 2006 to the Cards, and as I have already alluded to, sucking a lot at the end of last season, zero-ocho is definitely a year for redemption for the boys at Shea.
You have to hand it to Omar Minaya for nutting up and having a Pablo Escobar-esque type off season. Highlighted by trading for the most dominant pitcher in baseball in Santana, acquiring Ryan Church and Brian Schneider from the pathetic Nats, and threatening Pedro Martinez within an inch of his life, the Mets GM has waved a giant wad of smelling salts under the congested Flushing schnozz. There is hope for the Big Apple’s equivalent of Meg Griffin because it seems like there is a new committment to winning.
The left side of the IF is on lockdown. The right side of the IF might get lockjaw due to too much Fix-a-Dent. The OF is on the aging side, but Beltran still has great range and will hit almost as many meaningless home runs as you in a summer wiffle ball game. Except you never do because you’re a hammered nancy trying to remove your bunched boxers from your duodenum half the time. And the pitching is solid throughout. Good 1-2 punch with Maine maturing nicely, Joe Smith reminding me more and more and mustache’less Jeff Nelson as a reliable middle man, and Willy Wagner closing up shop in save scenarios.
OK, that’s the story for beastly east. Tune in next time for the gentle NL Central. See how I almost rhymed that there? Stupid like a fox. Maybe it won’t even take 5 years in between posts either…
