Beisbol Sure Has Not Been Good to Me This Year

marvelousmarvbackbiter, His Timbers Shivering, As He Talks a Little Baseball
I watched today's Fox "Game of the Week" and several times it almost brought tears to me eyes. I was watching the Los Angeles Dodgers whacking the Arizona Diamondbacks to take over first place in their division. And what a game it was--a pitchers's duel between Diamondback ace Brandon Webb and Dodgers's new star Chad Billingsly--they went 4 innings of great shut-out baseball until Webb started pitching wildly, walking batters right and left, and then loading the bases with 2 outs and Manny Ramirez was up--and Webb brilliantly hoaxed Manny into swinging at anything--and Webb slammed old Manny down flat and saved his zip-zip ballgame--that was until a couple of innings later and Webb loaded them again--and here came Manny again and BOOM, just like that, Manny hit a grand slam--his 21st of his career, putting him second behind Lou Gehrig who hit 23 grand slams in his heyday. And then Webb was taken out and Ruiz was brought in--and Ruiz had trouble with his control and sure 'nuff here came Manny up against Ruiz with the bases loaded--and BOOM--Manny hit one sky high, right straight up into that bright L.A. sun, right in the eye of the sun and the Diamondback center fielder lost it in the sun and the ball slammed down onto the warning track and bounced into the stands for a ground rule double--and 2 more runs scored and the Dodgers led the Diamondbacks 7-0--then 8-0--and NOW JOE TORRE (the best manager in baseball) and the Dodgers are in First Place--and they are now, finally, 3 games over .500.

And what brought tears to my eyes was watching the Dodgers batting--they were keeping their bats on their shoulders--and then Tim McCarver mentioned that the Dodgers were keeping their bats on their shoulders--one Dodgers let 12 pitches go by without taking the bat off his shoulder--and then it dawned on me that the Dodgers were now playing Joe Torre baseball--waiting until they got the right pitch before swinging--what Joe emphasized over and over with the wild-swinging millionaire Yankees when last year he led the Yankees to another playoff--while this year, new whizkid manager Joe Girardi--yep, the Steinbrenners just had to fuck up the Yankees--they can't stand winning--really, you think I'm BS-ing you, but Steinbrenner can't stand winning--look how he saddled Joe Torre with worthless pitchers and had-beens like Randy Johnson and Rajah Clemens--then fucking up his pitching staff by letting Andy Pettite go to the Houston Astros after he'd led the Yankees in pitching! Plus Steinbrenner turned down Manny Ramirez wanting to come to NYC and picked on-his-way-out Johnny Damon--the first bad mistake George made in that deal was forcing Johnny to cut his hair--his Sampson strength, and since Johnny cleaned up for George, he's been off-and-on great but mostly bummish--especially this year.

The Yankees are sad to watch. This time last year they were making the comeback of the season coming from 7 or 8 behind Boston to go into Boston and sweep 5 from the Red Sox to momentarily be in first place, only to then lose 5 straight to Baltimore and Tampa Bay--and end up winning the Wild Card then losing to Cleveland in the playoffs--Mariano Rivera letting Joe Torre down by blowing two saves giving up 9th-inning home runs--and then Steinbrenner turned on Joe and told him he either won the play-offs with Cleveland or he was fired! You see what I mean how George Steinbrenner, and now his worthless son, Hank, are determined to ruin the Yankees! Joe was so clever a manager--I'm sure A-Rod and those fucking two-faced stars didn't like the impositions Joe put on their playboy nightlife and their fucking around clowing in L.A. and Miami with whores and celebrity nymphos and Madonna--Joe wanted them to play baseball and win and then they could play around with the loose tootsies all they wanted during the off months.

Now Joe Torre is sitting in the catbird seat in L.A. He's good Dereck Lowe pitching good National League ball; he's got Manny Ramirez; he's got this Chad Billingsly and John Lackey...and the weather was spectacular in L.A. today.

The Dodgers are now in first place--though it's a tough division with Arizona always right on your heels and then the Colorado "Amazin'" Rockies are only 5 games back--last year, the Rockies at the end of the season won something phenomenal like 20 games in a row to represent the National League against Boston in the World Series.

The Mets. It could be a repeat of last year. If the Mets win the East, then my hat comes off in a tip in the direction of Jerry Manuel and Omar Minaya--that will justify the firing of Willie Randolph--so far Omar 1 Me 0--except with Brian Cashman--I'm up 1 and 0 on his worthless baseball general manager ass--the worst owner, George Steinbrenner; the worst general manager (of all time), Brian Cashman. Next year, the Yankees will play in the House that George Steinbrenner stole from the Citizens of New York City--cost overruns are now in the near-billion-dollar level for this rich man's ballpark--only the wealthy can now enjoy the Yankees losing efforts next year--the corporations and the rich businessmen will get to watch the games in the comfort of their luxury boxes--only 20,000 or so "general admissions" will be sold during the season--and at $45 to $75 a ticket.

Not a jolly baseball year for me. Not like last year--or the year before--what wonderful years those were for New York City ballfans--

Joe Torre looked so cool today winning--the Dodgers a couple'a weeks ago had lost 12 in a row--now they've come back from 5 games back to take first place--and no New Yorker in their right mind is a Dodgers fan!

And as a P.S., note: Lou Pinella's having a fun year managing the Cubbies! Can he take them to their first World Series win ever?

marvelousmarvbackbiter
for The Daily Growler