Like Sam the Butcher Bringin' Alice the Meat

Yeah, That’s About Right

The Royals came into the weekend at Minute Maid with the worst record in the Majors and leaves with the worst despite taking two of three from your Houston Astros. What the ___ was that?! How do you drop two out of three to a team whose three starters had combined for all of one freakin’ win? Scott Elarton going for perfection? Are you kidding me? Brandon Duckworth made it past three innings? How does this happen? I don’t want to hear about how those guys are pros too and they get paid and any given day and blah, blah, blah. You want to be in this wild card race, you want to get to the unfinished business in the World Series then try taking two out of three against the worst team in the entire freakin’ league! Inexcusable. Now the Twins come in as winners in seven straight Great.

--It’s not even the end of June and Andy Pettitte has already allowed as many home runs (17) as he did in all of last season. The most he’s ever given up is 23 back with the Yankees in ’96.

--Preston Wilson has hit 6 of his 7 homers at home where average-wise he’s hitting .220. On the road he’s hitting .352. He also has nearly twice as many strikeouts at Minute Maid.

--Bradley David Ausmus hit .339 in April, .270 in May, and is now at just .239 in June.

--Brad Lidge walked 11 guys in April when his ERA was 6.39. He walked 8 in May when it was 4.15. In June his ERA is 2.57, he’s 4-4 in save opportunities and he’s walked 1, 2, 3, zero batters. Lefties are hitting .283 against him while righties are at .190.

--For what it’s worth (and it ain’t much), but ESPN has the Astros ranked 21st in RPI. They also have played the second-easiest schedule (Cardinals=easiest).

--The latest NL All Star voting numbers are out and no Astro leads at any position. The closest is Craig Biggio who is 150,000 votes shy of Chase Utley. Willy Taveras is only about 180,000 votes short of Barry Bonds who is in 9th. The Mets have four leaders in Jose Reyes, David Wright, Paul Lo Duca and Carlos Beltran.

--San Francisco’s Matt Cain had 7.2 innings of no-hit ball Monday against the Angels. The last no-no was Randy Johnson’s in 2004. That was more than 5,300 games ago and is the longest drought in major league history.

Basketball Jones

Entourage was the perfect cherry to the Game 6 Sundae/ay. What a fantastic game and what a horrible ending. Not that I care if Dallas wins or loses, but having the referees go World Cup at the end took away some of the luster from the classic. Dwyane Wade was not fouled in any way, shape, or form at the end of the game. Ridiculous. And what about that backcourt violation?! The timeout thing was just silly. Josh Howard and Avery Johnson screwed up big-time, but I’ve seen refs grant timeouts and take them back in regular season games before, but not in an overtime Game 6 of the NBA Finals?! Whatever. I don’t care who wins, I just want great games whose outcomes aren’t overly influenced by the referees. I had Mavericks in 7 and see no reason why they still won’t win in 7, well unless Jerry Stackhouse gets another undue red card.

--Dwyane Wade was 21-25 from the foul line in Game 5. Who else was 21-25? The entire Mavericks team. Dwyane is special, but 25 free throws? The 21 makes broke Bob Pettit’s record of 19 back in the ’58 Finals.

--Miami went 10-1 at home during this postseason.

--If the Heat win then it would be the fourth time that both the NCAA and NBA champion would come from the same state. The last time it happened? Back in 1989 Michigan won the tourney and the Pistons the Finals. California did it twice with UCLA pairing up with the Lakers in ’72 and then Golden State in ’75.

--It’s been since 1979 when the Pirates beat the Orioles in Baltimore that a Game 7 in the World Series, NBA Finals, or Stanley Cup Finals has been won by the road team.

--Thanks to the expert sideline reporting from ABC we now know that Darrell Armstrong’s nickname is "Black College."

--It must be fun to be a part of the Denver media, which gets the pleasure of talking to and about Kenyon Martin. The Denver Post with this quote from a Nugget, "Kenyon was not playing a lot but was in the locker room encouraging guys to 'get tough, get ready.' We were listening and thinking of a guy who was out partying last night, on his feet, but does not practice and play. There is the perception that Kenyon does not want to be a professional. Are you really hurt? Kenyon is obnoxious, ignorant, boisterous."
So what is Kenyon going to take offense to in that quote? Kenyon: “You ask the people I go out with. When I do go out, I have a table reserved when I go and find me a seat. I don't like people bothering me. I find a seat. Me being on my feet? It was not like I was always in the middle of the dance floor all night. I don't run the clubs, but when I did go it was just to blow off steam."

Play Ball

Thank you to The Daily Show for bringing to light the unfortunate circumstances surrounding the Congressional Softball League. For 37 years it stood for all that was right about softball…slow pitches, aluminum bats, beer, making fun of guys who can’t swing, beer, running the bases while humming “One Shining Moment”, beer. Sadly this year a group of Republican teams decided they had it with the pansy ways of the Democratic commissioner. So what do you do when you don’t like the commish? That’s right, you pull your teams out and start up your own league. There were 190 teams total, but the Republicans got 110 teams to join their new league presumably called Bush League. The old league run by Democrat Gary Caruso didn’t have any real format for the end-of-year tournament, allowing the best teams to face each other early. New commissioner Anthony Reed, "What's the regular season for? It's very irritating to teams like ours who are 12-0." Very irritating indeed. I mean these guys work so hard, so long, for so little pay so that our country may run as flawlessly as it does. If we can’t get the basic ideal of fun always, always being second to winning then what chance do we have as a country? For taking itself so seriously you’d think that the leagues would at least have actual umpires calling balls and strikes. Then again I guess that’s par for the course. How can you run agree on how best to run a country if you can’t agree on how best to run your softball league? Shouldn’t that be on some sort of entry exam or something?

Quick Hitters and Random Thoughts

--C’mon UsandA, beat Ghana. Go Italy, Beat Czech Republic. Is Kazakhstan still playing? How priceless would Borat’s tour of the World Cup be?

--How strong was that rebound by Entourage from the premiere to show number 2? I could watch Johnny Drama swan dive, cup and all, into the pool all day long.
Remember when Johnny Drama played John Densmore in The Doors?

--If you feel confident that you’ll be able to sleep tonight without any problems even if you watch Connie Chung sing “Thanks for the Memories” then click, I dare you.

--The Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disneyland is going to have some new characters from the movie and just in time for the sequel. I had no idea that they first changed the ride nine years ago. Apparently in these politically correct times Disney felt the need to change from the pirates chasing women to pirates chasing food. Whatever.

--The next GOOD Music artist to knock it outta the park is going to be former Diddy butler Fonzworth Bentley according to Kanye. Bentley’s debut album is titled “CoolOutrageousLoversOfUniquelyRawStyle” or “C.O.L.O.U.R.S.” It drops in September.

--People named Taylor Hicks its hottest bachelor in the country. Yeah, everyone’s buying that.

--Your dumbass cop of the week comes to us from Clearwater, Florida. Clearwater Police Officer Nicholas Brems approached his wife (tactfully I’m sure) and coolly asked what the chances were of them two getting it on with other couples. She said no and he began pounding her head into the wall. Some real cops came and Brems got to enjoy the inside of a jail cell. I know this may shock you, but apparently Brems reeked of alcohol.

--Fantastic fight between Winky Wright and Jermain Taylor that ended in a draw. Nobody likes ties or draws, but if there ever was a fight deserving of a draw it was that one.

--If you’re looking for a fun sequel to rent, here are some outstanding options: Like Mike 2: Streetball, Hollow Man II, Dr. Dolittle 3, or Cheaper By The Dozen 2 featuring Eugene Levy who really needs to learn just how to say no.

--The Drug Years has been running on VH-1 and Sundance. It’s an interesting decade by decade look at, well, drugs.

--Seen any of the new Simple Life? Me neither, but if I did then it was probably pretty sad to see this Pakistani family ask Paris and Nicole (separately) why they don’t like each other anymore. That’s probably what I would have seen.
Back in the day when Nicole weighed more than the dress she was wearing.

--Because you need to know…There are now more than 8.7 million millionaires worldwide.

Questions, comments, or if you’ve recently discovered the magic of mashed potato cakes…