Category Archives: Baseball

Jose Canseco: Your Friends Will Be There When Your Back Is to the Wall

canseco.jpgYo, Commish, I think I got this whole steroids-in-baseball thing figured out.

budselig.jpgYou mean that steroids-in-baseball thing you helped start.

canseco.jpgYeah! I just wanna meet with you and Donald Fehr to discuss some ideas about how to fix it.

budselig.jpgWe have it under control, Jose.

canseco.jpgClearly you don’t, if big superstars like Alex Rodriguez are getting caught. Now dig this: I go undercover as a major league baseball player and find out who’s supplying the dope! See, I used to be a major league baseball player, so it’ll come naturally!

budselig.jpgYes, you used to be a major league baseball player. A very famous one whose face will be instantly recognizable to everyone you meet.

canseco.jpgNo, see, I’ve been working with an acting coach, and he’s been teaching me these facial exercises that can make you look like a totally different person. See?

canseco_tongue.jpg
budselig.jpgThat’s just looks like you sticking your tongue out. And let’s not forget, you’re over 40 now. You’ll stick out like a sore thumb.

canseco.jpgBut I can totally fit in with the young player of today. I got a totally rad wardrobe. Check out this shirt!

philmostchill.jpg
budselig.jpgThat’s the worst thing human beings have ever worn.

canseco.jpgThat’s just for working out in the gym. Here’s what I’ll wear when I’m going out with the boys after the game.

canseco_seethru.jpg
budselig.jpgAh, my eyes! Listen, Jose, I think you need to let this go. One man can’t take down the entire steroid underground.

canseco.jpgOf course not! That’s why I’m recruiting my good friend and fellow recovering ‘roid user John Rocker to help me.

rocker.jpgWhen I’m done, ain’t gonna be no more homos or Puerto Ricans left in this league!

canseco.jpgJohn, we’re trying to take down steroids, not ethnically cleanse, remember?

rocker.jpg*pfft* I’m out.

canseco.jpgAlright, I guess Rocker’s gotten too big for the show.

budselig.jpgWhat show?

canseco.jpgSo that’s when I bring my younger brother who looks vaguely like me but is slightly less repulsive.

ozziec.gifDo we get paid up front? ‘Cause I haven’t eaten anything since I found a soy sauce packet in the street last night.

budselig.jpgJose, I won’t allow you to turn MLB into your own personal version of 21 Jump Street.

canseco.jpgCommish, this isn’t about me, or the vindication of my books, or my return to glory. Well, I mean, yeah, it mostly is, but it’s also about justice!

harry.jpgHey, can I join you guys?

canseco.jpgHARRY, I TOLD YOU, YOU ONLY GET TO APPEAR IN EVERY FIFTH EPISODE.

The Talented Mr. Silver, You’ve Done it Again

Nate Silver’s predictions for the 2009 baseball season are here, and they predict the Mets will win 93 games and the NL East crown.

Now, I am way too superstitious and emotionally traumatized by the last three seasons to make anything remotely close to a prediction about the upcoming season. But I would like to point out that when we last heard from Mr. Silver, he predicted the outcome of the Presidential and Congressional elections spot-on.

Actually, calling it spot-on would be understating the case. More like, he came as close to calling the exact results as you can without a crystal ball.

So I’ll just say the man’s math needs to be respected, and we’ll leave it at that.

Rocky Rhodes: Gas-Drinkin’ Heroes of Yesteryear

Grant “Rocky” Rhodes is America’s oldest living sportswriter. He first rose to prominence in 1916, when he declared Yankee Stadium “The House that Ruth Built,” even though Ruth still played for the Red Sox and Yankee Stadium didn’t exist. He holds the world’s record for most consecutive days spent in a hat. His weekly sports column, “The Cat’s Pajamas”, appears in 7000 newspapers nationwide when not bumped for “Hints from Heloise” or “Funky Winkerbean”. Today, he graces Scratchbomb with his nine decades of sports wisdom to comment on baseball’s latest scandal.

rocky.jpgBeen a while since I took up the ol’ Underwood. I been outta commission for almost a year. It all started when my favorite attendant, Frankie, took a little vacation. Frankie’s my favorite because he always throws in a little extra something in your daily meds.

Unfortunately, the home brought in some numbnuts to take his place, and this schmuck gives me exactly what it says on my chart. Little did I know I’d developed a bit of a chemical dependency on one of my pills, a little blue one that makes my liver pain slightly less unbearable.

So one day, I ask this guy for some extra, and he says no dice. What happened next is kind of a blur, but apparently I went insane with rage over being denied my fix. I remember poking him in the eye with my cane, and throwing my colostomy bag in his face, but the rest is kinda hazy. Next thing I know, they got me in detox to get the junk outta my system.

Y’ever see The Man with the Golden Arm? Yeah, it’s nothing like that. Frank Sinatra, you let me down a third time. I’d give you a piece of my mind if you weren’t dead.

* Long-time Rocky readers know the first time was when Frank convinced me to buy an Edsel. I won’t spill the beans about the second. Just know that it involves Jilly Rizzo, and I will take it with me to my grave.

Bottom line is, I ain’t exactly one to talk when it comes to drugs. And I’m sick as hell about writing up this Alex Rodriguez fella. The guy’s a head case. Back in my day, they would have locked him up on general principle. This country really started going to hell when FDR repealed the Lock ‘Em Up on General Principle Act.

I’ll tell you one thing, though. I just don’t understand this generation of athletes, shooting themselves up with steroids and horse semen and whatnot, trying to gain an advantage. In my day, athletes didn’t take performance enhancers. They took performance limiters.

Babe Ruth ate everything that wasn’t bolted down. Jim Thorpe drank high-test gasoline before track meets. Bobby Jones had his caddy whip him with a cane in the back the thighs before he hit the links. (I heard some nasty rumors about that last ritual, but I won’t repeat them here.)

You know why Lou Gehrig had to retire? It wasn’t because ALS robbed him of his ability to play. It’s because the disease actually made him more able-bodied than most other players. Back then, it was considered cheating if you didn’t come to the plate full of bathtub gin and missing at least one toe.

It was a badge of honor to succeed while handicapping yourself. Why did you think the Black Sox threw the World Series in 1919? They wanted to see if they could still win the thing while actively trying to lose it. They weren’t the first team to throw a game, not by a long shot. They were just unlucky enough to get caught. And to accept thousands of dollars from gangsters in order to do it.

I just wish all these kids involved with this stuff would come clean. That’s what we did back in my day–someone catches you with your hand in the cookie jar, you fess up. Or, alternatively, you stonewall the cops, then catch the next steamer bound for Brazil.

I guess it’s no use complaining about the way the world has changed. While I was getting clean, this guy from NA taught me a prayer: God grant me the serenity to accept the things I can’t change, the carriage to something about the weather, and the gonads to know what’s what.

I got no idea what that means, but it still makes twice the sense of anything else in this crazy world. At least until Frankie gets the med shift again.