Ahoy there, maties and soon-to-be maties! It be I, John Wehner, radio broadcaster for the Pittsburgh Pirates, and the dirtiest scalawag to ever take a tinkle in the Allegheny! Arrrr!

Hahaha – just kidding! Anyway, I’m here to talk to you about the Pirates, probably one of the more misunderstood teams in all of baseball. It’s been a dry couple of years in Steeltown, sure, but things are looking up for the yellow and black and red (and sometimes white)! Now, before a bunch of you go ahead and call the paddy wagon to cart me away in my very own strait jacket, hear me out. I’m sure that after you read my reasons for Pirate pride, you’ll jump on the Bucs’ dinghy and buckle your swash! Here we go!

REASON ONE: Feared slugger Adam LaRoche will adjust to the NL Central pitchers.

Everyone always talks about how hard it is for hitters to adjust from the blazing fastballs of the National League to the corner-pickers of the American League. However, what’s never talked about is trying to switch between divisions. For Adam, he’s going from facing soft-tossers like Tom Glavine and Pedro Martinez nineteen times a year to hard throwers like Carlos Zambrano, Roy Oswalt, and Bronson Arroyo. After years and years on that sort of pitching diet, it’s not easy to speed up your bat – it could take months and months of practice to get used to the high chesse that’s served in the National League’s central division. With the summer months just around the corner, I’m sure LaRoche is ready to swing the lumber the same way he did last year, when he slugged 32 homers for Atlanta. I guess the Braves think home runs grow on trees, as all they wanted from the Pirates was enigmatic hard thrower Mike Gonzalez. Come September, we’ll see what’s growing in the lush greenery of PNC Park.

REASON TWO: Ian Snell and Tom Gorzelanny are finally learning how to win.

Growing pains are tough, as anyone that’s been through puberty will tell you. They’re even tougher when you’re trying to rebuild your pitching rotation over the course of the baseball season. Folks are seeing dividends, however, as young phenoms Snell and Gorzelanny are pitching their hearts out every single start. Fact is, though, that’s not going to be enough.

A pitcher can’t just go out to the mound and do his best – he has to do better than that. It’s a hard lesson to learn, and the fact that these two kids only have 11 wins between the two of them (in 26 starts!) tells me they need some schooling. It tells me that they’re pitching just good enough to lose, which, as anyone that knows wins from losses can tell you, is never good enough. To be a good pitcher, you have to win, no matter what happens. If you expect your hitters to score you enough runs to win every start, then you’re going to get disappointed. I’m not saying Snell & Gorz need to be perfect every time out. I’m just saying they need to be almost perfect.

REASON THREE: X really is gonna give it to ya – a full season of Xavier Nady is a good thing.

When Dave Littlefield pulled the trigger on grabbing Xavier Nady from the Mets for the lost cause that was Oliver Perez (more on him later), I was over the moon. Here’s a guy with 30-40 homer power, riding the bench for the first place Mets? Who couldn’t use that sort of power in their lineup? Littlefield knew that the Pirates could use that sort of sluggiosity in their lineup every day, which is why Littlefield’s such a crafty GM. So far, X has not disappointed – he’s popped 10 round trippers, and driven in 36. He’s the perfect rightie complement to Jason Bay’s right-handed power, and he’s equally almost perfect with the glove – only one error so far while covering all OF positions! It’s a shame that we had to give up Oliver Perez, and I’m glad he’s doing so well in New York, but you have to give up quality to get quality, and there aren’t many guys of Xavier Nady’s quality in the major leagues.

REASON FOUR: Zach Duke actually trusts his coaches.

Baseball is a game of adjustments, both physical and mental. One of the reasons the Pirates felt comfortable in trading Oliver Perez is because he stopped making adjustments. After the coaching staff tried to perfect Perez’s pitching motion, he hit a brief speed bump for a few season, and you could tell in his body language he just started tuning his coaches out. Former phenom Zach Duke is going through the same growing pains. A lights-out machine of devastation in 2005, the coaches tried to maximize Zach’s potential. Results so far haven’t been great, but that’s to be expected. After all, if you could make omelets without breaking eggs, then hens would go extinct. I know The Duke is in good hands, and I know Duker knows he knows he’s in good hands. Talent always rises to the top; sometimes it just likes to take the scenic route.

REASON FIVE: Jack Wilson is an All-Star, and he knows it.

2004 was a great year for Jack Wilson. 41 doubles, 12 triples, 11 home runs, 8 stolen bases, and 82 runs scored, all career highs. He was the spark plug that kept the Pirates’ car running clean and fuel-efficient. But sometimes that engine won’t turn over, no matter how hard you try. He deferred his star status to Jason Bay, and found it hard to escape the monstrous shadow that Bay cast. He overcompensated by trying too hard, and it showed in his results, both at the plate and in the field. And then he let the numbers get to him, which dragged his numbers down even further. But Wilson’s entering the prime of his career. He’ll be thirty this December, and with age comes maturity. Watch Wilson play. And watch carefully – it’s not easy to see if you don’t know what you’re looking at, but I can tell you it’s probably there. He’s finally playing within himself, confident in what he can do, and (more importantly) what he can’t do. And he knows that the only stats that matter in baseball aren’t in the RBI column, or the R column, or the E column. They’re in the W column, and they’re especially in the L column. And Wilson, as you can tell by his initial, is all about the W.

REASON SIX: It’s the NL Central, stupid!

If you told me that the Brewers would still be in first place in the middle of June, I’d take away your keys and call you a cab. If you told me the St. Louis Cardinals would win the World Series after getting only 83 regular season victories, I’d drop you off in the emergency room to be checked for alcohol poisoning. And if you told me that the Chicago Cubs – the team that made the biggest off-season splash by shrewdly signing Alfonso Soriano, Mark DeRosa, Ted Lilly, and Jason Marquis – would be under .500, then I’d be writing your eulogy and founding BADD (Buddies Against Drunk Driving). What does this all mean? It means the division is wide open, and one little ten-game or fifteen game winning streak could catapult the Pirates from second-worst to second-first. All it takes are a few extra home runs from Bay and LaRoche, a few steals from superstar-in-the-making Freddy Sanchez, a few wins from Snell and Gorzelanny, and who knows? Maybe it’ll be Jim Tracy – one of baseball’s greatest minds, and one of its better guys – licking champagne off his lips while hoisting the greatest trophy in all of sports. The rest of the world is head over heels with pirates. Why shouldn’t Pittsburgh be the same?

Hey, you never know. Stranger things have happened.

John Wehner averaged over one plate appearance a game in his eleven-year Major League career.

In honor of Roger Clemens & his eventual return to baseball, here’s a special ROCKET FACT edition of IT’S A FACT!

IT’S A ROCKET FACT! As part of his off-season training regiment while in Boston, Clemens used to plunge his pitching arm into a bucket full of uncooked rice! When he signed with the Blue Jays, he began using dry cous-cous! After arriving in New York, he alternated between Barilla brand ziti, rotini, and linguini! After joining the Houston Astros, he switched to uncooked elbow macaroni from Annie’s Homegrown!

IT’S A ROCKET FACT! The decibel level of the crowd @ Yankee Stadium when Clemens’ return was announced during the 7th inning stretch was calculated at 123dB, 2 dB below the level where sound causes physical pain! In comparison, Suzyn Waldman’s radio announcement of the event was measured at 136dB!

IT’S A ROCKET FACT! Even at age 45, Roger Clemens’ legs are so powerful that he can pedal a stationary exercise bike from the Yankees’ training room to his locker in the clubhouse, all the way down the hall!

IT’S A ROCKET FACT! An anonymous source claims Houston Astros GM Tim Purpura, upon hearing the news of the Clemens signing, wanted to order 28 floral arrangements in the shape of “a big f*cking dick” to be sent to Clemens’ ranch. He instead chose to send an e-mail featuring Calvin (of Calvin & Hobbes fame) wearing an Astros cap and a Craig Biggio jersey urinating on the number 21!

IT’S A ROCKET FACT! There’s a clause in Clemens’ contract that obligates Yankee shortstop Derek Jeter to take his oldest son Koby out on the town at least 3 times a month, with the stipulation that Koby “goes all the way with one of those hot club girls”!

IT’S A ROCKET FACT! In addition to using pasta products for training, Clemens would have his wife cook the used pasta as a post-exercise carb & starch boost!

IT’S A ROCKET FACT! The provisions for private planes and separate hotel rooms in Roger Clemens’ new contract were not included as the result of the pitcher’s own demands, but those of his Yankees teammates, who bitterly recalled Clemens’ habit of constantly smacking them on the ass and saying “Yeah, you like it rough, don’tcha?”

IT’S A ROCKET FACT! Roger Clemens’ $28 million pro-rated salary is over $3 million more than the 2007 payroll for the entire Tampa Bay Devil Rays team!

IT’S A ROCKET FACT! 19th century baseball pioneer King Kelly had some Clemens-esque stipulations in his contract as well, including: separate hotel rooms for his black monkey, his Japanese valet, his uniforms, and baseball eqiupment; a local burlesque girl supplied before every game that would serenade him with “Slide, Kelly, Slide”; 365 pairs of monogrammed longjohns; and a mug of beer to be brought to him while playing defense at the top of the 4th inning!

IT’S A ROCKET FACT! Before each of his minor league starts this year, Clemens would listen to the Pussycat Dolls’ “Don’t Cha”!

IT’S A ROCKET FACT! If Clemens had a daughter, her name would either be Klementine, Klarissa, or Kapistrano, but not Kay!

IT’S A ROCKET FACT! There is still a restraining order out against the hotheaded Rocket! Former Major League Umpire Terry Cooney, who ejected Clemens from his start in the 1990 ALCS, filed the restraining order after an incident in February of 1991 where Clemens assaulted Cooney with thrown baseballs outside Cooney’s home! One baseball shattered the back window of Cooney’s 1984 Buick LeSabre; another permanently bruised Cooney’s left buttock!

IT’S A ROCKET FACT! According to agent Randy Hendricks, Roger Clemens very nearly stunned the baseball world by once again signing with the Toronto Blue Jays!

IT’S A ROCKET FACT! Former teammate Wade Boggs taught Clemens how to throw a knuckleball, but Clemens only threw it once during an actual game! Mariners slugger Alvin Davis took him deep at the Kingdome in 1987 off of that wily pitch, and Clemens never threw the pitch again!

IT’S A ROCKET FACT! Roger Clemens’ new contract includes a number of unusual incentive clauses! Among them: If Clemens once again strikes out 20 batters in a game, he will become the majority owner of the New York Yankees!

IT’S A FACT! At Big Jim’s Used Motor Vehicles, you’ll never strike out! Every one of our deals is a sure-fire shutout! Come on down and take advantage of our No Credit – No Checking Account – No Cash – No Problem policy! You’ll leave our lot with a new-to-you Datsun Pulsar or Volkswagon Rabbit if we have to glue your butt to the seat and nail your hands to the steering wheel!

Big Jim Potzrebie is the founder and CEO of Big Jim Potzrebie’s Used Motor Vehicles of Milwaukie, Canby, Drain, Dufur, Happy Valley, Barlow, Estacada, and Aurora, Oregon.

I am so sick and tired of these media pinheads giving this Alex Rodriguez jerk all this undue attention. If it’s not about his totally ridiculous contract, then it’s about him failing to live up to that contract during meaningful baseball games. If it’s not about him sunbathing in Central Park like some homeless drug addict, or him playing illegal poker, then it’s about him cheating on his wife with a blond stripper bimbo. If it’s not about him fighting with Yankee captain Derek Jeter because he’s not feeling loved, then it’s about him fighting with people on other teams for acting like a spoiled little girl. And, news flash Alex, no one cares any more.

Let’s face it, baseball’s been falling out of favor with Americans ever since 1996, when the big bad New York Yankees began lording over all of baseball with a wallet bigger than Rosie O’Donnell’s backside. Ever since that year, the Yankees have bought their way into championships, leaving less fortunate teams dying in their wake. They don’t care if you beat your wife or used drugs or even hit the ball – if the Yankees think you can help, then you’re a Yankee.

So, of course, it’s no wonder that the Yankees ended up acquiring the 2nd-most hated player in all of baseball, Alex Rodriguez. (This is a Bonds-Free Zone, too, so don’t expect any talk about that no-talent tax-fraud steroid case.) Only a town as corrupt and biased as New York could think itself big enough to handle an ego-gone-wild such as Rodruigez’s. Any man that shamlessly lets other people call him A-Rod clearly has some issues.

As New Yorkers know, ever since Rodriguez put on those pinstripes, he’s been nothing but trouble. You can’t go more than a day with some picture in some paper showing Rodriguez doing something stupid, like slapping at someone’s glove, or making an error. His kind – the money-grubbing pay-me-now kind – love this sort of attention, though. They thrive on being in the public spotlight, even if they claim they don’t. They love having their egos massaged and stroked like they’re at some Taiwanese massage parlor getting a Happy Ending.

Why else would he do something so stupid as to go out in public with the women he’s cheating on his wife with? Why else would he yell “Ha” or whatever at a guy trying to catch a baseball? Those are moves that scream, “Love me, listen to me, feed my ego, make me feel better about my shortcomings and small penis.”

It’s about time the media stops feeding this guy’s press lust. So right now I’m going to do all you beatwriters and know-nothing talking heads a major favor and lay out a game plan that you should follow for the rest of the season, if not the rest of Rodriguez’s career. If you follow this advice, you’ll teach that prima donna and his type a serious lesson. If you don’t, well, you’re all nuts.

First of all, just stop talking to the guy. Take all the questions you’d ask him, and find someone else on the team to talk to. After all, the media controls the spin, so Rodriguez will only be as much of a story as the media allows him to be. Let’s use that well-known media bias for some good, for once.

Talk to the backup catcher, talk to the ballboys, talk to the traveling secretary. You could talk to the girls waiting to get in Jason Giambi’s smelly jock strap. Talk to anyone except Rodriguez, because he can’t be the story anymore.

Second, don’t even refer to him in print or on television. If he’s in a picture you’re publishing, block him out. Put a picture of a crying baby or Mr. Yuck in its place. Refer to him as “the Yankee third baseman,” or “that player who can’t get the big hit in the clutch.” Remember, he gains strength and satisfaction every time he’s mentioned in the press. His kind always do.

And, as an aside, a word of advice from a Peabody Award-winning journalist: do your job with some imagination. Don’t just go talk to the guy with the most homeruns, or the highest batting average, or the most strikeouts. Try looking beyond the obvious stories and focus on what really matters. On the Yankees alone, there are at least 24 other guys whose stories could be told, and maybe more. Every story written about Rodriguez is a story that’s not written about a truly great player, a low-profile soldier like Derek Jeter.

Of course, these moves are going to make him want to come up to you and ask what you’re doing. This is where you have to get creative. You could do what a lot of kids do, and have him “talk to the hand” – it’s crude, but it works. I’ve won tons of arguments with Geraldo by just putting up my hand. You’d think he just got asked about Capone’s vault, he’d get so flustered.

You reporters could pretend you don’t hear him, or listen to music on headphones, or pretend you received a very important cellphone call about your wife burning down the house. If there’s someone else around, you could quickly start another conversation and drown him out. In this case, it’s best to “buddy up” with a fellow colleague, so the interrupting conversation’s not too awkward.

The point in all these examples is to shun him, and make him aware of the shunning. Make him aware that the press is fed up with his nonsense and wants nothing to do with him anymore. That’s the only way you can get him to stop. It’s time for you pinheads at ESPN and the YES Network and other sports media providers to step up to the plate. And with the baseball world descending on yet another boring Red Sox / Yankees series, it’s imperative that this happens now. Do the right thing for once in your life. Stop talking about Alex Rodriguez.

Bill O’Reilly’s first work of fiction, Those Who Tresspass: A Novel of Television and Murder, is 320 pages long.

Hello. This is John Sterling, the voice of the New York Yankees. Welcome to a special Memorial Day edition of Yankeeography. In today’s weblog-only exclusive episode, we’ll look back on the turbulent and tempestuous career of the man the New York press calls the American Idle, an All-Star pitcher and World Series champion whose impact on the field has been dwarfed by his presence in the trainer’s room. I’m speaking, of course, of the crafty competitor Carl Anthony Pavano.

Pavano began his professional career in 1994, when he was drafted in the 13th round by the Boston Red Sox. A tall right-handed hurler from nearby Southington High School in Southington, CT, Pavano was seen by the Red Sox as a homegrown blue-chip prospect destined to do great things on Yawkey Way. His performance in Boston’s farm system did not disappoint – at the tender age of 20, Pavano was dominating the Midwest League, winning 16 games with a sparking 2.63 ERA and an impressive 6 complete games, including 2 shut-outs.

By 1998, Pavano was a coveted pitcher throughout the major leagues, and the Red Sox capitalized on this demand, using Pavano as the crown jewel in a trade with the beleagured Montreal Expos to acquire dreaded Yankee nemesis Pedro Martinez. The Expos hoped that Pavano would be the keystone to their pitching staff, an ace to helm a rotation that would feature promising youngsters such as former Yankee Javier Vazquez, former Yankee farmhand Tony Armas Jr., and former Red Sock Dustin Hermanson.

North of the border, however, Pavano found himself lost in the unforgiving Canadian wilderness. Those years spent under the auspicious concrete shroud of Olympic Stadium were ones that Pavano would probably like to forget. These were times of attrition, punctuated by infrequent success and frequent injury.

In his five years with Montreal, Pavano never pitched more than 135 innings, and won no more than 8 games a year during his half-decade in Canada. In 2002, Montreal finally gave up the ghost, packaging the once-magnificent Pavano in a multi-player deal that sent him to the hapless Florida Marlins. But, unbeknownst to most of baseball, these Marlins would be helpless no longer.

When Carl Pavano found himself in teal pinstripes, it was as a piece of a trade that saw the Expos acquire coveted Marlin slugger Cliff Floyd. Most pundits believed that this trade signaled another white flag of surrender for the Florida Marlins, a young expansion franchise that went from the toast of the town to burnt toast in just a few short years. Continually aware of their bottom line, the Floyd trade shed a $6 million albatross from the team’s ledger, and Florida ended the 2002 season 4 games under the break-even mark of 81-81. They entered the 2003 season with a modicum of hope, however – they had a bevy of young stud pitchers in their rotation, an alluring mix of power and speed in their homegrown line-up, and a superstar in Ivan Rodriguez, signed to a one-year, $10 million contract. They also had Carl Pavano, a workhorse in the making.

Amongst a cadre of heat merchants such as A.J. Burnett, Brad Penny, Josh Beckett, and phenom Dontrelle Willis, it was the presumptuously fragile Carl Pavano anchoring this pitching staff. He lead the Marlins in innings pitched, games started, intentional base-on-balls, hits allowed, runs allowed, and batters faced. His performance was reminiscent of the gutty stewardship that Yankee fans saw in Andy Pettite and Chien-Ming Wang. And just as Andy Pettite did so many times for the Bronx Bombers, Pavano lead the Marlins to victory in the World Series. Ironically, this victory came against his future team, the New York Yankees.

Despite the pressure that comes with competing against a 26-time World Champion, these young upstart Marlins showed no signs of defeat. In Game 4 of the Series, it was Pavano’s turn to take control of the spotlight, holding the vaunted Yankee line-up to one run over eight spectacular innings, and outdueling future Hall of Famer Roger Clemens. This brilliant performance, coupled with an even more impressive 2004 campaign (18 wins, only 8 losses, a 3.00 ERA, and over 222 innings pitched) made it clear that Pavano’s destiny would find him coming to the City That Never Sleeps.

On December 20, 2004, the Yankees got their fans an early Christmas present. After a heated bidding war with the Boston Red Sox, the Yankees emerged victorious, signing the coveted Pavano to a four-year contract. After 2004’s heartbreaking defeat at the hands of Lady Luck, the Yankees reloaded, acquiring Pavano, firey hurler Jaret Wright, and vaunted strikeout artist Randy Johnson to bolster a frail and fragile pitching rotation.

Unfortunately for the Yankees, Pavano’s tenure was over before it had a chance to begin. Pavano pitched like the ace of old in 2005, racking up quality starts in 7 of his first 10 appearances, including an impressive performance against the Red Sox at The Stadium on April 5th. But shoulder trouble hampered him once again, and he wasn’t the same after coming off of the Disabled List.

In 2006, Pavano’s luck took an even more sinister turn, with a freak injury to his buttocks, and an unfortunate car accident punctuating what turned out to be a lost season. While some members of the media, and some members of his own team, questioned his commitment to the Yankees, it was Pavano himself that kept his automobile accident secret, in the hopes that the Yankees wouldn’t discover that he was seriously hurt. Only the truest of sportsmen suffer though such indignities for the sake of his own well-being, and Carl Pavano is such a man.

Though his 2007 season, and his Yankee career, are now in the history books, Pavano had one last shining moment left in that golden arm of his. After an auspicious Opening Day emergency start, Pavano took the mound on April 9th against the pride of the AL Central, the Minnesota Twins. In front of 26,047 fans, and against former Baltimore Oriole ace Sir Sidney Ponson, Pavano spinned a gem, holding the Twins offense to only 2 runs in 7 innings of work. He limited AL batting champion Joe Mauer to one hit, and kept reigning AL MVP Justin Morneau out of the hit column. It was a dazzling display of craft and gamesmanship, giving the Yankees the opportunity to pull out an important 8-2 victory.

This final performance was a reminder, both to Yankee fans and to fans of the game of baseball, of the sort of player that Carl Pavano was, and will always seem to be. And during this Memorial Day weekend, when people all over the world remember those that sacrified their own lives for the good of our American way of life, let us remember this baseballplayer, this man, Carl Anthony Pavano. He is a proud, shameless man that transcended both the game he loved and the injuries he endured. And in just a short amount of time, Carl Pavano quickly became a Yankee that no one will soon forget, and a Yankee that no one will ever want to forget.

For Yankeeography, I’m John Sterling.

It’s true that baseball’s popularity is at an all-time high, and both fans and players are enjoying an age of prosperity. Though no one in the press will actually come out and admit it, I’d like to think I had something to do with that. Since my inglorious exit from the Major Leagues, the Powers-That-Be have gone above and beyond in order to make it seem as if I never existed. In the 1990s, baseball was looking for superstar sluggers to shine a light into the darkness in which they found themselves, and I helped fill that void. I was one of only four players to have eight straight seasons with 30 home runs and 100 runs batted in, back during a time when the game wasn’t regularly stained with things like steroids and corked bats. Baseball was able to convince the Fox network and ESPN to pay billions of dollars for broadcast rights in no small part because of me. Baseball is now a truly international game in no small part because of me. Baseball is a multimedia sensation on par with the Super Bowl and Hollywood. You’re welcome.

But even with all the uncredited good I’ve done, there’s been some inadvertent bad as well. In a way, I helped set the performance level bar at a height that other players (whose names I won’t name) could only reach using the help of pharmaceuticals. Now, as everyone with half a brain knows, it’s the fault of baseball that they couldn’t prevent drugs I never took from entering the picture. Of course, if the press had their way, they would blame me alone for steroids and amphetamines and other stimulants, just as they blamed me for everything bad that happened during my career. It was my fault Cleveland couldn’t win a World Series, despite having no-talent jarheads like Charles Nagy and Orel Hershiser losing games. It was my fault I had a clause in my White Sox contract to make me money, since I was the one that forced Chicago to put that in the contract. It was my fault an arthritic hip kept me from playing for the Orioles, just as it was Bo Jackson’s fault he was saddled with a hip pointer in the prime of his career. Nothing I did for the good of the game was ever given proper credit, which, as history shows, is completely wrong. As Julius Caesar said, to the victors go the spoils and the history that they can write as they see fit. And, as I like to say, to the spoiled goes the oil to keep their squeaky wheels nice and greased so they can keep on running me over.

Even the folks that hated me so much they were jealous know I outplayed Mo Vaughn in 1995, and was the first player ever to have 50 doubles and 50 home runs in one season. But Mo Vaughn won the MVP. People that really know me know I’m not the sort of person to lose my temper – I don’t get mad, I get even. Don’t believe all those stories about me; they’re lies. But let me ask you a question: if a man accidentally crashed my car through the front of a Denny’s in downtown Shreveport when I found out about losing the MVP to a lazy fat no-talent DH like Mo Vaughn, after a night full of drinking and strip clubbing, would you blame him? When a man with my resume falls off of the Hall of Fame ballot after only two years, but tiny singles hitters like Dave Concepcion almost get voted in, can you really say there is any justice? Can you say that you wouldn’t have yelled at that liquor store cashier when he asked for some identification? There are only so many insults a man can endure before he’s forced to act. Ted Williams went to Korea. Nas wrote “Ether.” Oedipus killed his dad. And I accidentally kicked my neighbor’s dog off the 3rd floor balcony into oncoming traffic. It’s a matter of degrees.

I bring all this up because I want to set the record straight about yet another slight. Recently, there’s been a lot of talk about these player / fan confrontations involving Ken Griffey Jr. and Vernon Wells throwing funny things into the stands after dealing with some taunts. When I was a young player, throwing things at fans was frowned upon, especially in response to someone’s heckling. There’s a story about me that, in 1990, a fan was yelling things at me regarding my alcohol abuse, and calling me that name I don’t like to be called. Supposedly, I responded by hitting the heckler right in the middle of his fat flabby chest. What I was actually doing was turning the other cheek. I was trying to show this fan that I wasn’t such a bad guy. I wanted to give him a souvenir that he would remember. Can I help it if the guy can’t catch? Can I be at fault for having a powerful and deadly accurate throwing arm? Is it just a coincidence that now you have those T-shirt shooting rockets at every sports game everywhere?

When it comes down to everything, I am an entertainer first and foremost. It’s my job to perform for the fans, day in and day out. They come to see me hit monstrous home runs, and to see me flex my bicep and yell across the field at that chickenshit bitch Kevin Kennedy when the opposing team claims I used a doctored bat to hit that home run. That’s real entertainment. And what better way is there to entertain than to involve the audience? Some of the best works of art out there, like Moonlighting and The Last Action Hero, broke through what critics call the “fourth wall,” to talk to folks in the audience and make them part of the story. That’s what I was trying to do with my toss into a stands. I was trying to engage with people on a primal, instinctual level, because that’s the only way you’re going to reach people, especially if they’re yelling fuck-ass nonsense at you from the left-field bleachers.

My real point is that if it weren’t for me, these Griffey and Vernon Wells incidents wouldn’t be laughed at. They would be seen as some sort of terroristic attempt to scare fans. They would be threatened with lawsuits, and harassed by reporters, and shunned by teammates. If I didn’t give that fan a baseball right between his saggy mantits, I don’t think anyone would be able to interact with the fans in this unprecedented way. I broke the fan / player barrier, much in the same way that the Beastie Boys broke the “white people can’t rap” barrier. And it would be nice if, for once, someone gave me the goddamn credit I fucking deserve without me having to choke a bitch.

Please. Do it for the fans.

In 1997, Albert Belle lead the AL in Grounded Into Double Plays, with 26.

So Rickey had a good day, right? Rickey went to a ballgame the other night, and Rickey caught a foul ball. And that’s real good, because Rickey never caught a foul ball before. Now Rickey’s made lots of catches in his Hall of Fame career, and all of them were great, because Rickey makes great catches. But Rickey never caught a foul ball in the stands as a spectator. That was a special moment for Rickey, almost as special as when Rickey won a World Series, but not as special as when Rickey became the greatest of all time.

So you can imagine how Rickey felt when he turns on his brand new Visio HD television to ESPN2, and sees those goofy chumps Mike and Mike making fun of Rickey. Mike and Mike make it sound like I took the ball out of the hands of some kid, like Rickey’s some sort of chump that has nothing better to do than upset kids and steal things that don’t belong to Rickey.

So let’s get some things straight. First of all, of course Rickey’s going to catch the ball instead of the kid. Rickey’s taller than the kid, by at least two feet. Scientists call that Natural Selection. And even if that wasn’t the case, Rickey’s got great ups. That ball was Rickey’s the minute it left the bat, and everyone knew it.

Second, Rickey is a fan of the kids. Rickey loves signing autographs for kids, taking pictures with kids, and even slipping kids some extra cash when folks aren’t looking. Hard to believe, even for Rickey, but Rickey was a kid once upon a time. Rickey knows being a kid is hard work, especially since you can’t make any money as a kid. Rickey remembers doing chores as a kid to get enough money to buy himself some ice cream on the weekend. Rickey cleaned a lot of gutters and pulled a lot of weeds for that Rocky Road, and Rickey don’t want anyone else to do that, too. Rickey’s a fan of hard work, but he’s also a fan of the kids. That’s why Rickey offered an autographed ball to the kid that was next to Rickey when that great catch was made. Rickey doesn’t want anyone to leave empty handed. Rickey is a people person, and that includes kids.

So to all those gum-flapping jibber-jabbering fools like Mike and Mike – the ball was hit to me! Damn right it’s my ball! And Rickey did what Rickey always does when the ball is hit to Rickey! He catches the damn ball! Rickey’s gonna break it down for you. Rickey got the ball, so Rickey’s happy. The kid got an autographed Rickey ball, so you know he’s happy. The press gets another story about Rickey, so they’re happy. So shut up about Rickey, Mike and Mike! Stick to talking about stuff you know, like nothing!

Pay Rickey!