I'M BAAAAACK!

It's been over 13 months since I've posted anything,but I guess I'll try and get back into it again. Two reasons: (1) One friend is shaming me into going at it again, (2) There is enough silliness going on in sports that I should have no trouble finding topics.

When I started this years ago, I didn't want to just recap games or report scores. I wanted to comment on activities and use sarcasm and exaggeration to do it. People who are naturally funny have no problem doing this, the rest of us have to work at it. It's not easy and I felt like I had dried up and couldn't continue. I don't know how people like Dwight Perry and Brad Dickson do it, but I'll give it a try.

One of the silliest things happening now is MLB's attempt to play a season in spite of the problems of COVID-19. Five Major League games were "postponed" yesterday. That means at least 300 professional ballplayers were unable to play...and probably shouldn't have. That's in just 10 days. Look, I'm a Yankee fan and the team is loaded. Nobody wants the season to go on more than me but I don't want anyone getting sick. No one I know has come down with the virus and they all claim to practice every safeguard that's recommended so where's the problem?  Some people are obviously ignoring the rules. As my wife says, professional athletes think they are invincible. Scott Boras, uber agent (not the Windows app, but the king of the sport agent), believes the teams should each hire a monitor to ensure the safety of the players. This is great. Now Scott can organize the monitors and be the first agent to represent babysitters. ("My client must be paid extra to monitor minor leaguers, too.")

I've been following baseball  for 65 year - yes, I am that old - both on TV and live. The games are just too long now. In my mind, there are three reasons:

1) The commercial breaks between innings are too long. With the ease of DVR, you don't have to suffer through the commercials. I sure don't. You guys are wasting your money. YES network has these "And now a quick word from ***** .  Five seconds and we're back to the game. I watch these. Try it.

2) Batters - STAY IN THE DAMN BOX! Why do you have to wander all over the place between pitches? One of these days, I'm going to time the wandering just to see how much time is wasted.

3) Why do pitch counts end up so high? I watched Don Larsen in person pitch 9 innings and only threw 94 pitches. These days, that's the pitchers count after 5 innings. The games took 2 hours and 6 minutes. And that includes the time it took for Yogi Berra to run out and jump into Larsen's arms.

That's enough for now. I'll be watching games with a different focus from now on. Let's hope there are more games.

One final note. We are currently playing a new game here at home. We're about to have our place repainted so my wife is taking this opportunity to purge the house. Here are the rules:

Wife: Do you still use this?

Me : Uh, no, I guess not.

Wife: Do we need to keep this?

Me: Well, no I...yes, I've...do what you want.

Wife: What is this? I'm throwing it out.

Me: But I....okay.

The questions may vary but these are the only acceptable answers.

***THEY SAID IT***

"If the Miami Marlins lose another player to a positive COVID-19 test, is there any truth to the rumor that Dr. Anthony Fauci automatically moves into the starting rotation?"  -- Patti Dawn Swansson, The Ricer City Renegade (A recently discovered blogger from Winnipeg)

"Canada was No. 4 on a new world ranking of peacefulness. No. 1 when they excluded Don Cherry."  -- RJ Curry

"I’m so old I remember the days that positive tests meant PEDs."  -- Janice Hough

"There is no sex allowed in the NBA bubble. OK, I'm giving this another 48 hours before it completely collapses."  -- Brad Dickson

"The Jays released left-handed reliever Marc Rzepczynski. He was hampered by a high pitch count and a low vowel count."  -- RJ Curry

"You know the world is messed up when Mariano Rivera is attending the White House briefing and Dr. Anthony Fauci is warming up to take the mound at a major-league stadium."  -- Brad Dickson

"I don’t know how baseball people were able to judge the greatness of Babe Ruth, Hank Aaron, Mickey Mantle and Willie Mays without knowing the launch angle and exit velocity of their home runs."  -- Bob Molinaro

"If the Blue Jays win the World Series, will they be treated to a championship parade through the vacated streets of Buffalo?"  -- Dwight Perry

"How bad is it in Major League Baseball? 37 cardboard cutouts of fans placed in the stands just tested positive for COVID."  -- Brad Dickson

"16 Marlins players tested positive for COVID-19: “And they said the Marlins’ fielders couldn’t catch anything.”"  -- Alex Kaseberg

STAY SAFE EVERYONE!