2008 MLB Season

[Ananas]

"Let's Go Tribe" completely nails the Yankee bullshit to the wall, making me happy that the Indians are my other team:

In just seven years, the Yankees took the highest payroll in the sport and tripled it, shattering any illusions of a level playing field and turning the sport into a competitive joke. Once a hated but worthy adversary, the Yankees were transformed from a symbol of American excellence to a symbol of American arrogance, of wretched excess, of unfair advantage, of winning by cheating rather than competing, of performance enhancing drugs and cosmetic surgery, of buying it rather than competing to win. On the field, they were a club that started every inning on third base, and in the stands, their fans thought they'd hit a triple. They attracted fewer fans who were in love with the sport, and more freakishly obsessive front-runners who oozed entitlement like a toxic pus. The overspending Yankees begot the overspending Red Sox, and the putrid Yankees fans begot the incomprehensibly obnoxious Red Sox Nation. You could spend the rest of your life smacking these people, really hard, and it wouldn't be nearly enough.

[Toe]

Meh.

I find most Blue Jays fans to be worse.

[Ananas]

They aren't. Seriously. Jays fans are less obnoxious at home than Red Sox and Yankees fans are on the road.

[Guest Mr. Potato Head]

Unless you fire their beer vendor and replace him with a better beer vendor. That's unexcusable.

[gunnar hendershow]

In a bit of baseball history, tomorrow marks the 100th anniversary of Fred Merkle's famous blunder. What has unfortunately and/or hilariously been dubbed Merkle's Boner.

http://www.baseball-almanac.com/boxscore/09231908.shtml

The Cubs and Giants were locked in a furious pennant battle. On September 23, 1908, the score was tied 1 - 1 with two out in the last of the ninth inning at the Polo Grounds. Runners were on first and third base when Al Bridwell singled to center. As the runner on third crossed the plate with the apparent winning run, Fred Merkle jogged towards second base then started for the clubhouse in right field - leaving the basepaths. The Cubs retrieved the ball (or a ball), tossed it to Johnny Evers who tagged second, and a force out was called ending the game in a tie.

"Merkle jogged halfway to second. I saw him stop, glance at the fans pouring out of the seats and start for the clubhouse beyond right field." - Johnny Evers

Edited September 23, 2008 by damshow

[Lowerdeck]

Red Sox fans are bad, and this is coming from one. Yankees fans meanwhile are godawful.

The thing I hate is, the Red Sox started to do the exact same shit as the Yankees in order to keep up. For a few years, and still have at times, bought hired guns in order to be just like the Yankees. Now that the Sox won two titles, everyone's all front runner obsessive and all the fairweather and pink hat fans have come out in full force. Drives real fans like me insane.

[gunnar hendershow]

The Red Sox are no longer the alternative to the Yankees, they are one and the same.

[Lowerdeck]

The Red Sox are no longer the alternative to the Yankees, they are one and the same.

True. Both have obscenely high payrolls, and soon the Yankees will likely drop to Red Sox levels. Both have hired guns which are ineffective, simply because the clubs are loaded. The Yankees are now getting back into the prospect game because the Red Sox did so well at it of recent.

[gunnar hendershow]

I still remember when the Orioles were in that level of payroll with the Yankees. Then a few things happened and here we are...

I dream of a day when I can see pink Orioles hats at games.

Edited September 23, 2008 by damshow

[Lowerdeck]

I dream of a day when I can see pink Orioles hats at games.

Sure, they might be good lookers. But odds are good half them girls don't know shit about sports and only follow the bandwagon. Which drags the quality of the fanbase downward.

[Ananas]

I still remember back when the Jays had the highest payroll in baseball. We won the World Series both times.

At the Rogers Centre, the pink hats show up in droves when we have "Ladies Night Out" on assorted Thursdays. Basically they sit in a 200-level section together, get shitfaced and then they have a Q&A with a couple of players. Ushers working said sections should be prepared to be hit on by an endless line of non-looker cougars for 3 hours and have clean-up at the ready for when they puke. Not our brightest promotion by any stretch.

[Toe]

Hill finally making progress!

Aaron Hill has had a lot of trouble recovering from his concussion. Losing him has been a huge blow all year, and I hope he can come back next year at 100%.

Concussions are a wierd thing. Luckily, baseball isn't a high impact sport (although some catches look pretty painful).

[Lowerdeck]

With all that said, I'm not really a huge fan of retiring jersey numbers. I like Toronto's system where they don't retire numbers persay but have the ring or the hall of fame with all the major players in the club's history. Soon you'll see teams like the Yankees using numbers in 80s/90s or trip digits because everyone's a Yankee legend and ends up in monument park (all the single numbers will be gone except for 6 in a few years). I think the fans will remember the team's great players, and any hall of fame designation by the club is significant enough without taking a jersey number out of commission.

Well, this turned out being rather prophetic... the starting pitcher for the Yankees tonight is wearing number 91. Already given up three runs in just a third of an inning.

[MalaCloudy Black]

Now all I need is for Tampa to whip Boston in the ALCS and then win the world series.

Edited October 7, 2008 by Cloudy Chance of PAIN

[Lowerdeck]

Now all I need is for Boston to whip Tampa in the ALCS and then win the World Series.

Fixed (Y)

[MalaCloudy Black]

Wrong.

[Guest thekotesman]

I am really shocked that the Phillies are up two-to-nothing over the Dodgers.

This Red Sox game has been boring so far, barring a tight "fair-or-foul" liner that turned into a groundrule double.

[Lowerdeck]

It's home run derby time in St. Petersburg, as now Dustin Pedroia has two of them. Bay and Youks have one for the Sox, while Upton, Floyd, and Longoria have one for the Rays. And it's only in the top of the 5th.

[punky]

No love for the NLCS going on?

This series has been pretty damn good so far (tonight's game especially) and I can't believe the Phillies actually have a realistic shot at going to and actually winning the World Series, ending our 25 year championship drought. I would've said you were fucking nuts if you told me that in the middle of the season.

Edit: Of course, as I say this Lidge is reverting back to '05 NLCS Brad Lidge. C'mon, Lidge.. get Pujols out of your mind and end this inning.

Edited October 14, 2008 by punky

[Guest Mr. Potato Head]

In other news, Paul Beeston (the first man ever hired by the Toronto Blue Jays) has returned to TO in the Cliff Fletcher role, active scouting for Paul Godfrey's replacement. This has led to a variety of conspiracy theories, everything from "Beeston's going to end up with the job" to "Godfrey has health issues" to "Rogers and MLSE are about to merge and buy entire neighbourhoods in downtown Toronto".

We now go to EWB's Toronto Blue Jays insider, John Q. Beatnik.