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Freak Speak

Baseball Managers Fake It Almost As Much As Pro Wrestlers

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Humor Post #73 from the world’s Crankiest Curmudgeon’s Middle School Blog (and probably the awesomest YA blog too) –

I was watching ESPN’s Sports Center the other night and they had this great video collection of baseball managers blowing up at umpires. There were a lot of red-faced conniptions going on, but some took it way farther than that. Kicking dirt on the umps, throwing bats, tearing bases out of the ground, you name it, they were doing it. There’s this guy Wally Backman on some Georgia team who is famous on YouTube for having a mouth dirtier than a bus station bathroom. I’d put the link here but I don’t want to get in trouble with any parents who might be reading this. They could sic the cops on me for corrupting minors or something.

Anyway, near the end of this ESPN show — and I have to say it was pretty hilarious —  Crankenfuss had a brainstorm. Mightier than a hurricane, you can be sure. Here it is. I’m almost positive the managers are mostly acting!! You know, like pro wrestlers. Now I know a lot of people think wrestling is real, but there are a lot of people out there who claim Elvis sings to them at night. Live!! Folks, the bigger the lie, the more people will believe it. Anyway, even the wrestlers admit they’re faking it, at least some of them. Oh, I don’t doubt they get hurt. (Getting belted in the head by a chair would cause a little discomfort, don’t ya think?) It’s obvious they’re super tough. It’s just that they know who’s going to win ahead of time. I mean if someone stomped on your neck with all his weight, I think they’d have to peel your neck off the mat. But those guys get that done to them all the time and they don’t die. They always seem to keep on fighting.

In a word, wrestlers E–X–A–G–G–E–R–A–T–E everything. They exaggerate their moves, their pain, their anger, their meanness toward each other. If they did’t, how could they go to the same locker room after a brutal match and not kill each other back there?

The Crank is getting off topic again. Too much chocolate or ADHD, one or the other. Back to baseball managers and their E–X–A–G–G–E–R–A–T–I–O–N–S. How come it’s only baseball bosses who go nuts like that? I watch tons of sports. I never see a football coach throw a football at a referee’s or get up his face, spit flying out of this mouth. Or how about basketball coaches. They wear zillion dollar suits, at least in the pros, and act very professionally. If they say something nasty and the ref hears it, they get hit with a technical foul and the other team gets free throws. In other words, their team GETS HURT when they act up. NOT IN BASEBALL. Nothing happens to the team at all when the manager throws a hissy fit.

Warning alert: New Crankenfuss brainstorm. It probably all starts with the fact that baseball managers dress up in baseball uniforms. How stupid is that? Do basketball coaches dress in shorts and sneakers? Football coaches in helmets and pads? Gimme a break! The managers are already playing make-believe so they just take it all the way. Now I admit I could be wrong about this, amazing as that sounds. I’ll admit it when you show me another sport where the managers/coaches do the same type stuff as often as those baseball guys.

Until then Dr. Crankenfuss thinks there’s something very fishy about those whacked out managers. Maybe there should be some kind of acting award for those performances.

Just sayin’.

From Your Dude with the ‘Tude,
The Doctor

Freak Speak

What’s wrong with football, baseball, and soccer? How about their names?

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Humor Post #68 from the world’s Crankiest Curmudgeon’s Middle School Blog (and probably the awesomest YA blog too) –

Anyone catch any of the NBA playoffs? Pretty awesome stuff. Those guys can do stuff on their own that the rest of us would need pulleys, ropes, wires, and green screens to bring off. But I realized that there’s something else good about basketball. Its name makes sense. Basket + ball = a game where you try to get a ball into a basket. How simple! How truthful! How sensible!

Now let’s talk about football, America’s most popular sport by far. It’s so popular they still talk about it almost every night on ESPN and the season ended almost six months ago. But the trouble is that football is hardly played with the feet at all, unless you count running. But then shouldn’t we call every sport (except hockey) runball? Anyway, you do use your feet in football, sure, but at the very most once every four or five plays. Usually it’s less. Now there IS a game that uses your feet much more. It’s called football. Well, uh… that’s what it’s called in every other country in the world except ours. We call that sport soccer. Huh? But even football/soccer would be better named as foot and head ball since a bunch of goals are scored by headers (which is hitting the ball with your head, for those of you who don’t live on Earth).

Okay, you say baseball does have people running to bases. Yes, you are so right, but you are so wrong that that’s the best way to describe the game. Wouldn’t the bat, or the actions of pitching and catching have as much or more to do with the game? Besides, getting on base isn’t the ultimate goal. Getting to the fourth base is! So baseball, you strike out too.

Well, what about hockey? you ask. (Or maybe you don’t, but hey, it’s my blog and Ima be in charge.) Hockey is basically just a soccer… uh, football game played on ice. A bunch of guys trying to get a ball (or a ball substitute) into a goal surrounded by a net. (That goes for lacrosse too.) Nothing in the name hockey even suggests a hockey stick, kind of an essential part of the game, wouldn’t ya think? And there’s other games called hockey, like field hockey. And what’s a hock anyway? Just askin’.

Bowling? Where’s the bowl? Golf?? Tennis??

There goes Crankenfuss, you say. Always pointing out the problems, but never anything good to say. True enough. Most of the time. But today I have a few sports where the names DO MAKE SENSE. Handball! Yep, it’s not that popular, but you score every point by hitting a ball with your hand. What a concept! Notice that it’s not called wallball though that would at least include an important part of the game. And there’s swimming. Ah, a sport that tells it like it is.

Diving.
The 100 meter dash.
The high jump.
Long jump.
Calf roping.
Dumpster diving.

And how about fishing? I’m talking about fighting those marlins and swordfish, not sitting around drinking beer all day in a rowboat and catching minnows. And one more great one: bullfighting! Even though it’s not really a fair fight, what with them stabbing the bull about a gajillion times (by the picadors; you can look it up) before the matador ever gets into the ring, it still pretty much summarizes what’s going on.

So in closing I’ll say… I’m through. ‘Nuff said. Game, set, and match to
Dr. Crankenfuss
Your Dude with the Tude

Freak Speak

Intentional Walks in Baseball? Give me a break!!

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Humor Post #43 from the world’s Crankiest Curmudgeon’s Middle School Blog (and probably the awesomest YA blog too) –

You thought I was done turning sports rules upside down? Hey, I’m just getting started. I mean, pro baseball just expanded their playoffs. That’s rule changing, isn’t it? And they want the new round of playoffs to be ONE GAME. Remember, baseball isn’t like football or basketball where you have the same team every game. In baseball, the main ingredient changes every game. And that would be the pitcher. A baseball team changes from a Monday to a Tuesday like a cake changes to a pie. Both have most of the same stuff, but boy, they don’t look or taste the same. Not that I’m talking about tasting a baseball team, but you get the picture. Anyway, what I’m saying is that this first round should be best two out of three. That would at least test the main part of both teams’ starting pitching staff.

But here’s the rule I really want to change in baseball: THE INTENTIONAL BASE ON BALLS. I want it banned, banished, killed, have the big kabosh put on it. It’s way worse than the “Hack a Hulk” intentional fouls I talked about in my last post. At least there the player has a chance to make two points. In baseball, he just gets to first base with no chance to make even a double.

Let’s use Barry Bonds as an example. Now I was about three years old when he was blasting just about everything out of the park. But everyone knows about him. And in 2004 — I looked this up — he was at bat 617 times and walked 232 times. That’s over 1/3 of the time! Now “only” 120 of these walks were listed as “intentional,” but come on. You know what happened. Most pitchers who did take the chance of facing ol’ Barry probably gave him nothing to really hit and he ended up getting an “unintentional” walk.

And just to stick this amazing fact in, Albert Pujols of the St. Louis Cardinals was given an intentional walk in the World Series WITH NO ONE ON BASE. The Texas Rangers were so afraid of what Albert could do them they didn’t even give him the chance to bat WITH NOBODY ON BASE. Oh, am I repeating myself? repeating myself? Well, that’s because it’s unbelievable to me that the whole sport wouldn’t let all their paying customers get to see what they buy their tickets to see. Let’s see, wouldn’t that be one team’s pitcher trying to get out the other team’s best hitter?

So I don’t know what else to say about it. I guess we could let football teams let the other team’s best runner get a free three yards every time he touches the ball. As soon as that guy got handed the ball, the game could be stopped and the runner’s team would get a free three yards.

I can’t figure out how you could work that “intentional walk” or “Hack the Hulk” in hockey. Makes me want to get more into hockey.

Now I’ll shut up. Let’s just get rid of the intentional walk in baseball so the fans get to see hitters hit.

From your Dude with the ‘Tude,
Dr. Crankenfuss