A Concise Dissertation On The Crackhead And His Behavior

In some ways [one way], crackheads are the ultimate pragmatists. They have a singular goal, which is to obtain and consume as much crack as possible, and do absolutely anything and everything to make that goal a reality. This is a direct parallel to Christians, soldiers or anyone else who dedicates their lives to a cause. When Karl Marx said, “Religion is the opiate of the masses,” he was half-right. A statement that would takes care of the missing half-rightness there would be “Opiates are the opiates of the masses,” as a significant percentage of the population derives more influence from drugs than from God.

Crackheads, by nature, love crack. This is an indisputable fact that unfortunately crackheads may not be willing (or capable) to acknowledge, as smoking crack is not ideal to preserving the brain. Everything a crackhead does; every minute of his day; every second of his being; is centered around acquiring and smoking more crack. In order to achieve this most noble of goals, crackheads will do things that people who aren’t addicted to crack cocaine won’t do. For example, a crackhead will climb up an iron pole and risk imminent death in order to tear down what they notice to be a loosely attached crosswalk sign in hopes of exchanging said sign for money, which would allow said crackhead to purchase and consume crack.

The bar I work at purchased this crosswalk sign, and it is now on display. Come check it out and enjoy happy hour until 8:00pm every day at the Cherry Tree Bar in Brooklyn!

Seattle Mariners Continue Proud Tradition of Being Terrible

The Seattle Mariners are a bizarrely run sports franchise. Playing in the easiest division in baseball to reach the postseason, the team has now failed to do so for seven consecutive seasons. With only four teams in the AL West, and routinely crappy ones at that, the Mariners open every season with a 25% chance of claiming a playoff spot. However, with Wednesday’s trade with the Pirates, the Mariners made a bold statement about their goal to avoid postseason baseball until the Sun expands into a Red Giant and envelops the Earth, thereby ending any chance of accidentally slipping into contention, as sometimes happens in that stupid division out there on the left side of the country.

Enjoy reading my rambling complaints about baseball? Click here to finish the article!

Some Sounds That You Should Go Out Of Your Way To Listen To

Francoeur Walk Watch

12 games and 52 plate appearances into his tenure as a New York Met, Jeff Francoeur has yet to draw a walk. This is hardly surprising, as the formerly well-regarded Atlanta Brave had walked in just 4.8% of his plate

He deserves it.

appearances leading up to his trade to New York. However, baseball fans and writers have famously short attention spans, and Francoeur’s .327 batting average and two home runs since the trade have already led to a backlash against the Jeff Francoeur backlash.

The New York Times has already published the run-of-the-mill, “Coaching Advice Helps Mets’ Jeff Francoeur Get Comfortable,” puff piece about how Mets hitting coach Howard “Not The Hotel, But I Will Take You To

One To Rail Some Coke And Bang You There” Johnson has corrected some heretofore undiscovered glitch in Francoeur’s swing that is responsible for the outfielder’s supposed resurgence. MLB.com, which can always be counted on for thoughtful baseball coverage, has joined the party as well, announcing that Francoeur has “gotten back into the swing of things,” following his first home run since the trade on July 21st against the Nationals. The official website of Bud Selig’s baseball P.R. machine also proclaims that Francoer began his career with “A stellar first two-and-a-half years for the Braves,” a period in which Francoeur’s adjusted OPS+ was exactly 100, leaving his offensive performance just below that of the average right fielder.

Bottom line: Jeff Francoeur sucks. He sucked with the Braves and now a hit-by-pitch is the only thing saving him from the dreaded higher-batting average-than-OBP as a Met. Adam Krohn wrote an interesting piece for the Dalton, GA The Daily Citizen last night (The Internet is amazing) in which he suggested that Francoeur may be well-served to quit baseball altogether and pursue a career in football. Honestly, I don’t care what he does after he leaves baseball, but it has been clear for a while now that he can’t cut it at the highest level of the game.

Tasmanian Devils Have Terrible Disease, Huge Balls

From Wikipedia:

“As of 2005, the Tasmanian Devil population has been reduced by up to 80% in parts of Tasmania by the devil facial tumour disease, which is gradually spreading throughout the island. It is believed the majority starved when the tumours spread to their mouths, and that the tumours are spread by fighting between devils over carcasses they feed on – typically, fighting devils will bite one another’s faces. There is no known cure for the disease, and intensive research is underway to determine its cause.”

Let’s hope that the Tasmanian Devil community has it’s best doctors working on that as-yet-unknown cure to Devil Facial Tumor Disease, the most badass-named thing ever.

Interestingly enough, the above-quoted Wikipedia entry for the Tasmanian Devil includes pictures of several fictitious Tasmanian Devils, but not The Tasmanian Devil.

New Music To Make Living Worthwhile

Well, here it is: the greatest supergroup of all time, as NME and Antiquiet report that Queens of the Stone Age frontman Josh Homme has joined forces with Dave Grohl and Led Zeppelin’s John Paul Jones. The trio is

In case these guys were somehow not awesome enough, throw someone from Led Zeppelin into the mix.

currently in the studio working on what Homme’s wife, Brody Dalle of The Distillers, has deemed “Pretty fucking amazing…Just beats and sounds like you’ve never heard before.” There is no reason to doubt Dalle’s claims considering the band’s pedigree reads like a musical fantasy draft: take this generation’s most badass rock frontman, reunite him with the drummer from his magnum opus who also happened to have been in Nirvana and round out the roster with the bassist from Led Zeppelin. Epic.

Meanwhile, in other music news, Muse and the Arctic Monkeys have set release dates for the upcoming records, with Muse’s fifth album, The Resistance, set for September 14th, while the Arctic Monkeys’ Humbug (produced by Homme) is slated for release on August 25th. “Crying Lightening,” the first single from Humbug, is already out on iTunes.

Ichiro San, I Hate You Vol. II

I wrote a column about a year ago outlining my disgust with the way Ichiro Suzuki plays baseball and moreover, the constant fellatio he receives from baseball writers and fans. With said column continuing attracting the ire of Ichiro fans who leave comments on the Internet, I present a list of selected players with higher career adjusted OPS+ (on-base percentage plus slugging percentage, adjusted for ballpark and league averages) than Mr. Suzuki. This list is comprised of very good baseball players, but hardly the caliber batsman that draw suggestions that they be enshrined in the Hall of Fame, like Ichiro does all the time for some reason.*

Richie Sexson
Lenny Dykstra (who’s apparently broke now)
Rusty Greer
Chris Hoiles**
Andy Van Slyke
Cliff Floyd
Chili Davis
Mickey Tettleton
Hideki Matsui
Glenn Davis
Ryan Klesko

*As usual, assuming that the Hall of Fame even matters at this point.

**As an O’s fan growing up, I always liked Hoiles, but until I grew up and learned to appreciate the beauty of boiling an athlete’s career into a spreadsheet of data I never realized exactly how good he was.

Medication For Us All

Gotta love the Wee Wittle Pharmacette’s mascot: Pilly the Pilled-Out Pill, who beyond being stoned to the bejesus, bears more than a passing resemblance to the Queens of the Stone Ages’ sometimes mascot, Bulby.

East Flatbush Ave. in Brooklyn, somewhere between Ave. J and Rockaway Beach

Note: Google reports no results on a search for “Wee Wittle Pharmacette,” while Dictionary.com reports that “pharmacette” is not even a word. Classic.

Military Not Even Bothering At This Point…

You’d think a film that glorifies the United States Military might want to avoid advertising on oil tankers…

List Of Guys Who Will Become Guys

The “Guy” is an important character in the world of major league baseball. The term may have been coined by esteemed thinker and current roadie Eric Ripps and refers to those dudes who round out the ranks of highest level of professional baseball. They generally play for 10 or more seasons, hit 25-30 home runs in a season once or twice, play in an All-Star Game or two, spend a stint or two with the Orioles, Royals or Rangers, land one sweet free agent payout around the age of 33 and then peter out into oblivion, finishing their careers with adjusted OPS+ around 100. Recent examples of Guys include Mark DeRosa, David Dellucci, Preston Wilson, Xavier Nady, Eric Byrnes and Jeffrey Hammonds. For reference’s sake, Jermaine Dye is one notch above a Guy while Reed Johnson falls just short.

Below is a list of young or young-ish players who are in excellent position to replace the current DeRosas and Marcus Thameses and become MLB’s next class of Guys:

Edwin Encarnacion
Delmon Young
Johnny Gomes
Conor Jackson*
Andy LaRoche
Brandon Moss
Mark Teahen
Wily Mo Pena
Justin Maxwell

A running theme amongst these players is they were once highly regarded prospects who refuse, for one reason or another, to become the star players their teams initially hoped they would develop into during their first several seasons in the majors leagues. Of course, hoping that any player will be a Cal Ripken or Justin Upton and dominate the league right out of the gate is a great way to cultivate disappointment, as there are 125 Marty Cordovas for every Albert Pujols. Most of the younger players on this list have been traded at least once, while the older dudes have generally spent much of their early-to-mid 20′s performing at a high level in the minor leagues.

Delmon Young is an interesting case, as the 2003 #1 pick broke into the majors with a solid 2006 season at age 20, prompting Baseball-Reference to list Tris Speaker’s age-21 performance as a top comparable for Young’s 2007 campaign, before his disappointing 2007 resulted in a top comp of Rocco Baldelli for the following year. Young was then traded to the Twins, where his adjusted OPS+ of 102 indicated that he was roughly a league-average hitter as a 22-year-old in 2008. While his lackluster walk rate and power numbers lead me to believe that he will never be the star Peter Gammons and others predicted he would ultimately become, Young is still very, uh, young , and I’m fairly confident that he will at least eclipse “Guys” like Dellucci, Wilson and his diabetic piece of shit of a brother. Young also has yet to achieve enough to merit writing about without mentioning that time he throw his bat at a minor league umpire, so here it is.

*This is a disappointing one. Jackson’s .423 career minor league OBP resulted in one of the most heartfelt mancrushes I’ve ever harbored. However, as a 27-year-old with an adjusted OPS+ of 101 through nearly 2,000 plate appearences, CoJack’s ceiling at this point has become Glenallen Hill. <Wistful Sigh…>

Trent Reznor Gets It

“Music IS free whether you want to believe that or not. Every piece of music you can think of is available free right now a click away. This is a fact – it sucks as the musician BUT THAT’S THE WAY IT IS (for now).”
-Trent Reznor

Fully Developed Ideas Are Lame

Radiohead mentioned in a letter to their mailing list that they are currently in the studio, which can only be a good thing. Meanwhile, Thom Yorke released a new song this week, a cover of Miracle Legion’s “All For The Best” on the compilation, Ciao My Shining Star: The Songs of Mark Mulcahy. Mulcahy fronted the band Polaris, who performed the theme song to The Adventures of Pete & Pete.

I can’t find a picture, but there was a ridiculously (literally, it was ridiculous) hot blond lady sitting behind home plate during last night’s MLB All-Star Game. I only note this because of how noticeable she and her gigantic fake tits were. Don’t worry, I assume there will be images online shortly, as she has already inspired a message board dedicated to discussion of that time people saw a hot woman watching a baseball game .

Dr. Dre has emerged from the shadows; His venue: A Dr. Pepper commercial. Also from Dr. Dre’s corner of the universe, Eminem’s new album kind of sucks.

“I think the DH’s add so much offense that … even when you have the pitcher hitting, the overall lineup is much much stronger.” -Tim McCarver, to President Obama.
So T-Mac’s logic on this one is that designated hitters add more offense to a team’s lineup. So much so, that even when they are not playing, the rest of the players in the lineup magically hit better than they would have had they not played with a DH in other games. This is what Tim McCarver said to the President of the United States. Wow.

Adam Jones: Do you have a good curveball?
President Obama: If I did, I wouldn’t have run for President.

Will Albert Pujols win the Triple Crown this year? Currently leading the National League in home runs and RBI, the St. Louis first basemang and weirdo religious fanatic is fourth in batting average. Should he hit enough singles to usurp Hanley Ramirez for the batting title, Pujols would also be a strong contender for the real Triple Crown, as he currently sits atop the leaderboards in on-base and slugging percentages.

“I wanted to do that for a grand upperclassman of the baseball world.”
-Ichiro Suzuki, Discussing his recent visit to George Sisler’s grave in the most Japanese statement of all-time.

Fun With Dead Famous People!

Match the funeral pics with the dead famous person being mourned! Answers below; no cheating!

1.) Farrah Fawcett

2.) Billy Mays

3.) Michael Jackson

4.) Ed McMahon

5.) Steve McNair

A

B

C

D

E

Answers:

Note: I am aware that I could have waited and added photos from the funerals of Robert McNamara and Arturo Gatti.

PS: The recent run of famous people kicking the can is clearly an act of distraction, but from what? Iran? North Korea? A-Rod? The secret Islamic agenda of Barack Obama?

New York Teams Good

One of the best features on Baseball-Reference’s updated interface is the sort tool, which can be used to arrange lists of players, teams or anything else on the page according to their ranks in any given category. For instance, this morning, I used the sort feature to arrange every franchise by their cumulative runs scored and allowed. The following franchises have positive run differentials entering the 2009 All-Star Break:

New York Yankees (11,294)
New York/San Francisco Giants (7,264)
Brooklyn/Los Angeles Dodgers (3,970)
Chicago Cubs (3,333)
St. Louis Cardinals (2,970)
Boston Red Sox (2,695)
Cleveland Indians (1,729)
Cincinnati Reds (1,124)
Pittsburgh Pirates (1,066)
Detroit Tigers (974)
Chicago White Sox (973)
Boston/Milwaukee/Atlanta Braves (553)
Toronto Blue Jays (186)
Houston Colt 45′s/Astros (124)

The St. Louis Browns' terrifying logo was a perfect compliment to their abysmal play.

It’s interesting to note that the Astros and Blue Jays are the only franchises on this list that joined either league later than 1901, I guess the older teams not dealing with lengthy expansion periods against the more-established clubs contributes to that. The Arizona Diamondbacks are the closest to breaking even at -54, although the team’s ludicrously poor play this seasons suggests that the figure is only going to swell for the time being. Also interesting is the dominance of the three original New York clubs, which possess the top three run differentials in baseball history; I’m guessing this has to do with money.

On the other end of the spectrum, the Orioles’ current 12-year run of losing seasons has put their -4,424 differential second only to the Phillies’ epic -5,624 total. Being outscored by four to six thousand runs…unbelievable. To be fair, much of the O’s ridiculously terrible total can be attributed to their former incarnations, the St. Louis Browns and Milwaukee Brewers, who combined to make one postseason appearance between the Brewers’ incorporation in 1901 and the Browns’ move to Baltimore in 1954. The Baltimore tenure of the franchise has made 10 postseason appearances, including three World Series victories.

Pee-Wee’s Bike For Sale In Park Slope

With Puerto Rican flag decal for added novelty!

While we’re on the subject, it’s worth watching this kid do the classic Pee-Wee dance from the same film as the bike, 1985′s Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure. The kid is great and perfectly weird and the crowd goes fucking nuts for him, especially when he breaks out the toe walk (around 0:47).

Credit to Wogelife for finding the video of the weird kid.

PS: I didn’t know that Phil Hartman co-wrote Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure. That’s obviously pretty sweet, too bad he’s dead as shit.