City of Pain

Chase Utley and Placido Polanco are apparently heading to the DL today, and you know what that means: Hello Greg Dobbs. Just when the Phils were poised to start chipping away at Atlanta’s division lead and push the overachieving Mets’ head back underwater where it belongs, this shit happens. Arguably your two best pure hitters are going to be sitting on the bench until at least the All-Star break, and maybe longer. Both players also lead the all star voting at their respective positions.

Since 2007 the Phils have been pretty lucky in terms of fighting off the injury monster.  I recall Utley breaking a bone in his hand, I think Rollins got hurt one year for something, and maybe Brad Lidge last season, although we would have been better off had he stayed on the DL the entire year. This season it all finally caught up with us, just like most things do in the universe.  If there is any silver lining in any of this, it is that this is happening near the All Star break. In theory, both players could be back immediately after the break, missing 13 games.  That’s three more Halladay starts and seven home games.

The only way to remain in this race is to stay afloat until the break. That’s assuming no one else gets hurt in the process, unless that person is Greg Dobbs, and then we can rejoice once again.

You may believe this to be true. You may also believe that some random shithead pecking away at this computer is the worst thing that ever happened to journalism. It’s just that right now in Philadelphia, we’ve got a paucity of topics worth our time, so we get filler topics. Not just on the overnights, but every damn day all the time. It’s these miserable little hypothetical and barroom conversation starters that just annoy the piss out of me. Talk to me about the games, rumors, anything but this crap.

Let’s cover some of these ridiculous topics:

Is Jaime Moyer a Hall of Fame pitcher?

No. I don’t care how long he pitches. I don’t care how many wins he has. He was never a pitcher the other team was scared to face. He was never dominant. He was good for some very good Mariners teams in the early 00′s. He’s nothing special. Please stop. I know he’s a great guy and he’s from Souderton. Good for him. Name a little league field after him. But not in the Hall of Fame. This isn’t like stuffing the All-Star ballot box for Raul Ibanez. This is utter nonsense.

Why don’t people like Cole Hamels?

Because he’s different and Philadelphia doesn’t like his brand of different. He talks funny. He’s from California. He’ll never have a bloody sock or run face first into a wall. He’s a dorky kid from Cali with a hot blond wife and a ridiculous baseball player who should probably stop talking and doing commercials that air in Philadelphia for his own good because this town is poisoned against him (thanks 610). He only won us our only championship in the last 30 years. It’s the same thing as hating Iverson because he has tattoos. The ignorant minority gets on the air and colors everyone’s attitude in a moronic way.

Oh my God, we’re never going to win anything ever again without Cliff Lee.

This may or may not be true. But let’s get one thing straight: it happened. And let’s get another thing straight: Ruben Amaro is not getting fired for it. And finally, there’s no guarantee we would be any better off now, in October, or in the future for keeping him. These three kids they got back from Seattle, who knows about them at this point, other than the fact that Phillipe Aumont is not doing so hot? Who knows about the people we traded for Halladay, or even Cliff Lee? We don’t know dick. It’s fun to play these games, but for every regret, there’s a Pat Burrell. I didn’t like the trade then, I don’t like it now, but for fuck’s sake, get over it. We have more pressing things to worry about like Mike Zagurski’s featureless face.

Why can’t we trade Raul Ibanez and Joe Blanton for Tim Lincecum and call up Dominic Brown?

These callers are great because I do get a good chuckle out of the host mocking their utter lack of baseball knowledge and common sense. So these are OK. I actually love trade talk because it’s interesting when it’s coming from Buster Olney. But when it’s Gerry from Olney, it’s just a waste of my time.

Actually, I’m not sure what’s worse: breaking two vertebrae or being drafted by the Sixers. Both cause a lot of pain and suffering. Both are potentially crippling to all of your hopes and dreams. You at least get paid to be a Sixer, although at times, it probably feels like being paid to chew off  your fingers.

You may be wondering, why so negative? New coach, new starting 2, no more Dalembert. Well, it’s still the Sixers and the odds are good that something will go wrong. You still have Ed Stefanski running the show. Comcast cares more about stealing your money than building a winner. And there’s still going to be no one at the games next year. Does Evan Turner make anyone want to spend a night in that soulless cavern where the sideshow bullshit is often more interesting than the games?

Let’s look at this team as currently put together:

PG: Holliday, Williams
SG: Turner, Green, Meeks
SF: Iggy, Kapano
PF: Young, Speights, Nocioni
C: Brand, Hawes, Smith

Is this a .500 basketball team? Possibly. Should any of us give two shits and a fuck? Honestly, no. Fire Trader Ed, hire Kevin Pritchard, trade Iggy, turn Willie Green into glue, make Brand disappear and let’s just stink again. Draft some 1 and done college animal next year and let’s build something great that no one will care about and all the racist old white people will complain about on 610.

Oh, and fuck Hip Hop.

Having to “root” for the Celtics or the Lakers is sort of like rooting for Clay Aiken or Adam Lambert to see who takes your little brother’s anal virginity. It’s painful. Having ABC bleep out every other word because some scary black men are cursing during the heat of battle is totally un-American. And continuing to deep throat Kobe by giving him, and not Pau Gasol, the Finals MVP just shows how disgraceful the NBA really is. If I were Kobe’s wife tonight, I’d crazy glue my butt cheeks together so that psychopath doesn’t turn my anus into a manhole. And the biggest loser in all of this is me not taking the Celtics +7 tonight, which may have been the most obvious sports bet in the history of time. Fuck my life.

But like all things in this world there is a silver lining. Yes America, Adam Morrison finally got his ring. He can proudly display his championship ring right next to his streak-stained gym shorts and beard trimmer. Thousands of hours in the gym working on his NBA game finally paid off. Too bad none of his teammates wanted to hug him during the celebration because they would have gotten a nose full of fecal particles emanating from his diarrhea stache.

Kill me now.

You know it’s one thing to use the word “gay” when you’re walking down the street with some friends, spot a puppy nibbling on a bone in the sunshine, cool breeze flowing over you and say “I feel so gay right now.” Maybe you’re playing frisbee in the park, picnic basket off to the side, barely legal teenagers prancing around in their bikinis off in the distance and you yell out to the heavens “This day is so gay and I can’t contain myself!”

Or maybe you’re a Chicago Blackhawk player who just won the team’s first Stanley Cup on the worst clinching goal in the history of sports, and instead of celebrating graciously in the showers with your lathered up, muscly teammates, you decide it would be cooler to call the opposing team’s least gay player “gay.” Wouldn’t karma be so much cooler if Chris Pronger walked into the locker room, dragged Patrick Kane by his cute, curly hair and pork plowed his anus with so much force his nose and mouth bled uncontrollably? Now THAT would be gay.  In a good way.