By George Castle
Once a year, the Sox fans bring their pooches in,
which is better than a plague of frogs.
But the canines had to take the place of winning ball
‘Cause Chicago’s bullpen went to the dogs.
Posted 6/14/08
Big Papi’s Big Hurt
By Stuart Shea
One little piece of skin,
The size of a child’s little finger,
Can bring a big man down.
The pain will linger
for David Ortiz,
For at least three weeks.
He’s in a cast…geez.
Like a mouse to an elephant,
A torn tendon sheath
Doesn’t sound significant
But to a guy
Who depends on his wrists
It’s a poke in the eye
And a full-arm cast
And a lot of sitting.
How long the pain will last
Is not clear…
But it could go all year.
Posted 6/10/08
Rocky Road–My Favorite!
By Stuart Shea
Chocolate-dipped in a stale sugar cone,
The Rockies emit a miserable moan.
Last year the Series a reachable goal,
This year, last place and 12 games in the hole.
Their bats are as flabby as Jell-O congealed,
With pitching you’d find on a Little League field.
Where’s Tulo? He’s hurt, batting .152,
And Brad Hawpe’s bat has a case of the flu,
The offense an orange without any juice–
In a ballpark like Coors, there’s just no excuse.
Their 2007 pitchers a challenging foe,
But two thousand eight is a sick horror show.
Ubaldo Jimenez is just 1 and 6,
Jeff Francis ain’t fooling no one with his tricks.
Kip Wells, Micah Bowie, and–ugh–Glendon Rusch
Just prove that this pitching staff hasn’t got much.
What’s in a year? What will the team do?
I’m sure they’ll get better–in a season or two.
Posted 6/7/08
When Color Meant Color
by Sid Yiddish
Listening to the Cubs-Padres game on the radio the other night, I fell asleep in the midst of the fourth.
It happens a lot to me,
But I’m not sure why.
Perhaps it’s the broadcast itself that seems to have a shelf-life of three innings before it goes stale.
Oh man…take me back to the days of the radio broadcast team of Vince Lloyd and Lou Boudreau And good old TV announcer Mr. “Back-Back-Back Hey-Hey” Jack Brickhouse in the latter half of the sixth
And “Drunk-As-Punk” Harry Caray near the end of the eighth.
That is, when color meant color.
And insults were good
And if a name was incorrectly mispronounced, no apologies were forthright or swift
And mistakes in commercials meant laughter and fun
And broadcasters just did their jobs with intelligence
And baseball games were just good old-fashioned baseball games you tuned into on your AM transistor mid-afternoon or late at night
And there was no such thing as
Political correctness.
Posted 6/6/08
Baked Zito
By Stuart Shea
Zito, Zito,
His arm is meat-o.
He goes down
To weekly defeat-o.
His salary is
Really neat-o.
Unless you’re the Giants who may have to eat-o
His contract if he can’t find some team in the National League, or even anywhere at any level of organized baseball, that he can beat-o.
Posted 6/5/08