by Michael X. Ferraro
Darwin Barney’s sigh
reverberates through LA
sound of an ex-Cub
All-Star Clerihews #2
by Hugh Manatee
Zach Greinke
Is feeling hinky
And regrets his wish
For bottomless Minnesota hot dish.
Hunter Pence
Ended the suspense:
He scares both adults and kids
Cuz he was tragically born without eyelids.
Dellin Betances
Will take his chances,
Gird up his junk-a
And take a dive into Lake Minnetonka.
Derek Jeter
Is a 14-time All-Star repeater
And, if we trust the announcers,
Also invented sliced bread, the Internet and trousers.
Nelson Cruz
Has got nothing to lose.
Though Selig may wince,
He’s gonna show up at the game dressed as Prince
CK None
by Michael X. Ferraro
With Kershaw slinging filthiness
and Scully narrating the scene,
The no-hit ingredients were
all in place at Chavez Ravine.
Fifteen Rockies went down on strikes
(one reaching by errant throw).
Rojas at third veered into left
to keep Clayton’s hit count to NO.
In the end, the lopsided box
score tells only a part of the tale
Of the night that 40,000
bellowed, while 9 could only flail.
Don Zimmer, RIP
by James Finn Garner
Old Zim
When I think of him
Looks like chaw and tar
And a grand har-har
To those squares
Who don’t care
About baseball
And giving your all
For what you love.
And when push comes to shove,
Had Martinez been 70,
Zim would’ve pounded him plenty.
You’re our kind of guy.
Goodbye, Popeye.
Ballad of Bitter Words
by John Kieran
Why, Mr. Terry, oh! why did you ever
Chortle the query that made Brooklyn hot?
Just for the crack that you thought was so clever,
Now you stand teetering right on the spot!
Vain was your hope they forgave or forgot;
Now that you’re weary and bowed with fatigue,
Here is the drama and this is the plot:
Brooklyn, dear fellow, is still in the league.
Sir, if they can they will blithely dissever
Giants in segments unequal or not.
Homicide, Bill, is their plan and endeavor;
Staring on Ryan and Jackson and Ott,
You they expect to reduce to a blot.
La guerre a la mort! (Or in German “Der Krieg!”)
Vengeance they want to the ultimate jot:
Brooklyn, dear fellow, is still in the league.
Detroit awaits you? Says Lopez: “Ah, never!”
Pennant for Terry? Says Casey: “What rot!”
Using your scorn as a club or a lever,
Brooklyn will labor and chisel and swat.
Prize in the bag — now it may go to pot!
(Furnish sad music by Haydn or Grieg),
Bill, you won’t like it a bit or a lot;
Brooklyn, dear fellow, is still in the league.
At the start of the 1934 season, NY Giants manager Bill Terry made the off-hand jab about his local opposition: “Brooklyn? Are they still in the league?” The Dodgers used it as a rallying cry and kept the 1933 champs from repeating, beating the Giants down the stretch in dramatic fashion and helping the Cardinals take the pennant.
Published in the New York Times, September 29, 1934