I Take Exception

A warning to the casual reader: the following post is really inside baseball. Well, not in the literal sense, because that would be fine and require no warning. It's a lot of blog drama, and I understand if you're not interested.

Farid at Beltway Boys just put up his interview with Bill Ladson, the Nats beat reporter for MLB.com. The neat part is that Ladson hates me, along with several other worthy bloggers. That's fine. I've come to terms with it. What I haven't yet come to terms with, though, is Farid's sycophantic attitude, his willingness to take Ladson' preposterous claims at face value, and his genuinely insulting generalizations about "bloggers."

Bloggers sometimes assume that we can write what we want with impunity because the only people that read our work are fellow fans who understand they are reading subjective rants, some of which we didn't believe ourselves when we wrote it.

Examples please. And not just examples from your writings, Farid. You're calling out "bloggers" here. I'm a blogger, and I assume that I can write with impunity because I'm protected by the First Amendment. And since Farid understands the inner motivations of bloggers, perhaps he can show me the stuff I didn't believe myself when I wrote it.

I'll summarize the next bit: "Ladson whined about some stuff and I agreed with him." Then:

I agreed that this wasn't good reporting - that is - printing assumptions as fact.

Like the assumption that we Nats bloggers make stuff up because we don't think Bill Ladson's reading? Seriously not good reporting.

Then we take a long break from the juicy stuff. There are actually some interesting questions and some interesting answers in the middle here. You might want to read the whole thing, even though it's gigantic.

Then Ladson resumes bitching, and Farid resumes enabling.

I assumed that a proficient writer like Bill Ladson wouldn't waste his time reading what hack-reporters like us wrote about the team.

You're doing it again, man. If you want to call yourself a "hack-reporter," fine. But keep your insults and your random hyphens away from me. Ladson:

"I do have a problem with some of the bloggers who act like they're in the know, in the locker room, and act like they know everything."

Huh. I had an anonymous commenter accuse me of that exact thing a while ago. I'm sure it's a coincidence. It was nonsense then and it's nonsense now.

I can't stand that fact that they get personal.

You know what's even worse than that? Anonymous commenters who get personal. But we could be talking about completely different things here, as Ladson has an idiosyncratic definition of "personal." Here's how I look at it, and tell me if you disagree.

• Non-personal: "Bill Ladson's methods of evaluating players are incorrect."
• Personal: "Bill Ladson's methods of evaluating players are incorrect and he is a bad person."

You see the difference, right? Ladson seems to consider a personal attack anything that contains the word "Ladson" and is not prefaced by email to him. Farid again:

The problem here is that bloggers are like journalists only in that we write words that end up being published somewhere.

Yeah, the free exchange of ideas is a real bitch. Why can't the government do something about this?

Unlike the mainstream media (at least those who are honest), we don't have set of rules to follow, we don't have an editor (other than our own common sense) to say, "Dude, that's going too far."

Right. And my common sense is doing a fine job. I don't need yours.

Now, I'm not talking specifically about any blog, but in general, we could do a much better job of being fair to those we write about.

You should start talking specifically about any blog, because if you don't I'll continue to assume I'm included as a target of all this helpful advice.

To us, talking bad about Ladson or Bowden or Kasten is like talking badly about our sister when she's in the other room. They aren't listening, so it won't hurt them.

There's that first person plural pronoun again. Don't tell me what talking bad about any of these guys is like, especially when your simile is so damn weird. I know Ladson reads my blog. I don't care if Bowden or Kasten does. I say the things I say because I belive them and because I can back them up, not because I think I can get approving howls from all the other unscrupulous lying bloggers.

I learned that bloggers have a responsibility to be fair to those they write about.

You just now learned that? What were you doing before?

Oh sure, we can haggle all we want about the "who's" and "what's" and "when's" of baseball, but when it comes to reporting, it needs to be fair and it needs to be accurate.

Fine. Whatever. I'm not a reporter. If I want a reporter, I'll go to Barry Svrluga.

It's easy to take a swipe at those in the public eye, guys like Ladson and Bowden and Kasten. To us, these are nameless, faceless men, which makes it much easier to be less than fair when writing about them.

If they were nameless and faceless, neither I nor anyone else would have any idea who I was making fun of. And as far as being fair, it's not like Bowden didn't sign Cristian Guzman. Or wear tracksuits. Or give fistbumps.

The difference, however, is that they are professionals, and this is how they earn their living. We can disagree with them all we want, and we can even be forceful in how we disagree.

But getting personal? Nah. That's just no good.

Since when does being a professional make you immune to criticism? You ever criticize the President? Well HOW DARE YOU?! He does that for a living.

The obvious response is that Farid isn't talking about any criticism, just the personal stuff. But given Ladson's ridiculously self-serving idea of what a personal attack is and Farid's sycophantic willingness to go along with it, it's clear what's meant. You agree with Bill Ladson, dammit, because he knows better than you.

And if that's going to be your attitude, you might as well quit. Farid is exhorting bloggers to stop providing an alternative to the baseball media and start providing fan sites, and I'm grateful beyond belief that the nature of blogging dictates that no one -- not Farid, not Ladson, not anyone -- has any authority over me or my writing.

Related Reading. The Ladson interview and my response to it have caused quite a stir in the sleepy winter Natmosphere.

• Banks of the Anacostia, Capitol Punishment, and Oleanders have difficulty accepting Ladson's mystical theories of player evaluation.
• Econo then thinks about it for a while and gently suggests that Farid's starstruck interactions with a superstar like Ladson may have led him to excess. Plus he yells at Boz, which is always fun.
• Dave at the Triple Play muses, reflects, then reflects musingly on musing reflections. I can't help but picture him strolling along a lake on a crisp autumn evening.
  

Remind Me To Tell You About the Womackiad Someday

My most enduring memory of Tony Womack isn't a happy one, but it is tinged with a certain grudging respect. Matt Morris -- and keep in mind that here we're talking about pre-stoner beard/underrated ace/my favorite player Matt Morris as opposed to the hairy, crappy version that you kids today are used to -- lost his shot at some kind of minor immortality when Tony Womack won the 2001 Division Series for the Diamondbacks with a single in the last half of the last inning of the last game. Maybe you remember it. If you knew me personally at the time, maybe you remember me swearing and crying and drinking until the hurt was gone.

I relate this story to illustrate the real danger of this move: Tony Womack is kind of famous; more famous, at any rate, than anyone he's competing with, and that makes minor league contract the Nats gave him dangerous. He's a three-time stolen base champion, a playoff hero, Time's 2006 Person of the Year, and a veteran presence, and those are the kinds of things lousy managers fall for when they're filling out the lineup card. Womack is here as a trial for Manny Acta, the second in what will no doubt be a long string of them.

Remember Jeffrey Hammonds? His resume was similar to Womack's: hoary, veteran presence, Time's 2006 Person of the Year. In 2005 he was a National, and he couldn't do anything. He never could pitch, so I guess it's not right to hold that against him, but he couldn't hit or run or field anymore either, and that's fair game. Yet Frank Robinson played him, even started him. Why? Well, Frank hated (hates, probably) Ryan Church like he's a Japanese pitcher. Plus, you know, you can't let veterans sit on the bench and not play. It's not fair to them.

Frank failed the Temptation of the Awful Veteran, leaving his final record in the Manager's Challenge at 2-117, the 2 being his handling of Jose Guillen and the Brendan Donnelly Incident, which Angels fans are still crying about to this day (cf. Jim Edmonds). Acta is so far 0-1, having taken the easy but wrong path in the Temptation of the Fast but Terrible Centerfielder. He perhaps deserves some slack here, though; it can't be easy for a new hire to resist the organizational pressure that has for years been strangling Ryan Church's career like an anaconda. This, though, is the real test. There is no excuse for playing Tony Womack.

And that's the only interesting thing about the Womack situation. Worst case: he plays all the time, sucks, and the Nats lose 101 games instead of 100. It's at least as likely that he won't even make the team and become another long-forgotten Spring Training footnote like Jared Sandberg or George Arias. But it will be an indication of whether Acta's merely a 500 grand-a-year stopgap or a guy who deserves to be running the team when all those investments in the farm system pay off.

In other Frank news, he got himself a job. So can we stop crying about this now? Do you feel better now that we can be sure he won't be selling matchsticks on a street corner to pay for his Lakers tickets? I mean really.

Programming Note: Man, do I feel pretentious for having a programming note. For all the people who care, I might as well be working on my Nobel Prize acceptance speech (it starts and ends with the word "Rickey"). Anyway, in case you're wondering, yes of course my return to blogging was inspired by Ray Smuckles' return to advice-giving. My plan is to post weekly, on Wednesday or Thursday. So expect things to be excessively long and slightly out of date. For an example, see above, starting with "My most enduring memory" and ending right about here.

Quarterly

Let me tell you, writing a musical about the life and times of Rickey Henderson is harder than you'd think. And getting financing for it is even harder than that. And getting Otis Nixon to star in it is even harder than that. So here I am doing this again.

Imagine my relief when, after several months hunched over a notepad stolen from my office trying to work the "tenure?! Rickey got 16, 17 years" gag into the libretto, I looked around and realized that the Nationals are almost identical to when I last saw them. There's really not that much to cover, so I'm not trying very hard. Because the last time I tried, Otis Nixon laughed in my face.

RATTY GOATEE OUT, PERM IN
Well, they fired Paciorek. I already miss him, his polo shirts, and his wildly popular trademark catchphrase ("Blargh!"). I also miss the sliver of faith in humanity that I lost when I perused fan reaction to his eminently reasonable sacking. The two things I learned: 1) Paciorek is the greatest color man that ever lived, and 2) There is no definitive way to spell "Wimpy." Or "Whimpie." Or "Whimpeey."

Now we've got Hall of Famer Don Sutton, whose chief claim to fame is as the background to countless TBS-fueled weekend afternoon naps. That suits me just fine, even though the mention of Buck Martinez -- a silver-haired, white-suited, kazoo-voiced god among men -- got my hopes embarrassingly high.

CRANKY OLD MAN OUT, CHIPPER YOUNG MAN IN
They fired Frank Robinson so long ago that I actually blogged about it. There's been some recent drama, what with Frank claiming he was promised one of those nice sinecures where he puts on a cap, shuffles onto the field, and waves to the rubes a couple times a year only to have it snatched from him by one or another lying piece of crap in the front office. Whatever. Don't care. Frank stole enough money napping in the dugout while getting paid to manage the Expos that I don't consider it an injustice that he'll be doing his whining about these players nowadays without the official backing of a major league franchise.

But enough of the Ghost of Lousy Seasons Past, and on to the Ghost of Lousy Seasons Present, Mr. Manny Acta! Some months ago I compiled in my noodle a list of things I was looking for in a new manager. I wanted a guy who 1) wouldn't cost a lot of money B) wouldn't be a bigger target for SportsCenter mentions than his players and III) would make sure Ryan Church got 500 at bats. I'm pretty sure he fulfills my first condition, and I know he's good for the second, but we're off to a rough start with number III. Nook Logan being named starting center fielder shows just how little things have changed with this team. My only wish is that Logan were from an exotic foreign country so that I could make an hilarious joke about how his name is the equivalent in whatever language it is they speak over there to Brandon Watson. As it is, I'm stuck with this.

CRIPPLED SECOND BASEMAN OUT, CRIPPLED AUSTRALIAN IN
This is tough for me. I was bagging on Jim Bowden before he was hired, and I sure didn't stop after he got here. He made it easy for me, too -- the Cristian Guzman signing alone is enough material for one of those one-note Fire [Sports Figure] blogs that Deadspin finds so amusing. But damned if he hasn't been on a roll lately. Remember when he ripped off the Reds so bad that their GM went crazy and started complaining that Freemasons were beaming mind control rays into his head? Or maybe that Gary Majewski was all torn up in the pitchological areas of the body. One of those. So, we won that one, and then he went and screwed Seattle so bad they almost had to move to Milwaukee again. I'm amazed that we managed to get anything for Jose Vidro plus Jose Vidro's bloated "what the hell we're about to get contracted anyway" salary. And we didn't get just anything; we got Chris Snelling, the Australian Ellis Burks. Plus some other guy. I'm not doing a lot of research here.

So what happened? Has Bodes, after 12 years or whatever on the job, gotten better? Or is it what I like to call the "Bowden's A Pimp. He Never Could've Outfought Bavasi" theory, along with the "But I Didn't Know Until This Day That It Was Kasten All Along" Addendum? Which is to say, Stan Kasten is actually running things and laying all these GMs out with x's where their eyes should be.

I certainly don't know. On the one hand, it's a lot easier to believe that someone associated with Bobby Cox and double-digit divison titles is competent rather than someone associated with tracksuits and Bob Boone. But on the other hand, the Lerner/Kasten administration has been so far marked by a certain . . . let's say thriftiness. Other than for laffs, why would they keep a well-compensated buffoon on the payroll? It's not like Kasten's afraid of the spotlight -- if he's willing to go on the John Thompson Show and be called a racist, I can't imagine he's nervous about facing Bill Ladson's soft tosses.

So I have to assume they're keeping Bowden around for some reason, and I further assume that that reason something to do with generally managing. Which leads uncomfortably to the assumption that Bodes is doing some good things. Not all good things, of course. The Nats starting rotation, as it stands today, is five reliable pitchers short of "solid," and the ¡Livan! trade is looking more and more like the result of a pretty severe misappraisal of resources. Like selling both your kidneys because you're pretty sure Mike O'Connor can filter the waste out of your bloodstream for a whole season. Nonetheless, it's no longer clear that Jim Bowden is the unadulterated force for crappiness he once was.

For the moment, therefore, I'm promoting Jim Bowden: having defeated Krivsky and Bavasi in single combat, he's now officially the best of the bad GMs. Like being the best Nats shortstop or cleverest celebrity gossip blog or the 2006 National League champions, it's not a huge accomplishment, but it's something, and there's plenty of room for advancement. I'm just trying to make sure I don't wind up like the guy who wrote this Hardball Times column, which stated that "It's too early to judge Jim Bowden's offseason, but it would appear that the last smart thing he's done was the midseason trade for Lopez and Kearns" the day before Bowden did something very smart. It is now the official position of Distinguished Senators that it actually is possible to underestimate Jim Bowden.

Stay tuned starting in April for my next quarterly update, when I'll discuss why it took them so long to bench Nook.

Triple Book Review!

I read books, and some of them are even the kind that you read straight through rather than choosing what actions the protagonists should take and then flipping to a page that describes the result. Most of the baseball books I read are like that, and I thought I'd take this opportunity to review some of them. Adjust your book-buying behavior accordingly.

First up is The Last Nine Innings by Charles Euchner, a book I read shortly before the season started and should have reviewed a really long time ago. It has an interesting format, using incidents from game 7 of the 2001 World's Series of Base Ball as launching points for a series of topics, some of which I even remember. Catching, for instance. There was an enlightening discussion of catching. Euchner deserves credit for what I remember being an even-handed account of the ever more tiresome dispute between the Moneyball idiots and the anti-Moneyball idiots. Although there were some glaring factual errors ("Orlando Cabrera of the St. Louis Cardinals" is mentioned as a better defensive shortstop than Derek Jeter, which is half right), The Last Nine Innings proved to be a fine read and -- if your memory is as bad as mine -- an enjoyable memory-jogger. I'd forgotten all about Jay Bell, for instance, and there he is! Recommended for fans of catching and of Jay Bell.

Above: Jay Bell congratulates Tony Womack, just as he would congratulate Charles Euchler if the opportunity arose. "Great job, Charles!"

Another book I read, and keep in mind that the quality of the transitions around here pretty accurately reflect what you paid for them, is Don't Look Back: Satchel Paige in the Shadows of Baseball by Mark Ribowsky. Now, Paige is one of the most interesting men who ever lived, and it's got to be close to impossible to write an uninteresting account of his life. Don't Look Back is no exception, and even at its sloggiest and despite Ribowski's sometimes head-slappingly pretentious prose, I plowed through it, eager to learn of the next leg of Satchel's journeys.

Ribowski does a fine job of filling in the cast of characters around Paige, particularly the less than legitimate black businessmen whose money and civic pride kept the Negro Leagues in business and Satchell -- in between his trips to North Dakota, the Dominican Republic, and elsewhere -- employed. Gus Greenlee, for instance -- the Pittsburgh numbers boss who delighted in being called "Big Red," as it reflected both his imposing stature and his mixed heritage -- receives a thorough and even poignant treatment.

But this underscores the fundamental problem with the book: not enough Satchel. It's probably not Ribowski's fault. He does (as far as I can tell) a great deal of original research, but at the end of the day, we're left with a clearer picture of Greenlee and others than we are of Paige. Paige was a private man who was ashamed of his origins and used to the endless slights that went with his race and environment. He didn't often show his true self and attained a truly impressive celebrity behind a well-developed character. Ribowski talks less about Paige than he does about America's view of Paige, and Satchel's remarkable fame is something that baseball fans of my vintage could stand to be reminded of.

Finally, we come to the most comment-worthy of my recent baseball readings, Those Damn Yankees by Dean Chadwin. I almost didn't pick this book up. A whole book about how much the Yankees suck? Well, I hate the Yankees a lot, but I'm not proud of it, and it doesn't seem to be a topic that would bring out the best in a writer. "Jeters a bich and the Spaknees spend to much money lol Tigers!" Sure, Jeters a bich and the Yaknees do spend too much money and I certainly loled when the Tigers won, but that's the kind of thing to be anonymously proclaimed on message boards, not committed to actual paper with a real publisher who compiled it in a volume that's available at a steep discount at my local independent bookseller.

But then I saw a compelling reason to buy it. At the top of the cover, above a fat guy in sunglasses and an Uncle Sam hat sticking out the sunroof of a pinstriped car, I saw this: "'I recommend Those Damn Yankees. It reveals Giuliani as the self-serving political manipulator that he is.' - Mayor Edward Koch." A question mark appeared above my head, only the first of many that the book would produce.

Let me get this out of the way first: Those Damn Yankees is completely fucking crazy. Dean Chadwin sees the Yankees as an embodiment and element of everything he hates. Republicans, white people, George Will, every newspaper writer that ever lived, and Giuliani -- especially Giuliani. And if he takes a shot at one of these annoyances, he considers them all hurt. When Steinbrenner does something shady, Chadwick points it out and yells, "take that, Giuliani you bastard!"

I've never seen baseball analyzed in Chadwick's manner. It's like a Bill Simmons column ghostwritten by Howard Zinn or Centerfield by System of a Down. And it's a good thing TDY is as unfocused as it, as its unorganized listing of grievances is what makes it entertaining. In one section, Chadwick complains about the "bleacher creatures" at Yankees stadium, their rowdiness and eagerness to call opposing players "fags." Later, he rails against the police presence at the Stadium and specifically around the bleachers. Uneducated, heteronormative fans or jackbooted fascist thugs -- they both make being a Yanks fan miserable. Everything is a cause for complaint. Why are there so many white people at Camden Yards? Why does a rich guy own the team? Why aren't there any Muslim players? Chadwick does not offer an explanation for that last "issue," but I bet white guys in nice suits have something to do with it.

It's a hell of a read. Chadwick is a literate baseball fan, a very good writer, a leftist, and a hater of all things Yankee; if you've ever wondered what an alternate dimension Stephen Goldman would sound like, here he is. His style of argument is so unhinged that he should start a blog. Ever thought about why Willie Mays drew fewer walks than Mickey Mantle. Racist umpires! By subconsciously favoring Mantle, umpires saw to it that "many experts" (by which he probably means SABR, whose "membership is overwhelmingly Caucasian and male, with a high percentage Catholic") would consider Mantle to be greater player, and all because of racism. This is an ideal condensation of Chadwick's 273 pages of ranting: an imaginary problem is tackled by assuming something ridiculous (in this case, that Mays and Mantle are, other than skin color, exactly identical players) and explained by assuming the absolute worst about any authority figures.

That's not to say that TDY is without its faults. When Chadwick stops complaining about stuff that drives him and only him nuts and ventures into stuff that drives lots of people nuts, you might as well be reading any other whiny "Why Baseball is Doomed" column. We all benefit from a little leeway when it comes to bad predictions, but it's hard not to smirk when Chadwick laments that Kevin Brown's contract with the Dodgers marked the end of competitive balance or that teams like the A's and Twins, with nine playoff appearances between them since TDY's 1999 publication, are doomed to bottom-feeding and might as well be relegated.

Those Damn Yankees seems to have made little impression on the baseball world, and that's a shame. Go to your local bookstore, and you'll find eight or nine rah-rah franchise histories, some uninteresting autobiographies, Rob Neyer's latest lukewarm excretions, and at least one Baseball Prospectus collaboration with an insulting subtitle. What you won't find is anything as original, as elegantly written, or as spellbinding as Chadwick's literary catharsis.

Tonight on Fox: New York Yankees vs. opponent

I didn't have time to write a playoff preview, but that's okay. You've heard all my jokes, and I dearly hope you weren't reading the previews -- or anything else on this site -- for insight. In fact, I'm starting to think that maybe the only thing old DS is good for is maybe running a yearly contest to see which player I'm most hysterically wrong about. Soriano, Wilkerson, and Guzman win, place, and show this year. The first two are pretty obvious, and Guzman did far less damage to the Nats than I figured he'd do.

But that, i.e. all matters pertaining to the Nats, is very much in the past now that the postseason has started, so I'll wait until later to relate how sad Frank Robinson's having 586 home runs makes me now that they've finally shit-canned him.

So you know how people sometime fantasize about the Commissioner (and I capitalize to emphasize the god-like powers he has in these scenarios) stepping in and with one nod of his mighty head sweeping away everything the fantasizer doesn't like about baseball? Like making it so that Barry Bonds doesn't exist or abolishing the wild card or something. Well, I think it's about time the almighty Commissioner did something about the godawful National League. Or rather, a couple days ago was about time. St. Louis? I love 'em, but they shouldn't be anywhere near this close to a World Series. If Selig had stepped in and awarded that slot to the White Sox, St. Louis' rag-tag bunch of concussed misfits would not be in a position to embarrass the League on a national stage. "National stage" is defined, per Fox's and ESPN's shared policy, as New York.

Sources!

Umm, good? I guess. That's why I'm not a blogger anymore, I suppose. I mean, did these same "sources" reveal that that tomorrow the sun is going to rise? I can't think up a reaction to something I've known for a year. Hell, next you're going to want 2000 words of reaction to Washington having a baseball team.

Themes

My blogging this season has had four themes.
1) The Nats suck.
2) But I don't care because I can't watch them.
3) My indifference is reified by the literally but actually figuratively palpable lack of posts around here, which is so high concept I think I should get a grant.
4) Will Carroll.

And I think I did a pretty good job of balancing these four topics, what with the months of not posting interrupted by the occasional jamming of my blog-finger, Pillsbury Doughboy-style, into the Wickman-soft stomach of Will Carroll's inanity.

But now things have changed. Will Carroll has moved on, and the Nats are on TV. And that's made a difference, a difference so drastic that even I'm surprised. (Not Will -- I actually see him less often than I do Anita Marks these days.) The Nats still suck, Bodes is still in charge, and I still haven't seen anything from ownership to give me any hope, but still: I'm watching the Nats. Any chance I get. Even with Paciorek still grunting.

So I was watching the Nats and realizing there ain't a whole lot to talk about. (Sample abandoned post: News Flash! Austin Kearns looks like the bass player from Wilco!) Plus I was afraid I'd lost my touch. The big news of late has been Alfonso Soriano joining the very exclusive 40-40 club. So I took a look at the issue and thought to myself, "Hmm. What can I say about this that will delight my readers and cow my enemies?" Well, if you look at the list, you notice that almost everyone on it is an asshole. So I started thinking -- and here you get to watch the maestro at work, so feel free to take notes -- this club has more assholes than a proctologist's Rolodex! Well, that doesn't work because there are, at most, three assholes in the club. It's not the number, it's the proportion of assholes, but anything containing the phrase "the proportion of" is going to have a really hard time being funny.

So I got discouraged and gave up. "Sometimes you just gotta know when to give up, kid," I told myself (I call myself kid sometimes). But then I saw the Onion take a stab at it, and I realized that there's no way to make a good joke out of it, which made me feel better. So, in conclusion, make it your pastime!

It Helps that Ortiz Bugs the Hell out of Me

Interesting question over at teh OMG: do you care that Soriano is getting himself thrown out and picked off and whatnot in his quest for 40 steals? I certainly don't. I'm not going to begrudge the guy his shot at a place in the record books next to Jose Canseco (and let's give it up to Alfonso for not bouncing one off his head), even it means he's going to be distracted from playing the game properly.

But I think I'm obliged in one sense or another to post this disclaimer: I am a terrible Nats fan. Maybe the worst. With that said, it won't be a surprise that I'm rooting for Ohka tonight, and Soriano can make as many history-pursuing outs as he wants.

It Helps that Armas Bugs the Hell out of Me

Interesting question over at teh OMG: do you care that Soriano is getting himself thrown out and picked off and whatnot in his quest for 40 steals? I certainly don't. I'm not going to begrudge the guy his shot at a place in the record books next to Jose Canseco (and let's give it up to Alfonso for not bouncing one off his head), even it means he's going to be distracted from playing the game properly.

But I think I'm obliged in one sense or another to post this disclaimer: I am a terrible Nats fan. Maybe the worst. With that said, it won't be a surprise that I'm rooting for ¡Livan! tonight, and Soriano can make as many history-pursuing outs as he wants.

What I Learned from Having MASN for Three Days

• Brian Billick sure has a lot to say.
• Anita Marks can do anything! Except make me watch her show or even go to the trouble of figuring out who the hell she is.
• When in Denver, Bob Carpenter can't stop saying "In this ballpark." I'm guessing it's the thin air.
• Jamey Carroll's still mad.
  
• Tom Paciorek's still annoying.
• The Nats suck so bad only dogs can hear it.
  

A Corner Bar Metaphorically

I'm really enjoying this Majewski scandal. Apart from schadenfreuding all over the spectacle of a public figure transparently trying to cover his ass by whining to utterly uninterested authorities, this can only work out well for us Nats fans. There are two possible consequences, and I like 'em both. Either:

1) Our laughingstock of a general manager is proven not just to have robbed (which we already knew) but to have destroyed, humiliated, and driven mad a rival executive, and that's the kind of thing a fan can take pride in. Or . . .

B) Bud Selig or whoever rolls up the MLB rulebook and pops Bodes on the nose with it. Maybe he blinks a bunch of times and reflexively cries a little bit or maybe he just writes a hilariously indignant column in the Examiner. "Yo, I didn't do nothin', dawg! Don't hate the player! Put down that Haterade, son!" Either way, seeing Bowden humiliated is just about the only thing I'm rooting for these days.

I don't know what it is, but this blog just can't seem to hold on to any of its husky sources of inspiration these days. First Livan gets shipped out for farm boy grindage, then Will Carroll bids adieu to my daily stop for terrible writing, bullshit rumors, highbrow literary analysis, and cringingly unfunny comedy bits, The Juice Blog. His goodbye post, sadly, does nothing but reinforce why we're going to miss him. It's got the self-satisfied coyness we've come to expect.

Due to recent developments, things that should come clear in the very near future, I am ending my involvement with "The Juice" blog. . . I wish I could say more at this time, but as each second passes now, things will become clearer.

It's got clunky prose.

I'd always considered this a "corner bar" metaphorically, a place where anything might be discussed with a general center of baseball goodness.

And, of course, the kind of musing about the Future of Blogging that can only emanate from a guy who's as dumb as he thinks he's smart.

I'm still not sure of blogging. I think the word is overused and misused. It's a new form of journalism, one that's continually evolving. Years from now, I doubt we'll even remember the word and the impact that it has on society will be assumed. Information will be ubiquitous, though I have no idea what form it will take.

Honest to God, does he plug "blogging" into a custom-designed Mad Libs for Dipshits program? I can't think of how a conscious human being comes up with that paragraph. But as long as we're talking about the Future, I don't know what form all that ubiquitous information will take, but I bet this guy does.

This isn't the end for Will, though I can't imagine where I'm going to get my Buzz Machine Fix.

You'll still find me at Baseball Prospectus,

They may have gotten rid of Dayn Perry, but they're never getting my forty bucks again.

Mind and Muscle,

I can't see myself buying one of those magazines with a shiny, grinning, hugely muscular hairless man on the cover, even if it does say "Droolworthy Details about Will!" on the cover.

Total Texas Baseball,

I did some research here, and I can state that Total Texas Baseball seems to be the Baseball Bias of Rangers websites. So that's something.

and soon, a couple new places, ones I think you'll like.

The Future? Will selflessly left the comments on that post closed -- he doesn't need your adoration. He does it for the children. But the comments on this post are wide open, so let's all let Will know how much we'll miss him.

Requiem for the Husky Man

So, why haven't I been blogging? I have to ask myself that question because no one else cares, but here's a clue: my favorite player, the figurative wind beneath my literal wings, this blog's gelatinous muse and smooth-talkin', slow-walkin' guardian angel is traded, and I can't muster much more of a reaction than the "Huh, that's kinda interesting" I emitted when Ronnie Belliard got traded to St. Louis.

Is it a good trade? Once again, asking myself. Shit, Ryan, I don't know, and why would you be listening to me anyway? We've got "prospects" now, and I guess that's kind of exciting. But not as exciting as having a massive, unstable Cuban either humiliating the opposition with a variety of 50-mile-an-hour pitches and an occasional non-hustle double or humiliating his own team with walks to the opposing pitcher and incomprehensible post-game tirades. It's also not as exciting as having a pitching rotation for your major league team, but hey -- youth movement and all. Whatever age ¡Livan! is -- let's say 38 -- he was such a youthful 38 that we all agreed to call him 31, but I guess that's not youthful enough for the movement.

I'll leave it to the real bloggers out there (and the links to the right aren't, as far as I know, completely out of date) to figure out what kind of performance Arizona can expect from the big guy and to make wild-ass guesses projections for the two newest members of the Nationals organization. I'm just going to miss the most interesting guy on a boring ballclub.

I Think Will Carroll Is Trying to Lure Me Out of Retirement

Can you think of a better explanation? I guess he gave up on the Brian Giles thing, but it looks like he's filming a rap video, so good for him.

Let's Hope This Works Out Better Than The Last Trade I Liked

"Don't forget, pitching is the name of the game. The lack of it, especially in the bullpen, beat us last season."
-- Cincinnati Reds GM Wayne Krivsky, after trading Austin Kearns, Felipe Lopez, and some other guy for four or five dudes I have already forgotten were ever Nationals.

Psych! That quotation actually emanated from Cincinnati Reds GM Bill DeWitt after he traded Frank Robinson for Milt Pappas and some dudes that everyone's forgotten ever played for anyone. Still, instructive, huh? Here's what we can learn:

1. Reds GMs tend toward the dumbass side of the ledger.
2. History repeats itself.

Given that history repeats itself, the obvious implication is that Austin Kearns is the next Frank Robinson. So we have a lot to look forward to: an MVP, a triple crown, a few pennants, and that proud moment when Kearns becomes the African-American manager in baseball history.

And as for Felipe Lopez, History may not lay out his path as clearly as it does Kearns', but he's already the best shortstop in Nationals history, narrowly edging out Deivi Cruz for that honor.

Of course, all this comes at a price. The martyrdom of Brendan Harris is complete, and the end is happier for Harris than it is for most martyrs. He might even get a chance to play, rather than scraping together a living as a George W. Bush impersonator. I'm informed that Bill Bray is pretty good, and I'm certainly misty over the good times I had watching what's-his-name and the guy Paciorek liked because he's Polish. But it's worth it, and for once Jim Bowden's single-minded pursuit of Reds has paid off for us. I'm even getting to the point that I trust him to trade Soriano.

If It Worked for Needham . . .

I'm thinking about quitting, too. Looove meeee!

Me 'n' Alfonso

Alfonso Soriano and I have something in common. At the moment, I'm 28 years old and drunk. I wish I could stay 28 years old, and I wish I could stay drunk.

Alfonso Soriano is a Washington National at the moment, and he wishes he could stay a Washington Natinoal.

I wish I could stay 28 years old and drunk. Soriano wishes he could stay a Nat. I shouldn't stay 28 years old, and I shouldn't stay drunk, and Alfonso shouldn't stay a National. So that's something we have in common. Awesome!

P.S. I'm also eating a pretzel. There's no reason, basebally-speaking, that I shouldn't continue.

You Can Tell I'm Mad When I Go Crazy With the Dashes and Happy Fourth Everyone!

How am I supposed to celebrate the independence of a country that allows Jim Bowden to walk the streets as a free man? Not just "free," but "employed." Not just employed, in fact, but "employed in a position with enough authority and job security that he can utterly ruin something I'm rather fond of." As opposed to before, when he could just ruin it a little bit for a little while.

So after two years, here's where we stand: Yes, we have a team, and that's the main thing. Everything else -- everything -- has gone wrong. I won't exhaust the list of petty stuff (laughable uniforms, lousy broadcasters, PNC Bank ads), because we're beyond. Our new owners are showing dismaying signs of frugality. Stan Kasten just proved himself -- maybe beyond any hope of redemption -- incompetent. And then there's Jim Bowden. Good old Bodes, the kind of guy you're glad is in baseball as long as he's got nothing to do with your team. An embarrassment as a baseball executive and maybe as a person. A symbol, as if another one was needed, of the Nationals' status as a second class franchise. He was the GM no one wanted -- hell, the GM other GMs wouldn't even talk to -- and they plucked him out of a TV studio because MLB didn't care and Bob Watson already turned them down.

And now -- gulp, steel yourself and say it -- Jim Bowden is our GM. Not the interim GM, and not the guy who won't make any moves until the real bosses take over. Jim Bowden is the real boss. It's obvious at this point that the Nationals aren't going to become a premier franchise anytime soon. Before we could hope. Now we just have to hope we're not the Pirates.

A Little Something For Anyone Stopping By

Feed him an apple!

Ahhh

Well, I feel better. The 2006 season got off to a very bad start. As I detailed in this Baseball Bias column (and may the earth rest lightly upon you, Baseball Bias), we pretty much got our head flushed in the toilet on the first day of school. You probably remember this, but Pedro Martinez and company hit -- with baseballs and malice aforethought -- everyone in the lineup, more or less. Finally, having taken more than any reasonable team could be expected to take, the Nats responded and received two suspensions, while the Mets got off without even a slap on the wrist. And we lost the game and the series. It stung like hell, and it was more than just being pushed around by the Mets. It was a reminder of our pathetic status -- no owner, little money, embarrassing management. As fans, we weren't in a position to talk trash to anyone.

This weekend's series against the Yankees finally sure changed my mood. The Yankees are everything the Nationals aren't: rich, successful, and professional. Their fans display an astonishing sense of entitlement, while ours work themselves into exhaustion trying to find a bright side in, say, parking garage negotations. And we did more than beat them. Alfonsono Soriano running wild like he was Jackie Robinson, Daryle Ward trying his damndest to kill himself huffing from first to home on Jose Guillen's triple, and finally Ryan Zimmerman's walk-off Father's Day home run -- we got a season's worth of highlights in one weekend.

It doesn't change much from a practical standpoint. Two wins against the Yankees don't cancel out four against Colorado, and we're still looking at a fire sale in the near future. Still, watching the Nats this weekend (and what a novelty it was to be able to do that), I had an odd feeling. It took me a while to figure it out: I was proud to be a Nats fan.

Current Events!

A riddle: What's the only thing worse than a busker?

A busker in an enclosed area.

Lawn 9, Me 0

Well, the Rockies swept the Nationals. Given that it was due in large part to the proverbially loveable Jamey Carroll and Baylor University's own Jason Jennings -- not to mention how happy it makes occasional Yard Work contributor Charlie Monfort -- I can't get too upset. Should I be worried, though?

Probably not. This kind of reminds me of last May. The Nats were playing pretty well, and surprised the hell out of me by staying not insignificantly above .500. But then they dropped two of three to the Blue Jays and got swept by Cincinnati, which prompted one of my all-time favorite jokes (because if I don't toot my horn, who will?):

The Nationals have often been described as "scrappy." This may be true, but the Reds just beat the "s" right out us.

What happened next? The Nats dropped another series to the Cardinals and then won 14 of 16 to vault into first place. Remember how rad that was? It probably won't happen again this time, but my point is not to worry too much about a sweep to a traditionally unimpressive team. Even though this was four games. At home. And Jamey Carroll beat us.

Speaking of which, I noted last year that Jose Guillen beats the hell out of teams he used to play for, a stat that fits neatly with his public persona (continually offended maniac). The conclusion:

Guillen versus former teams:
.333/.410/.688, 9 HR, 16 RBI in 93 ABs

Guillen versus non-former teams:
.297/.346/.478, 15 HR, 54 RBI in 387 ABs

He hits homers almost twice as frequently against his former employers, doubles at a better rate, strikes out less often, and perhaps most interestingly, gets plunked at a higher rate.

I'm not going to go through all his numbers this year, but he has hit half of his six homers against his former employers in Pittsburgh and Cincinnati, and it's a real disadvantage for the Nats that they don't see the AL West this year.

But what of mild-mannered Jamey Carroll? He has only one former employer, and he just got through destroying them: 8 hits, 3 walks, and 7 runs in four games. He's hit one-third of his homers against the Nationals. Sample size be damned: I conclude that, underneath the mild, Godly exterior, Jamey Carroll is determined to regain his manhood by exerting his dominance over the team that sold -- not even traded -- him like a piece of virgin meat. DAMN that's hot.

And the theme of vengeance takes us into the weekend, as the Nats host the Yankees. Alfonso Soriano's career line against the Yanks? .358/.402/.593 with 4 doubles, 5 homers, 10 RBI and 15 runs in 81 at-bats. And I think I just did a better job of getting you all keyed up for this series than Major League Baseball itself is capable of, if an email I received from them today is any indication.

Round two of Interleague Play should fire up fans' memory banks.

I remember when we didn't have to pretend that the Padres and Mariners were rivals.

The Orioles visit Shea Stadium, where Jerry Koosman, Jerry Grote, Ed Charles and the rest of the 1969 Mets performed their Miracle.

I remember that! I was so excited I sent a telegram to William Howard Taft, but he was busy hunting dodos.

The Dodgers and A's face each other in a reprise of the '74 and '88 Series.

Easily the highlight of my life until I was born.

And for those with really long memories, the Tigers and Cubs -- who played in the World Series 61 years ago -- meet again.

I bet the Cubs lost! And everyone was white! MLB ignored the really cool precedent here: the last time the Yankees came to RFK, the fans ran onto the field and started a riot so bad that there wasn't another baseball game in Washington for 37 years. If the marketing geniuses at MLB suggested that kind of excitement was about to ensue, I might have some interest in attending. But as it is, I figure a 9-0 forfeit loss is a lot less likely than a 9-0 regular loss, so I guess I'll just mow the lawn.

UPDATE: Another email, this one just for Nats fans!

Get your tickets now as Nationals stars Alfonso Soriano and Nick Johnson battle their former teammates!

In other words, "You're rooting for guys a great franchise didn't want anymore!" Way to rub it in, you bastards.

Discussion Question

If Jamey Carroll single-handedly beat us tonight, how upset would you be? What if he single-handedly sweeps us? What if he fouls off a ball that hits Bowden in the head? And Bodes is rolling around holding his head and he's all "Dawwwg . . . why you gotta . . . play me like that . . ."

Game Notes 6-8-06

• I think Philly's starter forgot to finish spelling his first name
• Bang
• Zoom
  

I'm Leaning Toward CillyCelebs.com

Davey Johnson! You have to figure he won't be spending more than, say, five months as "consultant to general manager Jim Bowden." In other words, meet our new manager. An improvement over Frank? I'm too shortsighted and drunk to remember much about the guy -- I barely remember Preston Wilson -- but here's Bill James, the last and hairiest defender of Pete Rose:

. . . did you ever notice that Dave Johnson (as a manager) has the world's largest collection of disgusting personal mannerisms? He picks his teeth with his fingers, tucks his hands in his armpits, scratches his head, shakes and pats his unmentionables, spits, drools.

One quibble: "unmentionables" means underwear, and I'm pretty sure James is talking about balls. At any rate, Johnson's dugout behavior (ball-scratching vs. sleeping) is certainly a downgrade, but I expect him to be an improvement in all other areas. So yay.

Above: One result of a Google image search for "Davey Johnson"

The problem -- and I'm sure alert readers are way ahead of me here -- is that this scenario also makes it look quite likely that the Jim Bowden regime is going to last at least another year. On the one hand, I'm glad they're not holding the DUI against him. The other hand is much larger, and I think it has gangrene.

This is where I'm glad I'm carrying around so much apathy. I mean, what the fuck? This is Jim Bowden we're talking about. Yeah, I know there's this perestroika or whatever going on because Soriano's hitting a couple homers a game, but that doesn't make him not Jim Bowden. A while ago, I cautioned against hailing the Nationals' new owners as saviors. Now I feel like the anti-Will Carroll. Which is to say, I'm so fucking right. Not that I take any joy in it. With another year of Tracksuit Jim on the horizon, I'm thinking about starting one of those celebrity gossip blogs. It seems like people will read one of those no matter how crappy it is.

A Feeble Kick

Hey, the Nats! I know I've sounded this note once or twice before, but a list of things on my television more frequently than the Nationals would include the Orioles, Samoa Joe, and Australian Rules Football. Combine that with my natural shiftlessness, and there's little chance of my summoning the pungent combination of vinegar and other fluids that make Distinguished Senators such a wild ride and its author a hero to children everywhere. It's hard for me to kick against the pricks, as they say.

Anyway, take a look at Alfonso Soriano. He doesn't seem to be interested in this, but I am.

Notice anything different about him? Notice that he's dressed like a baseball player, rather than an actor playing a baseball player in a commercial where they were too cheap to get the MLB license?

Here's Ramon Ortiz to remind of what a real baseball uniform looks like, as opposed to one designed by the people who brought us Turn Ahead the Clock Night. Is it coincidence that the Nats won not only this game, but also the next three? Yes, of course it is.

Speaking of the future, the amateur draft was today, and I've developed a test so that you, the reader, can figure out if you're a homer. With their first round pick, the Nationals selected Miami high schooler Chris Marrero. You don't know him from Adam, and neither do I.

Above: Chris Marrero in action.
Not really, but you didn't know that.

Is your response something like "Great pick! I think Marrero will be a real contributor!" Congratulations, your certificate is on the way.

The test works just as well with the following names: Colton Willems, Sean Black, Stephen Englund, Stephen King, Glenn Gibson, and Zechery Zinicola. Fifth round pick Cory Van Allen, however, is the perfect embodiment of the scholar/athlete and will be a contributor -- the question is not will he win a Cy Young Award, but how many will he win. How do I know? I just know.

Something I'd Hate

The changes in the broadcast teams this year have been for the better. I really like Dave Juggler Jagermei . . . the guy who replaced the guy who didn't say bang zoom. The new TV play-by-play guy is innocuous enough, and I started out pro-Tom Paciorek. But, as I've mentioned once or twice, I can't watch the Nationals, so small sample size caveats apply. The sample size got a little larger this last weekend when our unbelievably heated series with the Orioles merited extra TV time, and that was enough to turn me against Paciorek.

I don't think I ask for too much from my broadcasters. As long as you're not as big a loudmouth jackass as Rick Sutcliffe, I can pretty much ignore you. I can even tolerate Joe Morgan, as his awesome accent and awesomer suits make up for the nonsense he often forces Jon Miller to be polite about. Not everyone, I realize, can be Buck Martinez, and that's okay.

But Paciorek ventured into Ron Santo territory this weekend, and that's unforgivable. Cubs broadcaster Ron Santo holds two important distinctions: being maybe the best player not in the Hall of Fame and being maybe the worst broadcaster in the history of sports. Here's what Ron Santo says when something bad happens to the Cubs: "Nnh." Or "Oof." Or maybe "Augh." No analysis, just a pissed-off noise. It's completely unprofessional and the distillation of all the anti-intellectual homer tendencies that are always trying to ruin sports for me. You can probably see where I'm going with this, but here's a quick summary of Tom Paciorek's contributions to Friday night's broadcast.

• Corey Patterson triples. Paciorek: "Oh."
• Jeff Conine doubles. Paciorek: "Yrgh."
• Ryan Church flies out. Paciorek: "Blugh."

At least it's somewhat understandable when Santo does it. He has, after all, been a Cub in one form or another for about eighty years, and one can appreciate the kind of blow it is for the old guy when things don't go the Cubbies' way, as they never do. But Paciorek's been involved with the Nats for about three months, and it's hard to believe that them blowing a lead is the bowling ball to the gut kind of experience he makes it sound like.

In a more positive development, I noticed a while ago that they've started playing "Hail to the Chief" when Chad Cordero comes out. I think that's completely, 100% great, which surprises me. It seems like something I'd hate.

Well-Fed

So all of a sudden Ryan Church is in AA. No, I didn't forget an "A," he's actually a level below Brendan Harris and Brandon Watson. There are excuses for that, but I'm not going to bother to mention them. The end result is that Frank Robinson -- and bear in mind that there are still people who think he's a great manager, and that their analysis almost always includes the phrase "586 home runs" -- has at times gone to war with an outfield of Alfonso Soriano, Alex Escobar, and Daryle Ward. Two thirds of that outfield have been the subject of special "This Dude Can't Field" pieces by Barry Svrluga, and the other one can't even hack it as a first baseman. As I've said before, there's a fine line between bad managing and sabotage, and Frank crossed that river and kept running.

Church certainly has struggled, and I (big surprise coming) blame Frank. Remember Tomo Ohka, how he walked everyone? Remember when he got to Milwaukee and suddenly stopped walking everyone? And remember how Frank would yank him out of games after -- or while -- he walked someone? I think we're seeing the same thing with Church. Maybe it means Church is soft, or maybe it means Frank's bad at his job. Probably both.

In other depressing, I-can't-believe-I'm-a-fan-of-this-joke-of-a-team news, the Nats can't spend a (relatively) little bit of cash to do something about the bullpen.

If the Nationals were to release a player currently on the major league roster, they would be responsible for paying the player until or unless another franchise signed him. So though Bowden believes there are several players in the minors who are, as he put it, "knocking on the door," he can't simply release veterans because it would essentially be adding to the payroll.

I think this is just a ploy to get me to care about the new owners. So far my interest has been limited to watching various hack sportswriters bonk their heads together trying to cram those heads up Lerner and/or Kasten ass. George Solomon is winning, in case you were wondering.

Theodore N. Lerner radiates the dignity one expects of an 80-year-old billionaire who has lived and worked here his whole life . . .

You've noticed that, haven't you? People who have lived in DC their whole lives have a certain nobility of bearing. And anyone who has a billion dollars got it from God for being a good person.

But I'm just being negative. Unlike my main man Thomas Boswell, who accentuates the positive to the point of lunacy. Some horse we would have all forgotten about in a year anyway broke its leg the other day, and the fact that 1,000 pounds of walking Alpo's hospital stay is front page news is the only thing preventing Boswell from being the dumbest thing in the Post today.

We won our heated, hateful series against Balitmore, and I blame the 15,000 empty seats per game on worries about the brawls that are de rigeur whenever Baltimorean goes against Washingtonian Virginian. The Nats hadn't won a series before that since beating Pittsburgh back at the beginning of the month, but Boz doesn't care.

These days, the Nats are just beginning to imagine a decent season despite a horrid start. Livan Hernandez had his second back-to-form start in a row Sunday with seven innings. John Patterson is due back in a couple of weeks. Maybe things won't be so bad after all.

Yeah, it's not bad at all! Alex Escobar Damian Jackson could be the solution in center field, and that's assuming we needed one -- my theory is that all those dropped balls in the outfield have been lulling our enemies into a false sense of security. Joey Eischen is bound to turn it around and become the gritty, foul-mouthed stopper we need. And as for the starting rotation, there are five pitchers there -- just like the Yankees!

William Blake ran out of Proverbs of Hell that apply to Boz, so I made one up. I think it sounds pretty authentic.
The well-fed ass is ever full of dung.

Svrluga: "You're a Damn Liar, Boz"

Tom Boswell, stating the indefensible:

And [Alfonso Soriano] hasn't butchered even one simple play.

Tom Boswell, backing up so fast I think he hit a deer:

Soriano's throwing has improved. Far more important, he seems to care. And he hates it when he screws up. However, he's missed several balls that a smooth "average" left fielder would have caught. He's definitely below average.

Barry Svrluga, not being a homer idiot:

But there is no question Soriano is costing the Nationals runs. That he has four errors -- tied for most in the majors for an outfielder -- and an abysmal fielding percentage of .951 tells only part of the story. Six games into a nine-game trip that continues today in Chicago against the Cubs, Soriano's adventures in left have played out awkwardly.

Jose Guillen, not being a homer idiot:

"We have to accept he's not a normal outfielder," right fielder Jose Guillen said. "You see when he tries to charge a ball and misses some of those line drives."

An anonymous scout, not being a homer idiot:

"He's awful," said one scout who has worked three Nationals series this season. "He's not a left fielder."

Alfonso Soriano himself, informing Boz that he's full of crap:

Asked last weekend if he felt comfortable in left field, the answer was quick, sure, and to be expected. "No," he said.

I point all this out not to criticize Soriano, whose general effort and good humor make me think a lot more of him as a human being than I did in March, but to draw attention to Tom Boswell's distortions and lies, which I'm still pissed about. That thing he said about Soriano not botching plays was a lie. It was impossible to defend (as Boz proved a day later), impossible to talk around (as Svrluga proved today), and evidence that Boswell doesn't think much of the intelligence of his audence.

As this Baseball Think Factory thread helpfully points out, he's still doing it. Here's what Boz said today about Barry Bonds.

When Pierre robbed him of what would've been homer No. 714, Bonds waved his arm disparagingly, dismissively at Pierre as if his excellent play in a close game were disgusting, an affront. How dare you?

Thanks to the internet, we can check this for ourselves. Go here and click on "Pierre robs Bonds." Watch Bonds' smiling, playful reaction to Pierre's catch and marvel at what a lying son of a bitch Washington's premier sports columnist is.

I'm overreacting, and I know it. But I'm sick of Boswell talking down to his audience as if Nationals fans were a pack of rubes who'd never heard of this game and, thanks to our ignorance, need to be told what to think about it. I'm sick of him dismissing well-reasoned criticism of his opinions by saying "Blah blah blah." Mostly I'm sick of the endless fact-mangling with which he supports his arguments. Boswell is -- for some reason -- well-respected, and his opinion carries weight. We should expect at least basic honesty from him, but all we get is condescension and lies.

I'm Fighting This Assignment

What level of frustration are you at? The way to tell this is to recall your reaction when Chad Cordero gave up that completely predictable walk-off grand slam to Jeff Francoeur on Saturday. So was it head-slapping frustration? Saying "fuck" a lot frustration? Laughing maniacally like somone in a Twilight Zone episode frustration? Me, I ain't frustrated at all. It's been a couple of weeks since I've laid eyes on a National, so as far as I'm concerned they barely exist. They're the thing on the radio breaking up the most annoying commercials in radio history (which is worse, the #1 Nationals fan groceries or the old guys singing "Take Me Out to the Ballgame"?). Sometimes I see something about them in one of the poorly-edited free newspapers I read in the morning when I don't have a book. So that makes my favorite baseball team essentially a cross between Elliott in the Morning and Nepal.

I missed the weekly Nats game I'm allotted because on Friday I went down to the rock and roll show. So I present:

The Distinguished Senators Concert Review
Pinback at the Black Cat - May 12, 2006

Pinback was very good, and all the Pinbacks did their best. They were totally Pinbacking. Pinning it back and letting it fly. Not even the fact that one of them (I call him Pinback #1) looked more and more like Jack Black as the show went on could ruin my enjoyment. To learn more about Pinback, check out their Myspace page and listen to "Penelope," which was the highlight of the show.

There was, regrettably, an opening act. If you've ever wondered what "Weird Al" Yankovic would sound like if he had less talent and more profanity, investigate Pleaseeasaur. Otherwise, don't.

A Simple Play

Remember the episode of Charles in Charge (actually, I think it was a two-parter) where Charles got hit on the head and became Chaz, a leather jacket-wearing, floozy-humping bad-ass? Then he got hit on the head again and reverted to his earlier, more virtuous persona? That's kind of what happened to me. Here I was, cruising along, bringing content on the regular, when I made the mistake of reading one of Tom Boswell's email columns. It's disappeared from the internets, but maybe you remember it. Among other things, Boz posited that Gary Majewski's game-losing error against the Mets on May 1 wouldn't have happened if the Nats had an owner. It was a great example of projection: Boz is real upset about the ownership situation, so naturally all the guys whose posters adorn his bedroom walls are too.

Driven mad by the madness of the idea, I spent a week just sort of staggering around, gasping and trying to figure out a reason to go on living. Some things are too weird for the feeble mind of man, and this was one of them. How ironic that my salvation would be another Boswell column, this one even more gnarled and wicked than the first. Reading that twisted mess of nonsense acted like a frying pan on my muddled head, returning me to my accustomed angry state.

I'm not Christopher Hitchens and Boz isn't Mother Teresa, so there's no way I can do a better job taking this apart than already Harper did, and I demand that you read his account of Boswell's pennant-waving distortions. There is, however, one particularly low-hanging fruit I want to rant about.

Boz loves Alfonso Soriano, and that's fine. It's obvious that he loves Soriano solely because he's a Nat, but who am I to judge? And even I have to admit that there's a lot to like about the guy. His power, his speed, his hot start, his striking cheekbones, and his surprising (to me, at least) effort and good attitude about his new position. But that's not good enough for Boswell, so he stoops to lying outright.

In left field, he has only one error but five assists, a ratio that many thought would be exactly the opposite. He's misjudged a few difficult fly balls and looked awkward, but has also outrun the ball for a few fine catches. And he hasn't butchered even one simple play. [emphasis mine]

I haven't seen much of the Nationals, but I know that isn't true. I'm also a blogger, so I'm disinclined to do a lot of research. So I used my favorite research substitute, the wisdom of Google. This statement, "And he hasn't butchered even one simple play," is the most dishonest argument I've ever seen Boswell use. I hesitate even to call it dishonest, since it's so obviously wrong that it couldn't deceive anyone who's even vaguely paying attention. Boswell is beyond mere distortion at this point; he's lying. And that bothers me, because he'll never be called on it in any meaningful way. Sure, the blogs will complain, but he'll never see it. He'll get some snarky questions in his chat tomorrow, but he'll either ignore them or toss off an equally snarky and entirely inadequate response.

For all the idealistic talk about the free exchange of ideas and whatnot on the internet, it doesn't work out all that well in real life, unless misspelled personal threats count as "ideas." But there is something to be said about the instant feedback available to bloggers and message board posters -- it keeps you on your toes. You have to be ready to defend yourself, and that means (one would hope) that you put just a little extra effort into not babbling like a concussed halfwit. Boswell, tenured and well-respected hack that he is, is cozily insulated from this kind of feedback. Which is probably a good thing, because no one wants to pick on an old man, and that silly homer wouldn't last a week blogging.

Hey, Look

I been busy, alright?

Hijinks, Tycoons

Here's something I just thought of: I can't watch the Nationals. They're not on TV. I don't know if you heard anything about this, but it's true. Channel 20 is some nonsense with Tyra Banks. Channel 10 is some kind of basketball exhibition. Channel 3 is showing the sitcom hijinks of Bernie the Entertainer or Cedric the Mac or someone. The Nats, according to the Internet, just came back from a five run deficit, and I can't watch it. With the result that I don't care.

We've got some owners, but I can't watch the Nats so I don't care. I'm finding it hard to take personal joy from some millionaires who wouldn't hire someone to piss on me if I were on fire paying millions to some other millionaires for the right to pay the salaries of a bunch of millionaires who happen to wear a W on their heads when they play baseball. And seriously, I don't have anything against millionaires. I ain't a commie. But when I can't watch the Nats, I honestly don't give a damn who's signing the checks. And when I'm selling plasma and any other fluid anyone's interested in buying to pay for my home, away, alternate, spring training, and 2001 Giants Livan Hernandez jerseys, I don't find myself rooting for the real estate tycoons who are supposed to fix everything.

You may have noticed a lack of posting here lately. Guess why. That's right, I can't watch the goddamn Nationals. I notice, thanks to the Internet, that Jason Bergmann pitched well over one inning for the Nats tonight. Who's Jason Bergmann? Beats the hell out of me. I can't watch the Nationals, so I couldn't pick the dude out of a lineup.

Pretty soon, either the Nationals or the team they're playing (Padres, maybe? I dunno) is going to win the game. As for me, I'm going to bed. I'd stay up if there were anything good on TV, but . . . you know.

Time To Play B-Sides

I ran out of bloggin' time, but I would be remiss if I didn't point out that ¡Livan! is back, pendejos! He's still not going to win any games because he's on the Nationals, but he's going to lead the league in moral victories. And actual losses.

New Baseball Bias column! (At some undefined point later in the morning.) Will a buyer of unknown origin fix what's wrong with the Nats? Click on the Blue Oyster Cult album cover to find out how many words I waste saying no!

Imagine Jim Mora Saying "Sidney Ponson" Over and Over

New Baseball Bias. I need to put a Moratorium on the Latin puns. Ha ha ha!

Sidney Ponson? Sidney Ponson? Look, I know this is a bad team. I can handle getting beaten twice by some no-name Mets rookie. I can handle dropping one to a no-name Reds rookie. But Sidney Ponson isn't just a bad pitcher, he's a punchline. The guy who got so fat and so drunk they kicked him off the Orioles just beat us without a whole lot of trouble. Pity young "Irish" Mike O'Connor -- he may not have pitched well by normal standards, but going five innings practically makes him our Cy Young. He was let down by our defense and hitting, while Ponson, that gelatinous judge-punching pantload, goes to 3-0. Look at him taunting us.

And then there's this:

"We're just in a pitching nightmare," General Manager Jim Bowden said before the game. "We need a [fill-in] starter for [Thursday]. We need a starter for Sunday. Our ERA's over 5. We can talk about all the problems of this team; you have to pitch."

What Bowden's greater virtue, his incompetence or his shamelessness?

This Time Blake Took the Day Off

Well, MLB is denying reports that the unbelievable nightmare of the Expos/Nationals franchise is finally over, and ain't that just like them? I mean, I know who's getting the team, you know who's getting the team, and we're supposed to pretend Bud Selig doesn't? But anything to prolong the pain. Something we need to watch out for, I think, is going soft after the Lerners finally do get the team. I'm planning to go out of my way to remind Selig, DuPuy, et al. that they can all go straight to Hell on the day of the announcement.

Hey, we got swept by the Reds! The Reds have actually been really good, so that's something. Hell, it might be less humiliating than losing one game to Florida. The Cards are next, and that ain't exactly something to look forward to.

Soon we'll be able to rate Nats seasons by how far into the summer it is before we run out of pitching. Last year, it didn't happen until September, but we're not wasting that kind of time in the '06. Some guy named Michael O'Connor is starting for us on Thursday, and neither I nor any deceased poet of my acquaintance has any idea who that is.

I do know who Zach Day is, though, and you may remember him as well. Well, he's back. Staying true to his "pitching, pitching, pitching" philosophy, Bowden picked him up off waivers for the Rockies. Sure, he's probably injured and the Rockies didn't want him and Frank Robinson never could stand the sight of him, but he does sometimes do a thing that could charitably described as pitching.

Speaking of which philosophy, read this and remember why you love Yard Work.

? . . . !

9 News has learned Major League Baseball has selected the new owners of the Washington Nationals. 9 Sports Director Brett Haber has confirmed that the Lerner Group will be named in a news conference that could come as soon as Friday.

I'm Not Sure This One's Canonical

Today's Proverb of Hell:
Uh-oh. Dude, that totally sucks. Go ahead and take the night off.

Thanks, William. I think I will.

Tygers

So, we just lost to the frigging Reds, and the only consolation is that one of my blogging compatriots is happy. That ain't much consolation. I'd say that Livan is literally breaking my heart, but the tests aren't back, so I'd better settle for the figurative sense.

It's time for yet another Nationals mailbag with MLB.com's Bill Ladson. Go read it and tell me what you think. I know it's hard to tell with me, but from here on I'm being completely not sarcastic: that was awesome. It appears that Ladson has developed a new, in-your-face style, and I'm all for it. The typical "some in the organization think blah blah blah" bits have been replaced by Ladson kicking some ass. There's no one leadery enough to yell at Guillen! The Nats need to stop whining about their schedule, the pantywaists! Michael Hinckley is batshit crazy! Ohka sucks!

I'm completely serious when I say that Ladson needs to keep this up. Sure, I think he's wrong about everything, but I always think he's wrong about everything, and at least he was spitting fire this time. I know my man William Blake has used this one before, but it's crazy applicable:
The tygers of wrath are wiser than the horses of instruction.

Blake ain't lying. Remember that, Ladson.

1,000!

There'll be a brand new Baseball Bias column around 9 am. What unpleasant soft drink is endorsed by Miguel Cabrera? Click on Malta Goya to find out!

Ken Rosenthal of Fox Sports is noting Frank Robinson's 1,000th win in a way I find completely rad.

Two scouts who followed the Nationals in recent weeks were appalled by the team's lax approach in pre-game preparation. "I covered them all spring," one scout says. "They've been dead-ass. They work dead-ass. And they carry it into the game defensively."

Manager Frank Robinson deserves credit for keeping the team competitive during Major League Baseball's ownership, but it's possible that his strained relationships with team president Tony Tavares and general manager Jim Bowden finally have worn him down.

"They work dead-ass" -- I love that! Anyway, I don't generally listen to pissed-off anonymous scouts, but this one -- let's call him Scouty McScoutingscout -- reinforces some non-anonymous criticism we've heard of Frank. Remember this gem?
Too many times, we didn't take batting practice. If you look at our record on Sundays, it's indicative of our success. I just don't think we prepare as well.

We are giving up hits in circumstances where our infielders should have been at a different position or our outfielders should have been at a different position. Our preparation is not there right now.

And while we're at it, let's take a stroll down memory lane with some dudes who have blogs. Needham!

What exactly is Frank's job? He's a wretched in-game decision maker (other than with the bullpen, for the most part), and he's definitely not a conflict resolver with his players. What are his strengths? And how do we know what they are -- other than our projections that he's done something vague like 'set a tone'?

Harper!

I don’t care what anyone says. I believe the team wins despite Frank, not because of him. I believe that calling out players in the press and trading players who have minor outbursts is dangerous. I believe that his heavy reliance on veteran players has stifled the growth of some of the younger players on the team.

This idiot!

He slept through the Expos' last season in Montreal and is on his best behavior in Washington because he knows cameras are on him. He sees this job as a sinecure to subsidize his golf habit. The bottom line is that Frank Robinson doesn't care about this team as much as you do.

Whenever Frank gets himself in some wacky scrape -- insulting his players, making out inexplicable lineups, getting a job with Ethel at the candy factory -- it's chalked up to his being too old-school, too gritty for today's players. It becomes a moral thing, another reason to hate these damned spoiled millionaires. They don't deserve a hard-assed taskmaster like Frank. But we're learning from people who know that Frank is anything but too intense for his players. He's not gritty and old-school; he's lazy and cranky.

The Wisest Witness

Remember this day, O Nats fans, as the first time we won a series from a team that can actually be considered a real major league team. I wouldn't be bothering to mention it, but I got some advice from my old frat brother Pindar.
Great deeds give choice of many tales. Choose a slight tale, enrich it large, and then let wise men listen.

That sounds like something Boz would do, so maybe he's been listening to Pindar too. So, let's see . . . enrich it large . . .

• Nick Johnson is the MVP. He only has half as many homers as Albert Pujols, but RFK is -- according to Science -- three times as hard to hit in as Busch. So actually he has five more homers than Pujols, and I bet you feel pretty dumb for even bringing it up.
• You internet types are always on about how Frank's no good. Well he just won his 1,000th game. Everyone on the internet loves Bill James, but how many games did he win? I'm not sure, but I bet it's less than 1,000.
• If the Mets did not exist, the Nationals would be good. Assuming that Pedro Martinez would cease to exist along with the Mets.
  
• Alfonso Soriano is the greatest player in Washington Nationals history, and I'm including Walter Johnson.
• Ryan Zimmerman would be Rookie of the Year if not for Jose Vidro. Yes, I know Vidro isn't technically a rookie, but look at him -- he's a whole new player! He's spiritually a rookie, and that's good enough for me.
• Royce Clayton is hitting .211. I don't know how to look it up, but I'm pretty sure that's over 200 points better than Cristian Guzman last year. Bodes, you've done it again!
• Billy Traber? More like Billy Awesome!
• Brian Schneider is hitting .216, over 200 points better than Cristian Guzman last year.
• Pass the collection plate -- this Church is on fire, and this time it's not Norwegian death metal hijinks! He's hitting well, basically, is what I'm trying to get across here.

Next up is the Braves. Can the Nats keep up their red-hot winning-every-other-game pace? What do you say, Pindar?
The days that are still to come are the wisest witnesses.

Sounds like a yes!

You're Right, Ryan - Livan Does Rule

I got nothing today. But I tell you who did have something was my main man Livan, who went 3 for 4 with a homer and two doubles. I'm sure you're aware of this, but he's a pitcher. And sure, maybe his pitching wasn't so hot, but some of that was Joey Eischen's fault, and the rest of it you can cram up your ass because Livan rules.

Serious Stuff

So, Jim Bowden got busted for DUI. I'm not going to make any jokes about this. I can't tell you what my line is, but this is on the other side of it. That's not to say I'm not laughing at the jokes of others or even making my own in other outlets; I'm just not comfortable piling on the guy here.

Bowden should be fired, but this shouldn't even factor into it.

In happier news, we've just about got our owner(s).

Atlanta sports executive Stan Kasten has joined the family of Theodore "Ted" Lerner in a bid to purchase the Washington Nationals, sources said, boosting the Lerners' chances in what baseball insiders believe is a three-way race to buy the team for $450 million.

So let's all welcome Theostan Lernaster.

This is an issue I've said nothing about, and there's a good reason. I don't know anything about these guys. If there's one area in which my knowledge is lacking, it's millionaires. How the hell do I know who's going to be a good owner? I was against Jeff Smulyan, and that was owing entirely to the fact that he was the only candidate who had actually failed at owning a team. That's enough for me. But people who know or pretend to know more than I do say this is good news, so go ahead and listen to them. I'm unconvinced that a new owner is going to be able or willing to fix much immediately, but anything that makes the Nats look a little more like a real franchise is nice.

One Right Answer

Nothing lamer than an off day. Let's see . . . MLB.com's Bill Ladson has "no doubts that getting Soriano was a great move" -- it's "the steal of 2006," in fact. But there's also "no doubt" in his "mind" that Terrmel "Sledge is going" at some point "to be" what you would call "a star." It's like when you're talking to someone who makes a lot of sense until he starts talking about how Freemasons faked the moon landings.

Harper made an interesting point about Ryan Church vs. Brandon Watson.

Ryan, in three games, has already passed Brandon Watson in extra-base hits, stolen bases, walks, and runs scored.

Ouch. Note how unlike, say, Tom Boswell, Harper is consistent in his opinions. He didn't tell us Watson was a "promising young Nat" until the day he was gone, at which time he started trashing him.

Will Carroll has been mercifully mostly silent, although he seems to have abandoned his idealistic idea of internet types getting press passes. Well, amateur internet types. Online writers are just as good as anyone else, but only as long as they're getting paid.

One final thought on this -- if you're asking for credentials, go to the mirror and ask yourself "What do you do for a living?" If you really want the credential, there's only one right answer.

Why this sudden elitism? Because bloggers are mean to him.

Bloggers eat their own with regularity, so I have long since stopped trying to get an IBWA going.

What Carroll fails to realize -- and can't be expected to realize -- is that Will Carroll spearheading an Internet Baseball Writers' Association is like Kevin Federline teaching a graduate-level course on how to bust hot rhymes. Did you like that one? I had Scott Long write that joke for me. He's always ready with the edgy celebrity humor.

Past a Diving Harris?

Baseball Bias column! But not until 10 am. Are the Nats loveable losers or just losers? Click on the French Army to find out!

It was a good weekend for my sacred cows. Brendan Harris actually got a start on Saturday and wound up saving the game with a great catch -- a walk-off Web Gem, as Buster Olney called it. Sunday saw la vaca sagrada numero uno, Ryan Church, justify his presence by hitting two home runs -- he's third on the team!

Still, I can't take too much joy in finally winning a series. It's going to take a miracle for the Marlins not to be the worst team in the league, and Saturday's win was fraught with bad signs. Leaving aside John Patterson's brilliant, 13 strikeout performance, the Nats played like crap. Facing a 22-year-old pitcher with 20 innings of major league experience, the Nats could muster only two runs despite being spotted six walks by Scott Olsen and four more by the parade of AAAA-types issuing from the Florida bullpen. 10 walks and only 2 runs? It's easy when you manage only five hits and run into four outs on the bases. A pickoff, two failed steal attempts, and an out at the plate -- that's Nationals baseball. Make it your pastime!

So let's not break out the Martinelli's just yet. After an off day, we head to Philly to play a real team. 13 games in, and we've had exactly one (1) good starting pitching performance. Ryan Drese might be out for the duration, though the advantage of the end of our rotation is that you don't lose much when you lose one. Chad Cordero's save on Sunday was really his first good performance, and it remains to be seen how much he'll regress from 2005.

The good news: Frank actually said he'd try Brendan Harris at shortstop, and Royce Clayton -- yes, the Royce Clayton -- left Sunday's game with a left arm injury. So that's something I'm looking forward to, though Nationals pitchers probably don't share my enthusiasm. ¡Arriba las vacas!