Minutiae

Ever since Larry Brown left town (Philly, that is...he's since grown accustomed to short-term jobs), fans have wondered if their beloved Sixers could win a championship with Allen Iverson. As the team continued to slip further and further into the basement of the league, the wondering has turned into an oft-repeated clamoring for GM Billy King's head if he doesn't get rid of Iverson by such and such a date. As King failed time and time again to pull a trigger on a deal that would send Iverson packing, the ire of the fans died down because if the team can't win, they might as well enjoy watching one of the greatest players of our generation, if not all time, do his thing in their back yard. This offseason, it once again seems "certain" that AI will be traded, quite possibly to the archrival Celtics, and once again fans are pretending like it's what they've wanted all along. That sentiment was echoed in the local media yesterday, when David Aldridge spun his own version of the Declaration of Independence, with the Sixers playing the role of the revolutionary colonies and Iverson as the stifling mother country.

( Why I'll be reluctant to toss my #3 jersey aside... )

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me 42 times? Shame on you again. I used to write about baseball more often, enough that I was once invited to hang out with some of the Phillies bloggers at Tony Luke's to watch some playoff baseball (not the Phils, mind you). I've since stopped writing about the Phillies, in part because I realized that there are many more talented Phloggers out there than I (each of those words is a separate link), but mostly because it's so damn hard to care about the Phillies anymore.

The hometown nine have played 77 games so far, and I can pretty much guarantee you that I haven't accumulated 77 innings of watched baseball yet. It's not that I don't care about the Phillies - I'm from Philadelphia, how could I not - it's that they haven't made it very easy to pay attention to them. With promising young talent in Chase Utley, Ryan Howard, and Cole Hamel (pictured) and at least one guy who plays the "right way" in Aaron Rowand, they could easily be a fun team to follow. Yet somehow, every time I flip the channel to Comcast Sportsnet on a game night, I see them down by four-plus runs.

( Root, root, root for the home team. If they don't win...I'm not surprised )

Kind of wishing I had something interesting to say today, about the season finale of LOST (summary of last two minutes: huh?) or the results in the American Idol finale (Soul Patrol, rock on with your hokey self). But, before I get too meta on y'all, I'll do what all bloggers do when they don't have anything interesting to say but want to keep a regular once-a-day, Monday through Friday schedule going: I'll link to something.

I just came across this today, a fact that, considering I used to go to the site daily before I realized its once-a-week schedule, is rather surprising. With Barry Bonds on the cusp of surpassing the Great Bambino, everyone's pretty much sick of hearing about him, and yet I couldn't help but read this article on Tomato Nation. Sars does a wonderful job of explaining why we'll never accept Barry right now but, thirty years down the road, we'll look at him like just another Ty Cobb. It's worth a read.

3:30 Update - officially changed the title of this post to "Linkology" now that there's going to be a link that has nothing to do with Mr. Bonds. Follow this link to AOL's in2TV, where you can karaoke your favorite cheesy TV themes. My personal favorite? Perfect Strangers, of course. And you can watch a full episode after the song plays, as long as you have the right combination of digital rights management, the latest version of Windows Media Player, don't try it in Firefox...it's nigh impossible to get everything you need to view the episode, but damn is it worth it.

3:31 Update - GET OUT OF THIS CITY! It looks like there's several episodes available for your viewing. I know how I'm spending the better part of my evening. I'm so happy, I do the dance of joy!

Thanks to the generosity of one Tom Durso, I spent last evening in the friendly (albeit cold and rainy) confines of Citizen's Bank Park, watching the hometown nine face off with the Colorado Rockies, whom they took two of three from in Denver not too long ago. Also at the game were Tom Goyne and faithful Phlogger commentator Mike Noonan. You see, I used to be, at least in part, a Phlogger. I would come up with a Phillies post every now and again. I decided before I moved back here to LiveJournal to stop the charade; I wasn't the stathead that these guys are, and didn't really care passionately enough about the Phils to dedicate myself to writing about them. Besides, I could write much more intelligently on movies and music.

Last night, that decision proved a smart one. As Mike, the two Toms and I relaxed in the outfield, enjoying our beers, I listened to their discourse on Cole Hamels, on-base percentage, and so on, I felt like the four-year-old sitting in his seat, waiting for the Phanatic to show up and munching on some cotton candy (or, as the case would be later in the night, some Graham Slam ice cream). Indeed, I'm not the seasoned stat nerd that the Phloggers are, and I never will be, because while I love watching baseball and I love my Phils, I'm not that enchanted by stats like ERA+.

That said, even I could offer opinions on why the Phillies lost last night, and will lose quite a few more games this year. Before the Phils even took their turn at bat, the Rockies had pounced all over them to the tune of a 3-0 lead. Starter Gavin Floyd made it all of 3 2/3 innings before getting yanked after giving up six total runs. The Phillies bullpen did their part to keep the Rockies off the base paths thereafter, allowing only one more run, but the Phillies bats couldn't keep up. It's always something with this team; if the bats were awake, somehow the bullpen would have blown it. But it was offense that killed our boys last night. It's not that the Phillies' bats are weak - Ryan Howard's mammoth blast a few nights ago should be enough evidence for that - it's that they're dumb. If this were a team of Little Leaguers and I was their coach, I'd put a moratorium on swinging at the first pitch of any at-bat. Sure, it would come back to haunt you every so often, but eventually you'd hope these guys would learn to be more patient at the plate.

There's too many problems with this team. Charlie Manuel did a great job shuffling the lineup to get some runs produced, but the 2006 Phillies are like a boat sinking in an old Looney Tunes bit: as soon as you put your finger in one plug, three more seem to open.

The polls on ESPN.com are usually predictable; the "who is the best team in the NFC right now" polls will inevitably be broken down by region, especially now that you can see on a map how the red and blue states are dividing themselves along sporting lines. I usually start to write a post about a particularly ridiculous poll but wind up erasing it for no good reason. But this poll, and the results, just cracked me up.