All Star Notes and other Random Rhetorical Questions and Answers

Is there such a thing as a rhetorical answer? There should be. It's an answer that you don't question. Or something.

Is the All-Star game a big waste of time? Is Hunter Pence a mouthbreather?

"Putz" is not pronounced "puts." Reminds me of the Upright Citizens Brigade sketch where Officer Lunatic insists on being called Loo-NA-tick.

Game Highlight, from a production standpoint: the always family-friendly Fux Network miking the Leyland and Froemming cursing...

I hate Jorge Posada. He can hit, but the guy can't catch.

I actually feel myself getting a little pissed about the national league futility joe buck (you) keeps talking about.

Is the "this time it matters" World Series home field advantage rule a ridiculous slight to baseball lovers everywhere? Is Bruce Froemming a massive butterball?

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Was it only a matter of time before Countrytime lemon opened his yapper? Leave it to the Post to drudge up some controversy:

"I think speaking only as if I was the manager - not Willie - he wouldn't play," Wagner said before last night's 5-3, 17-inning victory over Houston. "He wouldn't play the next two games - no matter how bad we need him.
"Because you're trying to build a leader, not try to build just a good ballplayer. You want leadership out there. You want a guy out there that people look at and respect because he's playing 100 percent every game.
"Nobody's going to respect him if he only shows up on certain games."
...
"I love Jose to death," Wagner said. "He's a great ballplayer. But the way I was raised is you hit the ball, you run like hell. The umpires will tell you if it's fair or foul.
"When you have that type of talent and you start to play that way, you become a prima donna. And when you're a prima donna, it's not fun to be around you."

Countrytime then went on to singlehandedly give the Mets possible World Series opponent home field advantage.

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Sadly Alomar Jr. has joined the "Calvade of Alomars" at Shea. The Alomar family is an unusual family for the Mets to be celebrating. I'm just saying.

Top Ten things that would happen to you if you sucked as bad as Dave Williams did the other day: you'd miss your plane, lose your wife, lose your pickup truck to the bank, contract an STD from a latex sex doll, lose the lottery, your cow would die, stub your toe, sign Roberto Alomar, oh I can't go on.

Things them Mets is sayin', or at least things reporters is sayin' that Mets is sayin'

Metsblog's D.J. Short talks to John Delcos, who drops this nugget:

Q: How much is the chase for 300 wins weighing on Tom Glavine's mind?

A: Glavine didn't get to where he is by letting things bother him. He's more frustrated by a lack of support than anything.

Whaaa??? Glavine is worried more about This is heresay, but still, if true is another reason to throw on the pile of reasons I will never truly accept Glavine as a Met, even if I sometimes say I do.

While my eyes were glazing over listening to the platitudes of Joe (suck and) Buck and Tim(MY!) Mc Carver (Tim we know its the AT&T ballpark, but thanks for constantly reminding us), I turned my attention to a miraculous little roundup-style article in the NY Times.

The print version of the article has the word in parenthesis and bold. The internet version has apparently been corrected, though there are similar phrases in today's NYT sports section.

With 30 home runs, 86 runs batted in and a .317 average, Rodriguez is having a superb season. Although he will [UNDOUBTEDLY] likely opt out of the three years and $81 million left on his contract to become a free agent, he spoke fondly of New York.

Ok first of all, I did not know that Slappy would LIKELY/UNDOUBTEDLY opt out of his contract, but I don't always follow these things. I know that his wife wears offensive t-shirts.

But....here is the paragraph that really caught my attention:

IN PRAISE OF BELTRÁN

Barry Bonds paid Carlos Beltrán, the center fielder for the Mets, a huge compliment.

“I just walked past Carlos Beltrán and he said, ‘I just want to be like you,’ ” Bonds said. “I said, ‘You’re already better than me.’ His talent is already better than me.”

No no no no no. First of all, that sounds to me like Barry Bonds is paying Barry Bonds a huge compliment. And BY ALL THAT IS MOOKIE Nooooooo! Carlos Beltran wants to be like this sad tragedy of a man, soon to be indicted, reviled coast to coast, who disrespects the game and the fans despite a royal baseball lineage? That is not good news.