I Thought it Was Lidocaine!

Thought I'd take a break from laughing at Roger Clemens and senselessly Googling for "Omar Minaya and Expos" images to alert you all of the latest news. Some college in middle America has produced a list of tired phrases and overused words that they say need to be taken out of circulation, such as "surge" and the like.

As for sports:
...announcers were urged to drop "throw under the bus" when assigning blame to a player. "It is a call for the media to start issuing a thesaurus to everyone in front of a camera," a contributor said.

I personally don't see any need to retire "throw under the bus." It is a colorful metaphor that best captures the blame and betrayal of sports in certain situations. However there are other more noxious phrases.

My nominee?

"bandbox"

We all know that there are now stats to adjust the measurement of a player's performance to control for the dimensions and characteristics of the park; smaller parks will make fly balls into homeruns, etc. That is the impetus, I would argue, behind the popularity of this phrase. There were days when this viral plague seemed to be in every other posting or chat. It drives me crazy. The Phillies, indeed, do play in a "bandbox," but if the implication was that their players were actually not performing as well as their statistics reported because they were "park-aided" well, I submit to you that they performed plenty well. Let's never speak of this again.

Anyone have some others?


***
Look who's talking

Carlos Delgado has started to talk to the media, but not about what I want to know.

NEW YORK - Mets first baseman Carlos Delgado said his fractured left hand has healed and he will begin swinging the bat next week.
"It's back to where it was before the injury,'' said Delgado this afternoon in a conference call from Puerto Rico. "I will be coming to spring training in good shape.''

Delgado sustained the injury when hit by a pitch in the season finale.

First of all, this injury had nothing to do with his performance last year. Second, I am less than enthused to hear that it is "back to where it was before the injury"--not good enough. Thirdly, I want to hear if he and his wife have hired a nanny for that baby that apparently knocked Carlos off his grove. And whatever happened to Carlos' pitcher diary?

I've said this 100 times: Delgado may be most definitely is the key to next season. If he is as done as he looked last year, we're in deep trouble. At least he's talking now.

***
According to the New York Times:

Roger Clemens said in an interview for '60 Minutes' that the accusation that he ever used banned substances is 'ridiculous.' Wallace asked, 'Swear?' Clemens said, 'Swear.'

Really? But why didn't Mike Wallace go that extra step of professional journalism and make Clemens double-dog swear? I mean, that's when I'd be really convinced. My initial reaction to Clemens' obvious strategy of winnowing it down to a he-said, he-said senario with plausible deniability is how easy it is to get caught doing something in the current media climate. Lindsay Lohan steps on a dance floor on New Years Eve with a bottle of booze and I know about it. But also how easy it is to lie and stonewall about doing something to a population conditioned by the Clinton and Bush years. We just kind of expect it.