October Gonzo...the MLB's latest crock of shit!

I know people want to continue to discuss the hotstove, but I need to take a moment to address a matter of grave importance. I suppose should be thankful for not having to suffer through Joe Buck's annual October prattle in the first round of playoffs. But I'm not. Why?

There is no debate over how fucking pathetic the MLB's new ad campaign, featuring a skeezy looking, White Sox cap wearing, guy with a laptop and strange accent who they call "October Gonzo, the best blogger in the world." It is as pleasant as this.

The debate is really about whether this is more insulting than last year's insultathon, featuring one of the most hated public figures of our time, Dane Cook. I think it is. We are supposed to believe that with all the loot it gets from us fans, MLB can't get anyone with a shred of creditably to hock the playoffs to casual fans or people not clear on the broadcast schedule? David Blane? George W. Bush? Rob Schneider? (oops they've got that one covered).



Last year, the geniuses at MLB strained credulity by offering up Alyssa Milano as a baseball blogger. Although she never responded to attempts to offer her my warm embrace of blogger creditability (or rips on her clothing line), it turns out Milano knows some baseball, and she is actually a Dodger fan (Alyssa if you're reading...call me!).

But it seems that I am the only one offended by this latest transgression. Buzz Bisinger got even some of the interwebs' most self-possessed and ironic denizens of mom's basement up in arms, storming to the barricades to defend blogging's honor against crusty old sports hacks with names like "Buzz," "Murray" or "Red." But no one is pissed about this?

There is only one October, you greedy motherfuckers. And everytime you let Faux Network broadcast it, another true fan dies a little bit inside. Oh and by the way, MLB Hall of Fame, fuck you too.

Check out October Gonzo's info, bro's.

About October Gonzo

This is the time of the season when it all starts for me. The race to October. Sure, I have my own home team but I’m really thinking about who’s going to make the amazing plays, the runs, the hits to get into October. Who will break out? Who will have a career season? Will a dark horse crash the party? That’s what it’s all about for me.
Interests:
Baseball, October

October Gonzo, everybody!

They didn't even assign the ghostwriting of this stupid ad to a teenage intern, or some pimply Hofstra undergrad. No, they just handed the job to a robot, albeit one primed with the concepts of "keyboard" "crazy," and "blogging" to give its output that authentic feeling:

If you told me in April that CC Sabathia would be leading Milwaukee's rotation on a serious Postseason run, I would have flat-out spilled coffee all over my keyboard in a fit of laughter. But, again, here's CC, dealing for the Brew Crew when it counts the most.

And that's the point. As the calendar inches ever closer to October, you gotta get ready for crazy, because once the Postseason starts, it just gets crazier.

Wow. What else can you say? There was so much going on that you could write a whole blog about this game alone. This series just got a lot more interesting, too.

Almost too much to blog about, but I want to hear your thoughts. What was the best moment of the first day of October baseball in 2008?


Corporate America hasn't had this persuasive a spokesman since penis faced Joe Camel. I was a little gratified to find "Gonzo's" latest entry had no comments when I checked, though plenty of jackasses have left comments trying to engage a fake electronic diariest in baseball chat. But the bigger issue is, what does this tell us about Major League Baseball's assessment of its customers, or blogging?

Now, I don't have the high opinion of bloggyness that many of my comrades do. My attitude is that blogs are like assholes. Everyone's got one. But I am perpetually disgusted by Bud Selig's insulting attitude towards fans--"pay for a new 6 screen MLB.tv even though the old single game version doesn't work" or "cancel your cable and go out and get a dish because we're yanking Extra innings off cable."

Maybe MLB is just going with the flow. "Insulting the public's intelligence" is shaping up to be the new post-Bush Madison Ave. strategy. No one charged with bilking America's consumers could fail to grasp the message of the 2004 General Election. This is a dumb fucking country. So here we go...McBain is a maverick, Palin is a reformer from the heartland. They're just like you and me.

Just like Gonzo!

Here's the point: it's one thing to sell laser-shooting robots, paeans to pointless violence, and exploding graphics to football fans. That's America's least common denominator and football fans have no interest in being respected on an intellectual level. But MLB's attitude towards baseball fans is the equivalent of slapping Mom's face before shitting in her apple pie. Basically, instead of respecting us for the knowledgeable, relatively non-violent sports fans we are, the MLB thinks baseball fans are asshats like Bud Selig or Joe Buck. They think because we'll pay anything, listen to any broadcaster, and suffer any indignities to support America's past time. To them, we are stooges and dopes.


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If you've finally been sleeping soundly or lost yourself in some other hobby, get a load of this Met-terror, courtesy of Newsweek's Ken Davidoff:

On the Mets' side, meanwhile, the front office would like to bring back everyone besides bullpen coach Guy Conti, who will probably be reassigned to the front office as the Mets cut ties with Pedro Martinez. It's just a matter of Jerry Manuel, now the full-time manager, signing off on bench coach Sandy Alomar, pitching coach Dan Warthen, first-base coach Ken Oberkfell and third-base coach Luis Augayo.

All this is tucked in an article claiming that the bad economy will lead CC Sabathia right into the Yankers arms...which is nothing compared to the last 5 words.

It's a travesty if the Mets put that guy back in a position to do significant damage. This is a team that missed the playoffs by a mere game or so two years in a row; they can't afford to have guys thrown out at home so often.

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A spirited defense of Manny Ramirez. Or, I guess its really more of an attack on Tim McCarver. I'd still rather have Manny “refusing to play” in rightfield, than some mash up of out-of-position rookies "refusing to not play."

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Also wearing a White Sox hat...

I wonder what Brian Bannister is doing right now. I bet Omar does too. As for the guy Omar traded for Bannister, well, the Amburgler is behind bars. And not for driving an environmentally unfriendly Hummer. Burgos was involved in a hit and run that killed two women, including one woman surnamed Minaya. Who knows what really happened down there in the Dominican? But this international pile up of crimes does not look to good for Ambiorix Burgos, and I have been urged by some of my most ardent fans to bring this up. Apparently, Burgos likes to run people down in his car. He also is approaching Marlin levels of depravity, assaulting women as though he were a Philadelphia Phillie. He seems to be trying to pin the Dominican incident on his cousin. And apparently, through all this, his conscience is clear:

“I am going to come out of this fine because my conscience is clear, and I’m not worried this will affect my career because I haven’t done anything … I’ll get out of here soon ,and I’ll also clear up what happened in New York.”

Predictably, no one is more excited about this than Marlins fans, who love a good crime spree. But I would be remiss if I didn't bring up the double standard: when Cody Ross punches, bites and slaps his male friends, it's just seen as adorable foreplay.