WELCOME BACK!
She’s not saying Welcome Back! I am! That’s just a picture, silly! But we did have this wonderful conversation.
Me: Wow, my first column in TWO MONTHS!
Mistress: No way! You’ve peen putting way too many hours into that website lately, and they haven’t paid you a god dam thing!
Me: I told you, they pay me with LOVE!
Mistress: Either you shut off that computer get on your knees and give me head right now! Or no sex tonight!!!!
Me: ummmm….I choose…….ummmmm…hmmmm..I choose….
THE COLUMN!
Hi Everybody! Welcome to another edition of Slayer’s Sports and Stuff! Don’t call it a comeback, I’ve been here for years! Man, have things changed since we last gabbed about sports. Not really in the sports world. That’s been on status quo. Everybody loves baseball except for Corey Laflin, the NFL still dominates the American psyche, college football is only a few weeks in its season and well on their way on creating another BCS mess, white people still hate the NBA, 98% of the American population will not miss the NHL, college basketball loses just about everybody on the McDonald’s top 10 high school prospects yet is still considered the best form of the game, and tennis, golf, and NASCAR still have their dedicated blueblood/redneck cults. There has been one thing that’s changed…we’ll talk about that later. But let’s get going with this thing. No delays, let’s roll!
BUT, FIRST!
Ok, let’s talk about some major changes before we take our journey. Some of you may have been wondering where I’ve been, ok….none of you. But I’ll tell you anyway. I’ve been doing editing. See all that green stuff around this column, that’s IP SPORTS! See that guy named David Goldberg, that’s me! Well, longtime readers (six months) of mine know that I never failed giving gossip at 411, told the truth of what it’s like to be an online writer, and gave updates on my slow climb up the ladder. Well, not only did I get promoted in rank, I got commissioned! Now why would they have the guy with a room temperature IQ to run this little zone! Let’s look at the history!
The number of hits my column generated was average at best.
I’ve stated several times that I hate the IWC without admission that if wasn’t for the IWC, I wouldn’t have a column.
I bothered Daniels everyday on IM to the point where he now blocks me.
I challenged Widro to a fight while drunk.
In my first column at IP, I f*cked off the entire site and I meant it.
The result: Editor of the sports zone. Go figure! And yeah, I’m not the real editor. Daniels is. So when things are going well here, praise him. When not, blame me.
NY SLAYER NO MORE
I then get told that several of the writers are on hunger strike until I change my name as they refuse to work at the same site that has writers giving themselves ludicrous pseudonyms. At first, I was like screw it. But then I got some information that one of the writers hadn’t eaten in ten days and was close to death. I didn’t want anyone dying because of little old me, so I changed my name to David (real) Goldberg (fake). Great, now we’re all updated.
BASEBALL
Let’s take a quick look at all the baseball teams that are still alive. In the American League, we have three teams that are in, and three teams fighting for the last spot. In the National league, two teams are in, one is almost in, and four teams will be competing for the last spot.
New York Yankees: The best lineup in baseball, two great starters, two great closers, and LOTS of bad pitching in between. This is still the top team in baseball, but they are very beatable (I made that word up!). This team is also oddly enough much better when Jason Giambi is on the bench. One thing is for sure, they want no part of the Angels. Not just in 2002, but historically the Angels have the Yankees number.
Boston Red Sox: Technically, not in but they basically are unless they completely collapse in the last week and lose six games. Which isn’t out of the realm of possibility. Now I pronounced this team dead a few months ago. Shame shame on me. Is this going to be THE year? Doesn’t look good. No bullpen, no depth at the plate, and a few loose screws on the team. Now man for man, they are the BEST team in baseball and the 2004 championship is theirs if they play for it, but you’re asking this team to actually focus for an entire month. It’s up to them.
Minnesota Twins: They’re in and have and will be playing the Yankees this week. Will this series effect either of the team’s psychology if they should meet in October? The answer is NO! Whatever hype this series generates will be meaningless. They will be calling it an ALDS preview; but divisional series don’t consist of straightening out the pitching order and playing AA rookies in the ninth inning. With that stated, nobody is paying any attention to this team as they are considered a benefactor of a bad division. And we all know what happens when the media says that. See the 2004 Pistons, 2002 Angels, and 2001 Patriots for recent examples.
Oakland A’s, Anaheim Angels, Texas Rangers: Angels are one game behind, Texas is two. So who wants it? Here’s the deal. For the next few days, Texas and Anaheim will be playing each other and Oakland will be playing Seattle. Oakland wants the Rangers and Angels to beat each other up while beating up on the lowly mariners. But Seattle would more then love to spoil Oakland’s season. About 10 different scenarios could happen once this week is over and we get to closing weekend, and any of the can happen. Don’t be surprised if we’ll be playing an ‘extra game’ next Monday!
Atlanta Braves and St. Louis Cardinals: Now, St. Louis has eleven more wins then Atlanta, but that’s meaningless once we get into the playoffs. Both these teams are in and they’re both very good. Remember when Atlanta was eight games behind in the division? Seems like an eternity ago. Atlanta gets an easy few days with the Mets, and the Cards would be more then happy to swat the Astros this week out of the post-season.
Los Angeles Dodgers: 3 games ahead in the loss column, they play the Colorado Rockies, and the Giants and Padres play each other in a three game series. Couldn’t get better for this team. Now, I’ve stated it before and I’ll say it again. I just don’t think this team is that good. In fact putting the records aside, I think of all the teams in the playoff race, they’re the weakest of the bunch we’re talking about here. Now, they’ll probably go and win a World Series now that I’ve said that.
Chicago Cubs, San Francisco Giants, Houston Astros, San Diego Padres
How’s that for a wild card race. This is the Cubbie’s wild card to lose and they’re holding on to it by only a 1/2 game. The Padres are what seems like a long three games behind in the loss column and a couple more will eliminate them. And you gotta give it to the ‘Stros for quietly crawling back into the race while the other teams went on respective mini-slumps. And how good is Barry Bonds? When he goes through a bad few days, so does the team. I’ve never seen anything like that where one batter is so dominant, it effects the entire team as a whole.
Now in Dead Team news, the New York Mets are going to try to snag Lou Pinella from the Devil Rays. But Tampa wants a player in return. Just do it Mets, he’ll turn your pathetic franchise around. And I do mean pathetic. How many mistakes can a team make in 12 months? They didn’t want to trade Reyes for Soriano, they didn’t want to pay Vlad, they traded their best prospect whose been descent in the major leagues after saying he wasn’t ready, and that team let’s its players run the franchise. Get Lou, get rid of all your veterans, start anew. As for the Rays, spend some money on your ballclub or get out of the majors. Plain and simple. And build a real ballpark while you’re at it. And build it in the actual city of Tampa instead of 40 miles away. And stop calling yourselves the Rays.
WOMEN’S SPORTS
I watched the Olympics. I covered it too. So after hours and hours of watching it, I learned that most of the time I prefer women’s competition. Volleyball, beach volleyball, tennis, soccer, lacrosse, ping pong, gymnastics, swimming, diving, the list goes on and on. I just prefer the chicks. It’s more fun, they scream and cry when they win or lose, and sometimes it just blatantly turns me on seeing a bunch of amazon women go at each other’s throats. The softball was fun too, just a little incompetitive(I made that word up too!). And outside Connecticut/Tennessee, I still find it difficult to get into women’s basketball. By the way, anyone catch Bill Clement do play by play on Badminton? One thing I learned is that ANY SPORT can be entertaining when called by a great announcer. Bill Clement is in my mind the best analyst in sports and it was obvious he had no clue who these people competing were (he kept calling them ‘blue team’ and ‘red team’) but dam, he made that sport much more fun then it had any right to be. He really made you feel like the balance of the universe was dependent on the result of the summer olympics badminton competition.
FOOTBALL
How good are the writers here at Inside Pulse??? So good, that there is nothing I can add to their superior coverage. That and I didn’t watch any this weekend. It was a religious thing….
HOCKEY
LA Kings president Tim Leiweke stated in a radio interview that he does not believe the NHL will have a season this year and called NHLPA chief executive ‘a bold faced liar’. Bettman then fined Timmy a ‘significant’ amount. Here’s the deal. The NHL is prepared to not have a season and have a war chest of around 300 million to consolidate the 32 owners. They realize they can out-wait the player’s association and they really don’t want anyone to know that. But some people do know that, I know that, and now you know that. Their evil plan has failed; which doesn’t change the fact they will ultimately crush the union or declare league bankruptcy and end it. Good times ahead!
ASSAULT ON PRECINCT 13
They’re remaking one of my favorite movies which in turn was a modernization/remake of Rio Bravo. This was John Carpenter’s fist post-college film and it has historical significance as it was the first film to deal with teenage gangs that had GUNS! And it is the first movie about South Central LA as a breeding ground for it. That and it had such a unique style/atmosphere that would later become synonymous with John Carpenter. A film history textbook will dedicate a few pages to this movie and you’ll find it any top 25 Cult Film list. Plus, it’s Quentin Tarantino’s favorite movie or at least that’s what it says in the box (There are actual several cinematic homages to this film in his movies). It hasn’t aged well and looks like what it is; a mid-70s independent film; but once you get over that, the movie itself usually engulfs you. So basically the movie is great for three reasons: Originality (despite the fact it was a ‘re-make’), historical/artistic significance, and John Carpenter. So how can a remake top that? It does have a decent cast and will be directed by some young and hungry French guy. So we shall see. I highly recommend the original for people who are fans of Carpenter, Tarantino, Rodriguez, cult films, westerns, horror movies, or gangster flicks. Admittedly though, you won’t love this movie unless you love movies. Just one of those flicks.
IP SPORTS
Mark U goes over all the top stories in his weekly pulse!
Mark U then gives us his weekly musings on bad officiating and how one bad call in one game can effect EVERY TEAM!!! Who Knew???
In Paul Carmon’s opinion the NHL can be saved by bringing back the Hartford Whalers! God bless that man.
Everyone say hello to Adam Jacobs as he presents his fantasy peninsula. Welcome aboard!
Everyone say hello to Patrick Nguyen as well! Welcome aboard too!
Corey Laflin is a chess coach! I can play chess too! Can’t win, but I can play!
And this Thursday, IP Sports will be doing a roundtable on who should be the MVP, ROY, and CYW. Ok, no one calls the Cy Young Winner CYW.
That’s it! See you next week when I tell you why 9 Innings From Ground Zero was the biggest bunch of bullshit I’ve ever seen. I didn’t dislike it, very well done; just based on a false and imaginary premise.
Have a great week!
