Happy Hour: As Bad as A-Rod's Fielding Percentage

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Faith healing may be preposterous and all that garbage, but damned if the upcoming start of the NFL, NCAA Football and EPL Season doesn’t make you feel infinitely better than you were say a month ago Sunday. Watching Liverpool take it to the hole, so to speak against Chelsea to win the Community Shield was a nice little slice of Heaven for a noted Chelsea hater like myself. My Carolina Panthers (aka Cardiac Cats for Tony Kornheiser) look like world beaters when the first team was on the field and looked like shit when they weren’t. It’s always fun to see Buffalo making a comeback against a projected NFC Title contender, let alone the fact that it’s your team they’re making the comeback on. Notre Dame is in the same boat as Penn State now, since expectations have been raised what with their revival seasons complete. The Nittany Lions may not have as high of an expectation to perform as the Fighting Irish do, since the followers of Touchdown Jesus have that BCS hopes riding on the arm of Brady Quinn. Of course, we’re in the midst of August, which also means that my beloved Carolina Hurricanes begin their Stanley Cup defense in less than two months, which also produces some groovy feelings in yours truly.

I was enjoying the times last week in beautiful Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, so that’s why your weekly dose of the Host with the Most was MIA last week. The week before that, I was just too damn lazy to give a damn. Speaking of “K-Mart by the Sea”, anyone that wants suggestions on a good sports-themed restaurant, check out Overtime Sports Café on Highway 17 North in North Myrtle Beach. The place is hardly a tavern or pub, but the food is good and the waitresses dress up like cheerleaders. Oh, and the place is huge and filled to the brim with various sports memorabilia, which is always a nice sight. For you Red Sox fans in the Charlotte area, check out Beantown Tavern, located at 130 Matthews Station Street in Matthews, North Carolina. I haven’t quite made it there yet, but any joint in Charlotte, North Carolina that plays every Boston Red Sox game is a fan of mine, so huzzah! Okay, that takes care of the Public Service Announcements, so let’s get going.

Baseball’s regular season is beginning to wind down, as the dog days of August are drawing closer and closer to the pennant races of September. Having said that, it’s still a bit too early to push panic buttons if you’re San Diego, Boston, and Minnesota. Detroit is pretty much a lock, considering their rebound against the Sox over the past few days, but the Yankees and Red Sox have a FIVE game set to bookend the week, so the divisional race will be much clearer once that Fenway series wraps up. The NL West is a clusterf*ck, with Colorado, Arizona, San Diego and Los Angeles battling it out for the division lead while San Francisco trails by only five games or so. Even the mighty St. Louis Cardinals are now feeling the burn as Cincinnati moves closer and closer to the division lead. Speaking of NL Central teams, history was made on Tuesday night as the Chicago Cubs and the Houston Astros went an ungodly eighteen innings before the Cubs broke the tie with a two run, bases loaded single in the top half of the inning. The lesson is clear: don’t walk the bases loaded in the eighteenth inning. The funny thing is, they weren’t the only two teams going two full game distances in one night. The Diamondbacks and Rockies also went eighteen innings in Colorado, with the away team triumphing in the end as well.

To me, baseball is the polar opposite of NASCAR these days. Aside from the obvious logistical differences that both sports produce, baseball is filled with its villainous teams of course, but there’s also a slew of likeable, loveable underdogs that win occasionally. Who isn’t rooting for the Dodgers to win the West, aside from Giants fans of course? Is there a fan out there who doesn’t enjoy seeing the Tigers leading a divisional race in August? Sure, you have the Yankees and their $1.7 Billion payroll, but newsflash: they haven’t won the big dance since 2000, and have had massive choke jobs in three of their five postseason runs since then. Compare that with NASCAR, where the top dogs in the sport are either bland (Greg Biffle and Matt Kenseth), cheaters (Jimmie Johnson) or totally unlikable shitheads (Kurt and Kyle Busch). Guys like Jeff Gordon and Dale Earnhardt Jr. are loved (and hated) by many, but hardly produce anymore. Sure, there are guys like Carl Edwards, Kasey Kahne, and Denny Hamlin making a name for themselves, but they’re the next generation of NASCAR, and as long as guys like Busch and Johnson run the show, it’s really a depressing series to watch. Hell, Tony Stewart is the most interesting guy out there week in and week out, and he’s hated by many as well (though I root for him by default). And people wonder why I gave up on NASCAR.

You know what? I’m so lazy right now, I just decided to give up on writing anything meaningful, so we’re going to try a little experiment. It involves taking a specific athlete from any sport, and talking trash on them (you’ll understand here in a moment).

Taking an “Athlete” to Task
1. Alex Rodriguez
Woo-hoo! Where to begin here? For a player making over $200 Million, I would expect one to be able to field a groundball and produce when it matters. Don’t give me the “He’s got better stats than most people in the league!” bull. He’s a financial drain on any other team in baseball, has no value as a clutch performer, and represents everything wrong with the New York Yankees in one fell swoop. He’s Captain Syphilis, A-GAY, Lipstick Boy, Karate Chop Man, Mr. March! We’ll have a contest in the near future to re-name Alex Rodriguez for the impending postseason push. The winner gets absolutely nothing but a smile for trashing the most overrated player in the history of Major League Baseball.

Allow me to clarify something here, although I’m sure the buggers out there wont believe me when I say this. My hatred and disdain for Alex Rodriguez is not in any way, shape, or form directed at his choice to join the Yankees instead of the Red Sox back in the winter of 2004. It was the fact that Boston went after him in the first place. You see, A-SUCK played an instrumental role in the casting off of Nomar, and the near-departure of Manny Ramirez. Story: in 2004, the Red Sox made a call to John Hart of the Rangers about the possibility of acquiring Alex Rodriguez. The trade, vaguely defined as Alex Rodriguez for Manny Ramirez, was damn near completed at various intervals, with my favorite Red Sox player, Nomar Garciaparra then going to the White Sox for Magglio Ordonez. One problem: the Union blocked A-Rod from “generously” slicing some of his salary off, and the trade was dead. Even then, the seeds of doubt were planted in Nomar and Manny. Garciaparra, rightfully feeling betrayed by his team, would be gone before the end of the year in a trade that broke the hearts of just about every Sox fan out there. The trade rumors also started a steamroll effect that nearly sent Manny Ramirez packing in the 2005-2006 offseason as well.

So, what happens next? A-Rod decides to move to the Yankees, when he’s assured that he gets all of the money in his contract (sticking it to Texas in the process). Really though, that was just the icing on the cake to hate the guy. I’ve long since established my disdain for the ballplayer, though to be fair I’m sure he’s a nice enough person outside of baseball. He’s been touted as the greatest Major League Baseball player of our generation, and possibly of all time. When you level these credentials on a player, and give him a $250 Million contract to boot, you need to be able to not only produce the stats, but produce championships. It’s a proven, unquestionable fact that every team that has let go of Alex Rodriguez has been better the very next season. Alex Rodriguez was traded to Texas after the 2000 season. In 2001, Seattle posted 120+ wins en route to winning the AL West. While in Texas, A-Rod continued to post huge numbers while the Rangers became one of the worst teams in baseball, rivaling the suckiness of Tampa Bay and Kansas City and regular intervals. So, in 2004, the Yankees trade for the guy, and Texas has a miraculous bounce back season where they’re fighting for a playoff berth until the final two weeks of the season. Not only that, but Texas is still a contender in the AL West right now, showing how far they’ve come since the A-Rod trade. Speaking of the Yankees, here’s how much A-Rod has helped the Pinstripers.

2004: Helped team advance to the ALCS, where he helped pile on runs as the Yankees defeated the Red Sox three straight behind a near perfect Game 1 from Mike Mussina, a masterpiece from Jon Lieber in Game 2, and a 19 run shellacking in Game 3. Then, when the Red Sox mounted their historic comeback, Rodriguez folded, going 8 for 31 with a .258 average over the course of the ALCS. His famous “karate chop” on Bronson Arroyo in Game 6 has earned him a dubious place in baseball lore. The Red Sox would come back to win the Pennant, and the World Series, winning four straight in each series.

2005: Again helped the team advance to the postseason, collecting a controversial MVP Award in the process. However, A-Rod went 2 for 15 with five strikeouts in the five game series loss to the Anaheim Angels.

2006: Rodriguez is in the midst of a down-year. Despite collecting 86 RBIs, he’s only hitting .286 with twenty five home runs. His defense has become atrocious, with his 21 errors nearly constituting a third of the Yankees’ total errors.

The guy is a bonafide case study in how people with bipolar disorder play the game. His huge numbers are a product of protection in the lineup, spending most of his career in hitter-friendly parks, and having little to no pressure on him. He hits home runs when his teammates are hitting home runs, and he goes into slumps when his team is down. Of course, he can slump defensively and offensively when his team is in the lead in the AL East as well, but you know what I’m saying. Am I being too hard on the guy? You’re call, but it is my column, and I call them the way I see them.