A daily accumulation of history and present as I follow the 2011 year through the baseball season and reflect on the glories and disappointments of the greatest game on Earth.

Sunday, February 27, 2011

Johnny Damon

Every time that I watch Fever Pitch, I can't decide if I actually like the movie, or if I want to drown Jimmy Fallon for his annoyingness. At the writing of this blog, I'm going with like it - but it's just barely.
The thing is that Jimmy Fallon is really annoying. I'm sure that he's only a fair weather Yankees fan (just like his convenient switch to Boston for the movie), but yeah... that's a big part of it.
Then there's the unlikeable factor of Drew Barrymore in the movie. I mean, who would take her to a baseball game, much less want to sell his season tickets to get back with her? Is there nobody else out there who is any better than her? Is Fallon's Red Sox obsession that problematic that he can't get another woman other than her (OK, this is probably true, but still... there are more tolerable women who would put up with him for a shot at those seats, I'm sure).
In addition, there's something about the whole Curse of Babe Ruth that permeated this Farrelly Brothers movie based on a book about soccer by Nick Hornby that really wanted to have another losing season and when the Red Sox surprisingly won it all, it was like... how can we get the reality that is going on in late October 2004 to be current in the movie.
So they went and let Fallon and Barrymore celebrate in St. Louis as if they were real fans who had been dying for this moment since the last time that the Red Sox were there in 1918. This really wasn't cool, but yeah...
Maybe I'm just nitpicking. There are good parts in the movie, but they aren't the ones that center around King Idiot Johnny Damon, who did his damnedest to leave Boston for a larger contract elsewhere when he was beloved in New England. While he wanted another year, he didn't have to sell his soul to do it.
And look what happened? The Yankees NEVER embraced him. He left for the Tigers and he left again for Tampa Bay. He's not exactly a spring chicken after all of those years in Kansas City (his rookie year was 95).
Now, he's hitting the apex of a career where he was never more loved than he was for the long hair and the Jesus beard. I remember what I did with the shirt I used to wear (picture to the left). He was Benedict Arnold, and now he's an afterthought looking for a place in an AL East wanna be transitional year team (and maybe they can be again, but it will never be like 2008 with the Crawford-less Rays).
But surely I digress into Johnny Damon's recent transgressions, which could easily apply to Manny Ramirez as well, but alas...
The point is that there are good parts to the movie. There is a love of baseball that makes one block out the world and want to watch games over being with other human beings at parties and the like. There are good things to it and those center around its enjoyable goodness, but it's not Bull Durham when it comes to movies.
But that's just me.

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