Josh Hamilton

After being named the first pick of the first round in 1999, the sky was the limit for Hamilton as he looked to the future and how he would be developing into the star that the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, who had still not been exorcised, had needed to move forward to the future. Behind him in the 2nd round was Carl Crawford. On the free agent front were players like Wade Boggs, Fred McGriff, and Jose Canseco. Wilson Alvarez offered hope that he could return to the form that he hoped he contained when they signed him the previous year and some guy named Rolando Arrojo was a runner up for the Rookie of the Year award.
With a lot of gambles and a lot of youth in the American League East, the Devil Rays hoped to build as they improved and drew fans to Tropicana Stadium. Much was made for the hope of their youth, especially Hamilton, and who knew? Perhaps this would be a quick turn around, like the other Florida team who went from non existent to world champions in their 5th season.
However, Hamilton found other things to make his life go... like the heart racing pleasures and pains of crack cocaine.
Not listening to Whitney Houston about how crack was whack, Hamilton took his life to "strange places" and "bad decisions."
After wandering in and out of crackhouses and through the middle of a highway in a drug dependent trance, Hamilton recovered in what he termed a "God thing." Proof that there is always hope at the bottom of the barrel, bottle, syringe, and spoon, Hamilton moved forward with life and gave it another go after the Devil Rays jettisoned him to the Cubs in the 2006 Rule 5 draft. Like a house made over by successful flippers, he was immediately sent packing to the Reds who made him a blossoming star in 2007. A .292 batting average and 19 home runs showed promise and sent the North Carolinian to Arlington as he had a break out season and a hell of a home run derby in front of the world who now praised him as a recovered drug addict with slight emphasis on the Christianity that made it all possible.
And for the purpose of religion and having something to do in front of fans who looked up to him and his story, Hamilton became something with the belief of his wife and child who saw him through eight different stints in rehab. He went on to hit a record 28 home runs in the first round of the 2008 home run derby at Yankee Stadium with the help of a grandmother who took his grunged-out drug-addled self in when he came to her door in 2005 as a barely unrecognizable body.
Proof that dreams come true, but that it's not always easy to move straight through as he relapsed into alcoholic partying time and injuries, but 2010 was back to form as he won the A.L. MVP Award despite MORE injuries that kept him from playing the full season. Still, he hit 32 home runs, 100 RBIs, and .356 over a season that consisted of 518 at bats. Even more so, his OPS was 1.044, which is hellacious - even in Texas.
This took him and his team to the World Series via the Yankees and his former team that he never quite made it to, the revamped Rays who had now been in the playoffs twice.
In thoughts of what could have been and of keeping Hamilton straight, there were many, but the Rangers kept their star in line with modified celebrations of ginger ale instead of champagne.
And here is another place where we hope and wish for the best as Hamilton needs to keep clean and stop partying the life of a dumb jock / ex addict. There is more glory in Cooperstown than up against the ass of a trashy waitress or doing shots off another woman's chest while his supportive wife sits at home. This is not to say that he's a bad person. We all slip and do stupid stuff; it's just that most of us can't hit a major league curve ball while carrying the hopes of this feel good second chance nation of ours to post season glory.

Harmon Killebrew

When more young kids are aware that your name is a drinking game than that of the 11th greatest home run hitter in major league history, which is a position that he will occupy for quite some time since nobody wants to take a chance on Manny Ramirez this off season and because Vladamir Guerrero is suffering from Dominican ball player aging-itis, this is something to say about the state of people understanding baseball history. Then again, many young players are completely unaware of the history of the game.
However, Harmon is just one of a long list of players and managers and announcers to develop life-threatening sickness and to move within inches of shuffling off this mortal coil. To be honest, 2010 was quite the legendary year for baseball with the comings, goings, and happenings, in what has come to be called the year of the pitcher.
But to that, Harmon was no friend of pitchers as he went deep 573 times in his 22 major league seasons. Six times, he led the league in dingers, and 8 times, he walloped more than 40 jacks. Eight times, he had more than 100 RBIs, which was at its zenith as the US put a man on the moon, a year that he contributed to 140 runs for the 1969 Twins. Considering that the Twins only had Rod Carew and Tony Oliva on their team that year, that's saying something.
Killebrew had 49 of the 163 home runs and 140 of the team's 744 RBIs. He was a man amongst men save for the fact he never hit more than 300 in a season (his first season didn't even produce 20 at bats). However, for those 49 jacks in 69, he only whiffed 84 times. That's not even half of a Ryan Howard season, and don't get me started on Mark Reynolds and Carlos Pena.
So as the 74 year old has developed esophageal cancer and moved into the Mayo Clinic for treatment. As he says:
"With my wife, Nita, by my side, I have begun preparing for what is perhaps the most difficult battle of my life. I am being treated by a team of medical professionals at the Mayo Clinic. While my condition is very serious, I have confidence in my doctors and the medical staff, and I anticipate a full recovery."
We can only hope that he recovers, and that as he does, people who profess a love of baseball remember that only 41 single seasons were ever greater than his 49 in 69. And while the Twins and the Senators and the Royals of his time were never that good, he was.
His plaque at Cooperstown proves it.

Barry Zito's Teddy Bear

The first time that Barry Zito came to New York in the playoffs, he was dealing, and the A's kicked butt. The second time he came, he was even better, but the A's weren't and they handed a loss to a great young pitcher. In the next two years, Zito went 2-1, and the A's went nowhere in the playoffs. When they got back to the playoffs in 2006, they still didn't go anywhere and Zito went 1-1. That said, when your team doesn't win, you just take the show to a different city and get a monster contract in hopes that you can be something great there.
The Giants bit in those days when there was still belief in Barry Bonds and getting a ring for the city of San Francisco for the first time ever and a ring for the Giants for the first time since 1954. Maybe someone should have told the 2002 Giants that it's cheaper to tell your guys not to celebrate before the fat lady sings than before Scott Spiezio starts a rally by depositing a 3-run home run over the outfield field wall.
Like Curt Schilling dreamed before game 1 of the 2004 ALCS, there's nothing like shutting up a city - even if he had to wait until game 6 to do, the Angels and their Thundersticks shut up Barry Bonds and his crew proving that K-Rod was better than F-Rod, and so the Rally Monkey got the win.
In 2007, Barry took his surfer cut, zen attitude, and teddy bear to the City by the Bay for $126 million over 7 years and rewarded the fans with ERAs of 4.53 and 5.15. The next 2 years were better as he was just over 4, which means about average, but in retrospect, the fact that he was left off of the post season roster altogether despite making $18million per year...
Normally, a really poor signing is measured in that free agency year upswing after a young player suddenly gets good, but Zito was one of the Oakland greats (along with fellow ship jumpers Tim Hudson and Mark Muldur). He was a man that had a fan base - maybe more so for that surfer hunk image that became all caring and sensitive with stories of his teddy bear, but for a guy to suck so badly that he's left off of the post season roster despite past success and the need to earn his $18million keep... yeah. Maybe that's why Carl Pavano doesn't have a home. One year of success in Minnesota after sucking up the place in New York with a long salary that never panned out and a serious dissing of Boston to get there... Perhaps the baseball world knows a Sidney Ponson mirage when it sees one - especially at the price that he's asking.
And there are good signings and bad signings in every off season. All up and coming teams have to sign big to get anywhere. Detroit signed Ivan Rodriguez for $40million over 4 years, though only half was guaranteed, to take a 43-119 team into the World Series in 2 years. Commitment is everything, but frankly, giving Jayson Werth 7 years and $126million after the relatively affordable and sane Phillies' contract that he has for 2 years $10million is absolutely ludicrous.
What do the Nationals get for it? Two years of dependable service, which in looking closely are the last 2. Three years with over 20 home runs, which are the last three. The last 2 years were 156 and 147 strikeouts respectively. Mind you, his rate didn't really drop last year; he just had less at bats. He did lead the league in doubles last year, but he's never had 100 RBIs. Joining Ryan Zimmerman as the power center of an Adam Dunn-less DC squad looking to compete for a new armed Stephen Strasburg and a yet to be shown Bryce Harper, there are things that the team must do. However, signing an above average Sasquatch for that long for that much money when even the big boys who can just throw money into the wind and hope for it to hit aren't offering 7 years to a 30+ year old fan favorite in a city that is over 2 hours north...
As Puff Daddy said, "It's all about the Benjamins," and I don't knock him for taking them... I would have, but frankly, I thought we were living in the era of sane baseball and not late life contracts to Derek Bell, Juan Gonzalez, Denny Neagle, and Mike Hampton.

Jebediah Springfield

Until 1796, he was Hans Sprungfeld, a murderous pirate that once tried to kill George Washington, but then, he left Maryland and headed west, and after a series of adventures and a desire not to have marital relations with his cousins, he became Jebediah Springfield, the founder of Springfield. Some point after that, he left his confessions for the world to see:
Know ye who read this there is more to my life than history records. Firstly, I did not tame the legendary buffalo, it was already tame, I merely shot it. Secondly, I have not always been known as Jebediah Springfield. Until 1796, I was Hans Sprungfeld, murderous pirate. And the half wits of this town will never learn the truth. ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. I write this confession so that my infamy will live on long after my body has succumbed to my infectious diphtheria.
And if that was how it all began, then it wasn’t much different than how the history of baseball began. Sure, there was no Lisa Simpson to ethically debate whether or not to tell the world about it, but eventually the truth would have to come out. In the meantime, baseball needed a founder, and it seemed logical that when Abner Graves “misremembered” having been privy to drawings from Abner Doubleday, the Army Captain became the creator of baseball, and so the historians who were attempting to create a history had found one or at least created a suitable alternative history.
Thus, in creating a truly American national game, this seemed to be much better than simply modifying the game of Rounders and taking from the British more than we wanted to in a day and age nearly a century after Rip Van Winkle had woken up to a new America twenty years after this fledgling country had swapped Georges, for to do that meant that we would be taking her daintyness, Jane Austen, and using her words from Northanger Abbey, "It was not very wonderful that Catherine, who had nothing heroic about her, should prefer cricket, base-ball, riding on horseback, and running about the country at the age of fourteen, to books" to originate the national pastime of America. And while Germans would try to claim the earliest remembered mention of "Englischer Baseball" rules, the reality is that the earliest mention of the game that I love is "away flies the boy to the next post and then home with joy, which was written in 1744 by another British person, John Newberry, in his work A Little Pretty Pocket-Book.
And technically, any "American" would have been British at that time as there was no inclination in Tom Jefferson's mind to write a Declaration of Independence to become a new and great country like he would do in another 33 years, but in the that period, a set of years equivalent to the life of Christ, the seeds of my sport would continue to germinate and become something greater, something more American than the British games of rounders and cricket.
For here was an America that was clamoring to be without the unduly English influence, and here was a beautiful new world whose nooks and crannies looked to be discovered while it discovered and created all of its nuances and culture during an age that would truly exhibit the promise of Jeffersonian Idealism. What better way to accomplish it than to do it with baseball diamonds in the fields of the ever expanding towns and villages along the way?
What better way to do it than to build a baseball diamond in the Catskills, which could then be named after a Civil War hero? And still better than that, what could be better than to enshrine the greats of the game within its walls?
Perhaps this is what Harry Chadwick and Albert Spalding had in mind when they created the commission to unveil the hidden history of my game in 1905. Nevertheless, instead of truth, they inherited the memories of an old man’s recollections from a life that never happened. To close the case on history with the nostalgic reminiscing of a the aged and tattered version of a man traveling back to age five and hoping that he managed to somehow remember that he met a man who was actually 155 miles away from where he was supposed to be on that 1839 day, seems a little far-fetched in this objective world of ours, but in the early twentieth century, it was all business as normal, and according to many sources, that half-assed glancing over is the real history of the great game of baseball that we Americans, Latinos, Asians, Canadians, and the smattering of other countries that have been able to field a team for the World Baseball Classic have inherited.
And so it is another hundred years later, I and many others can wonder why Graves would have sent the story in. Perhaps, he was looking to create a brief sense of notoriety by gaining his fifteen minutes of fame from the Akron Beacon Journal. Perhaps, it offered a chance to temporarily escape from his demons. All we know is that in the time after this, Graves managed to gun down his wife in cold blood and spend the rest of his life in an asylum. Perhaps, this is the most fitting end for the first chapter of this literary tale that is the world of baseball.
Whatever the case, it’s the beginning of this story that cements baseball as America’s game. And even if it’s not America’s game in the same way that it was, it’s my game, and that’s why I’ll be typing this story and these biographical expressions of baseball from now until November 4th. Stick with me until the end of the season. It’s going to be a wild ride.
Really.

Mick Billmeyer

Ok, let's be honest... who cares about stealing signs? Really.
It's not like it's a corked bat breaking and someone (Sammy Sosa) gets caught using it to get out of the deep slump he was in.
It's not like betting on your own team.
It's not like throwing your own team's games.
In fact, it's really boring. When guys like Brian Roberts wear contacts lens with extra power in them to get that much closer to seeing the movement of the ball out of the pitcher's hand or simply use video to learn to recognize a pitcher's motion to get the jump on the ball coming their way, there is still the need to put the ball in play.
It's not like a catcher gave opposing batters the pitches in advance during a meaningless series of All Star Game at bats to get back at the pitcher who tried to throw a broken bat at his head during an instance of roid rage.
It's simply stealing signs.
In Nascar, they say that if you're not cheating, you're not trying.
In baseball, unless you're Gaylord Perry throwing a spitball or dirty handed Kenny Rogers, you better not be cheating and doing anything to tarnish the sport.
So why get upset at the Phillies for stealing signs? It's not like the New York Giants didn't do it against the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1951 with Herman Frank and his telescope stealing signs off of the opposing catcher so that Bobby Thompson would be in a better position to smack the Shot Heard Round the World.
Sure, they had binoculars going, but isn't that more stupid than anything? They did it in plane sight. Maybe that can take the edge off the rumors about the hidden cameras.
All in all, baseball is what it is... a game of advantages.
Why stress on anything more than that?

Stephen Strasburg

I'm still trying to figure out how I didn't go to see this guy pitch in Harrisburg while he was still Triple A. Perhaps, there was the idea that they'd nurse him a little bit, but then they sent him to Syracuse and tonight, he rewarded fans by pitching a 6 inning no hitter before getting yanked from the game.
Maybe they were afraid that he would give up his first hit in the next inning. It seemed like the Senators were afraid of that when they yanked him after facing 16 batters in 5 innings and only letting a runner on who advanced via a passed ball.
But don't just ask me; ask Curt Schilling: "Since I'm 5 years old, I've played the game, love the game. I've never seen anything like this. ... Never. Nothing close. ... Not at that age, that polished. If he comes up to the big leagues -- which he will, in the next, probably, month, some period of time before the halfway point of the season -- he'll immediately, potentially be the best pitcher in the game. He's that polished.
"And I don't know him like a lot of guys that you judge from far away. I've heard nothing bad about the kid. He's got a great work ethic, he's got a pitcher's mind, because there's a lot of guys who get to the big leagues who throw 96 [mph] who never get people out. He's pitching smart, which is rare for a kid his age. He commands the baseball. At that level, that stuff to command the baseball, I've never seen anything like it."
The future of baseball is here. It's a great time to get in on the game now. With all of the young players building up a foundation of excellence, Strasburg's first game can't get here soon enough. I thank the good Lord for giving me the MLB Network to watch it when it happens.
And with the Nationals in 2nd place and 4 games above 500 past the first week of the season, this could be the start of something good.

Ken Griffey Jr.

They always said that the Kid played the game with class and a sense of fun, but frankly, I never really thought much of him. Maybe if I was a fan of the game when he and his father homered in the same game, but since I wasn't... yeah.
It seemed like it was such a big deal when he came across to the Reds in 2000, but it never was. He hit 40 homeruns the first year and trailed off every year after that except for a slight spike from 2005-2007.
Most of the time, he was injured.
Now, he's just washed up.
It was supposed to be a big deal when he came home to finish where he began. Seattle welcomed him with open arms. He rewarded them with 5 RBIs in 77 at bats. That said, it's hard to hit homeruns when you have a batting average that is points above the Mendoza Line. In addition, he decided that he would go for a nap in the clubhouse, and was unavailable to pinch hit when the Mariners needed him.
As a result, ne now faces the choice of retirement or to be released from Seattle, which really says something because the whole team not named Ichiro Suzuki has either lacked production or been injured too long to truly add up to anything, which really makes me glad that I didn't get Felix Hernandez in my draft this year.
Baseball's last great hope to cleanly climb up the ladder of career homeruns is all but done at 630 (but wait, there is another... THANK GOD for Albert Pujols). Somehow, this seems fitting in this transition year that we are in. Bring in the new. Build for the future. Will Faulkner was wrong. The past has past and it is dead.
How long until the Mariners fire sale? How long until Ichiro finds a new home? How long until King Felix gets sent to a contender and we find out if he's real or hype?
As the cold days of May keep getting cooler, we wait to see what good things that summer will bring.

Dallas Braden

It sucks to be Alex Rodriguez today. Sure, he's moving up the homerun list, but it sucks to ask who someone is when you're trying to look really cool after being a lazy ass that just stomps over his base and then to have him end up pitching a perfect game less than 3 weeks later.
E-bay features a 2007 exquisite rookie silver that is bidding at cents under $50.00 with 5 hours to go and it's got a dozen bidders already.
People are taking notice.
Not my fantasy leagues. I grabbed him for the team that he wasn't on right after the game. These people just don't watch rookies. That said, whatever they're doing must be better than I am since I'm 9th and 3rd out of 10 teams... but it is 162 games.
That's 2 no hit games in the first 2 months by 2 young stars.
Speaking of no hitter pitchers, Ubaldo Jimenez got robbed by his offense of being 6-0 as he only let up 1 run in 7 innings. It's not Pedro Martinez and Harvey Haddix unloved, but it sure feels like Randy Johnson squaring off against Jose Jimenez and losing 1 game to a no hitter and the other game to a 2 hitter. Prior to getting nailed for a ban substance, those were 2 of his 24 wins. On the flip side, he lost 44 times.
Now that's bad luck.
But Braden is young and has upside. I don't think it's nearly $100 worth of upside that the rookie card might go for when the auction is over, but it's still upside.
Who knows? Maybe he'll be more like Randy Johnson than Len Barker when it's all over, but whatever he ends up being, he's 1 of 19 people to throw a gem.
And that's something.

Robin Roberts

Imagine being a celebrity and going through life with cancer and trying your damnedest to beat it and all of a sudden, the Internet swells up with rumors that you're dead. I can't imagine the mortality that would be associated with cancer let along a false death rumor.
Mark Twain once summer it all up by saying, "stories about my death are premature," but for Robin Roberts, the Phillies pitcher from the 1950's, his life dd come to an end at age 83.
For a man with the benefit of being in a 4-man rotation, his 286 wins and 2357 strikeouts aren't that great of a total, but he did this for a largely lame Phillies team that was at most points lousy (including 107 losses in 1961) and at one stretch the Whiz Kids.
Despite being on a lousy set of teams, he finished his career with a 3.41 ERA.
In a week where famous deaths come in 3s, the Grim Reaper took Detroit broadcaster Ernie Harwell at 92. I was never a Tigers fan, so I can't say I have any memories of him. In fact, prior to his death, I had no reason to know who he was, but when he died, the MLB paid tribute to him and the rest of the country saw a man who was a legend in his market. I can only imagine that this was how Harry Kalas's death was received by the non-Philadelphia world.
Nevertheless, somewhere in there, Bob Uecker went to the hospital for heart surgery and made it out intact, a little bit worn out from the process, and ready to be again. Whether this is a person or whether it fulfills his goal of returning to the broadcast booth later this season, only time will tell, but we can be truly thankful that the fates and the skills of the surgeons gave him the opportunity to have another go around.
Life seems short and we all deal with mortality in our own different ways. Older men seem to get really quiet while they're watching friends and family shuffle off this mortal coil. Younger people seem to live in an invincible status as if time will never catch up with them. For me, I just notice the white hairs in the mirror and hope that in the downward slide that I'm going to be a silver fox or at least have the energy to do the things that I want to do. Having been fortunate enough to only have had a couple times where my health has been in question, I hope that my body makes it long enough to do the things that I want to do. I hope the same for my wife, my family, and my friends. I'm not ready to deal with death on any level up close and in person. In that, I'm a fairly lucky almost 39 year old. I lost a favorite teacher a few years ago and when I went to his funeral, it was the first one I had been to since 1989. When my grandmothers passed away, I was in England and unable to come home. I never knew my grandfathers, so I've avoided death save a few musicians, a few baseball players, and some historical figures that seemed shocking to think that they were dead, but all in all, it's not like I sat around mourning anyone for a long period of time. Frankly, Michael Jackson didn't mean anything to me, so I can't say that I took his death as anything.
The same can be said for my association with Robin Roberts. I never knew he might have been the best pitcher of the fifties. Never knew. I always thought it would be someone else, but at the end of the day, the eulogies came out. This isn't to disparage him. He was a Hall of Fame baseball great, but it's just that in history, we only have room to tell so many tales, which leads me to wonder what tale anyone will tell about me or those I love when the time comes.
To this, all that is left is the living. Anything else seems rather trivial.

David Big Papi Ortiz

Ortiz likes it when you call him Big Papi. We like it when you hit like Big Papi. At one time, George Steinbrenner was irate that the Yankees didn't get him. However, since April 17th, Ortiz has hits in 4 games.
Since the season opened, he's sat out 8 times. Mind you, he's the designated hitter. It's not like he's even having to run back to the first sack to catch a ball from deep in the 3rd base hole.
In 67 at bats, he has 3 homeruns and 6 RBIs. Just because he hit his first homerun sooner than May 20th, the date of the blessed event last year, isn't a sign of welcome relief.
The man is earning $13million. When it comes to sitting out 8 days of 1/2 work (offense not defense), I'd be willing to bat .149 and do just that as well. However, this isn't kicking a man when he's down, and frankly, since 2006 ended, he's been digressing into failure more and more. It's a story of the pain of propping a man up when he can't perform, and frankly, at this point, I can't believe anyone would even claim him off of waivers. Nobody wants that salary without a guarantee. I can't even picture the Yankees signing him just because it would rile up Boston fans. In that, there's no point poking a wounded animal with a stick.
But the real issue here is this: Boston's choice of CURRENTLY UNDERPERFORMING replacement players over the last few years based on who is in their lineup today.

John Lackey - $18.7million gets you 2 wins and a 4.50 ERA on the beginning of a long term lease.
JD Drew - $14million puts incentive under Drew's sorry behind to get hot and hit 5 homeruns with a .258 average. Prior to that, he was under .200 for April. Nobody in Boston other than Theo wanted him, and now, we're stuck with him. He didn't pan out for St. Louis, Atlanta, or Los Angeles. After the Phillies fans pelted him with D cell batteries in his Philadelphia debut, they realized that they got the good end of the deal in not getting him (even if Pat Burrell largely was a bust caught looking).
Mike Lowell - $12.5million to be platooned and rescued after being unable to be traded due to failing a physical offsets his .317 average with 1 homerun in 41 at bats.
Josh Beckett - $12.1million for 1 win and a 6.31 ERA. Sure, he helped win a title for Boston and Florida, but we need him performing for the extension he just signed.
Jon Papelbon - $9.35million for an ERA that's just under 2, but he also has 2 losses in 1 month. That's scary.
Adrian Beltre - $9million for him to bat .323, which is good, but the 1 homerun and 13 RBIs isn't, which once again proves 2004 was a contract year mirage.
Bill Hall - $8.5million to be unidentifiable even if he was dancing naked on your front porch.
Daisuke Matsuzaka - $8.33million to find out the gyro ball is a myth and his WHIP makes every inning an adventure.
Victor Martinez - $7.7million for .242 and 1 homerun and a complete inability to throw out runners; thus, it forces Jason Varitek back behind the plate all too often AND he can't throw out runners either.
Marco Scutaro - $5.5million for Theo to believe that defense prevents runs, but batting in 7 runs with 2 homeruns isn't getting the job done.

These aren't even the in expensive replacement parts. In short, this is a team in decline that has no chance to win for a few years. Maybe they can throw money at Pujols, but they need a lot of things.
One is to finally get rid of Wakefield, Varitek, and Big Papi. The past is the past. Let them be bench coaches. Winning requires nurturing young talent now.
Look at what happened to the Orioles in the wake of propping up Cal Ripken's streak - since 1997's division championship, they're a 4th or 5th place failure - and it's not like they have Tampa Bay to kick around since they're in a win or rebuild year. Toronto is rebuilding young and improved. The Yankees are the Yankees.
And the Red Sox... they're holding onto dreams long since dead.
Too bad that they should have learned that sometimes, you have to step on (Nomar's) toes to do well. Too bad they haven't learned it with Ortiz.

Matt Parker and Trey Stone

In 2004, South Park had an episode entitled Up the Down Steroid. In it, Cartman faked that he was disabled to get in the Special Olympics under the assumption that he could win. Meanwhile, Jimmy was training really hard to compete, but he found that "there are shortcuts," and the rest of the episode was typical South Park mayhem. From parodies of roid rage to Timmy's pressure on Jimmy to do the right thing, the lesson was everything from a totally offensive Cartman acting developmentally disabled to sheer hatred for Giambi, Bonds, and McGwire to a lesson learned that the only way to compete is to compete fairly.
All the same, it's hard to believe that the message that was made out of 2 retired players and a hanger on would still have any resonance in today's terms. After all, Manny, Papi, and A-Roid seem to be more current to the talk of steroids in sports, but it's not all sports or pop culture that South Park does. Instead, there is the ability to lampoon things and give lessons in ways that are equally conservative and potty-mouthed DESPITE the fact that this season tends to focus more on KFC and video game ads than it does on anything else.
However, this week when Comedy Central refused to allow any comments to be made about Mohammed, which is actually the 2nd time this happened. So in a very real sense they caved in to the rights of the extremists themselves. Nobody stopped Matt and Trey from putting the fecal material on Jesus and Bush at the end of Cartoon Wars, which was done simply to show that they can mock Christianity and American ideals, but when it came to Islam, we had to fear the wrath of the extremists (not the mainstream believers themselves).
So what does this have to do with baseball, you might be asking.
As America's game, we're to represent everything that is right about America. Sometimes, we do that with Jackie Robinson stealing home. Sometimes, we do it with celebrations for records. Other times, we do it by wearing uniforms that honor the military, the police, and the firemen. Most times, we just rise for the playing of the National Anthem and taking off our caps. A very simple request really, but for some in the stands who call themselves Americans, it's a brief moment of discomfort that doesn't remember the sacrifices of those that have given all for the rights that we have.
All the same, we even make room for people not to stand for the anthem. Carlos Delgado refused to stand because of the Navy's use of Vieques for a bombing range, and while people disputed - even home fans at Shea! - he had the right, and people respected it.
But when America gives way for the rights of extremists to speak - be it radical religion like the Westboro Baptist Church and their "God Hates Fags" campaign at military funerals AND for extremists to make death threats and anti-American speeches under the liberty that America and not their country provide for them (or in the case of Westboro, that they wouldn't allow for all citizens to live in the way that they would want to), it seems absurd.
In a time when a car bomb almost goes off in Times Square, baseball doesn't seem as important as hoping that we have a real life Jack Bauer to clean up the bad guys and save the day.
At least that's what I think.

Rickey Henderson

In 1979, Rickey Henderson came to the big leagues and despite a limited batting average of .274 and only a half season of at bats, he still stole 33 bases for that year. To put this into perspective, had he played in the National League, he would have made it to #12 on the leader board that year. In the American League, he tied for #7 despite being far behind Willie Wilson's lead of 83 thefts. Three full seasons later, he passed such notorious base robbers as Ty Cobb, Maury Wills, and Lou Brock's coveted 1974 record of 118 stolen bases in a season.
Had it not been for a pedestrian batting average and a cocaine habit, perhaps Vince Coleman could have caught the record. He did show promise in his first 3 seasons before imploding. Nevertheless, Rickey was never seriously challenged for the all time single season record.
Roughly 12 years into his career, on May 1st 1991, Rickey Henderson heaved second base into the air and declared his supremacy to the world. As Shaq's model at speaking in the first person, Rickey was all ego and all dedication to baseball. He was well on his way to becoming the greatest leadoff hitter in history and at the same point, he was well on his way to sticking around the game too long. Maybe it was to set the all time runs record. Maybe it was to accumulate 1406 stolen bases and to be that far above anyone else who could dare to surpass his record since let's be honest - nobody in today's game could keep up their current pace for 20 years and surpass him. Maybe it was because he wasn't talented enough to do anything else.
Maybe he just loved the game that much.
Whatever it was, Rickey was a hell of a player. From 1979-2003, he played for the Oakland A's, the Yankees, the Blue Jays, the Padres, the Angels, and eventually even made it back to the Big Apple to play for the Mets.
When you played his card in APBA, his numbers were sick. This was a man who could make a single into a triple. He did his 297 home runs including 2 seasons with 28 round trippers. There were 4 total seasons where he was over 20 home runs for the year when the number actually meant something.
He had an OBP that was incredible because of his plate discipline. Had it not been for Barry Bonds' cheating and ability to be hated, Rickey would have the all time walks record as well, but as homerun records go, tis better to walk Bonds than to let him pass the Babe and Hammerin' Hank.
So yeah... today or any annual day after this is the day to raise a glass and toast Rickey.
He was a great baseball star and the Hall of Fame knew it and he knew it, too.
But that's ok. Not everyone can steal that many bases in a year or a career.