Katrina Bowl

Ok, so we're all really happy that the Saints won the Hype-er Bowl this year. Everyone, that is, except the folks from Indianapolis. I really was hoping thay'd win inspite of the fact that foopbaw rates a very poor third behind a couple of other games that can be played 'pon a carpet.

I just have one little niggling problem: why is it that every--literally EVERY news or sports story about this game and this team never failed to mention how a win for the Saints would do wonders for the folks in N'Awlins trying to recover from Hurricane Katrina.

WHAT!!??

Hurricane Katrina, for those with memories de-enhanced by children's prisons, happened almost four-and-a-half years ago. Four-and-a-half years! Get over it!

South Florida had a class three or four hurricane every two or threee years. Typically, they're rebuilt in a few months, and saying it's worth the nuisance to live in such a wonderful place.

Folks equally devastated in coastal areas along the gulf coast of Mississippi and Alabama got relatively little news coverage, very little disaster aid (by comparison) and rebuilt and resumed their lives within a few months.

Four-and-a-half years after N'Awlins' first bad hurricane in recent decades, and there, it seems, has been little or no recovery yet.

To be fair, N'Awlins had a really bad break in the criminal mismanagement of disaster aid by local, state and federal relief agancies, for which literally dozens, maybe hundreds of local, state and federal officials should be taken out to the nearest concrete wall and shot. Literally.

Also, to be fair, a majority of the voters in N'Awlins deserve the hard times they managed to survive for having the suicidal stupidity to re-elect that profoundly inept thievin' idiot they have the incredibly poor judgement to have called Mayor. But for the few thousand remaining productive individuals in that fair city, who certainly voted to give the dunderhead Mayor Nagin a lift from the pointy tip of their boot, not only out of N'Awlins, but out of existence.

The hurricane was only the bare beginning of their problems.

Government defines incompetence.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

All the Sports Unfit to Report

There's a sports program on ESPN called Mike & Mike. I guess it's on radio, too. I rarely watch it because....well....who would watch a sports talk show on tv? I occasionally go to a particular pizza-sandwich shop for lunch near where I work. Pretty good Phillie steak sandwiches.
While I waited for my sandwich, Mike & Mike were on the house tv.

It was unbelievable!

We're in the middle of the NHL hockey playoffs, well into the NBA baxabaw playoffs (if anybody's noticed) and well into the big league beisbol season. Mike & Mike aren't talking about any of this. They're talking about foopbaw. And they're not really talking about foopbaw, they're talking about.....get this.....Brett Farve's locker. I'm not sure who Brett Farve is, but I know who Brett Favre is.

They weren't talking about Brett Favre, but somebody named Brett Farve. Well, they were talking about Brett Favre, but sometime in Favre's ancestry, somebody started mispronouncing the name and, being from Mississippi, no one had the intelligence to correct him.

Back to the point. Mike & Mike weren't talking about Brett Favre, but about Brett Favre's locker up there in the dungeons under Lambeau Field's grandstand.

Those two sports dorks spent at least fifteen minutes arguing over whether or not Brett Favre's locker should be retired as a shrine!!

For my part, as very little as I care about it, I think it's a stupid idea, since there have been numerous foopbaw players of Favre's stature in the Packers over the length of the team's history. They'd have to move the players to a nearby barn to dress--all of the lockers in the dressing room would be shrines.

But, even that's not important. What I don;t understand is how a pretty good sports tv network can give dopes like these a tv show when there are so many hockey, lacrosse, rugby and pistol target matches going untelevised.

Well, this entry is a mite outside of my usual area of discussion, so I'll leave it there.

Now, we return you to your regularly scheduled rants.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Middleweight Outfielder

In my pre-teens, I used to be a huge baseball fan. I went to my hometown Grand Forks Chiefs minor league games almost as often as they played at home. I was a member of the Knot Hole Gang (a special bleacher section for kids, at greatly reduced admission). I sold refreshments in the grandstand, more to get free admission than to make money (though I did make a little money).

I kept track of the stats of many major league teams and players. I was a Yankees fan, and closely followed the careers of Mickey Mantle, Yogi Berra, Whitey Ford, Don Larson and others.
My interest moderated as my thoughts turned to cars and girls (not always in that order) and as I passed through the military and the establishment of my career--though I went to the occasional game and often watched a game on tv.

After I moved to the Stalag, and the unfortunately scandalous move of the Brooklyn Dodgers to Los Angeles, my apathy began turning to distaste--not so much for the game, but for the business of baseball. Read my earlier entry here, and follow the links therein if you want to learn more. It also gives other reasons for my fading interest in major league baseball.

Now, it seems that baseball is in the midst of another turn for the worse. It happens when a batter is hit by a pitch, and believes it's deliberate. He often runs out to the mound to beat up the pitcher for his offense. Of course, the catcher chases him in an attempt to stop him. This causes both entire teams to leave the dugout to run out to the mound to help their teammates.

I'm much more of a hockey fan. When this happens on the ice, it's accepted as merely part of the game. The National Hockey League has worked on stopping fighting in hockey, with some success--there are no more bench-clearing brawls in hockey. As an ex-player, I kind of miss that. Hockey players learn to fight on the ice almost from the time they first put on skates, and two-man fights still happen pretty often during the game.

Baseball players, on the other hand, don't seem to fight well. They usually look kind of clumsy and stupid gathered at the pitcher's mound, throwing punches that never land and grabbing at each other's uniforms. Too bad they don't just pair up and get to it.

Seriously, though, high-priced players can get hurt in these situations. Something ought to be done to stop brawling in baseball, even if it's just to put an end to these embarrassing shows of ineptness.

Here's my recommendation. It's been established that a major league pitcher can pitch a ball wherever he wants it--their control is incredible. Thus, I have to assume that when a pitcher hits a batter, it's because he wants to hit the batter. Thus, if a pitcher hits a batter chest-high or above, the umpire should award the batter with, not a walk to first base, as is now the practice, but with a home walk. That is, a walk around the bases to score, and to score all those already on base. Of course, if the batter placed part of his body into the strike zone and got hit, say, in the elbow, this would not be a walk at all, but a called strike.

That could give the offended team as much as a four-run boost and often might turn the game.

It'd be just about a certainty that this change would effectively put an end to bean balls.

Or, as an alternative, they could send baseball players to hockey camp and teach them how to fight bare-knuckle.

Love the sport, hate the business.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California