July Is A Desert of Northwestern-Related Sports News

Summer has descended, the invincible Northwestern women's lacrosse juggernaut has unsurprisingly laid waste to all challengers, the Cubs' have plummeted into an unsurprising death spiral of injuries and the fact that the team is not very good to begin with, Carlos Zambrano has yelled at someone (the only reason why I would want to be a columnist for a Chicago sports newspaper would be to see how many times I could use that sentence as the lede in a sanctimonious demand to trade the hot-tempered hurler), and this blog will contain an unprecedented third straight reference to Kaiser Wilhelm II.

THE CUBS: A MASTERPIECE OF COMICAL BASEBALL INEPTITUDE


The Cubs' season is best summed up by this photo of reliever Jeff Samardzija getting
posterized by Albert Pujols in the first of Pujols's two consecutive walk-offs, which is
disappointing since he showed up to camp with eighteenth century count facial hair
which led me to believe that he would successfully fool batters with a series of
dastardly machinations and intrigue

Pretty much all that is left for Cubs fans is the hope for a truly epic Zambrano meltdown to make it worthwhile to even watch their games. As an avid amateur chronicler of Carlos Zambrano outbursts, I have to say I'm fairly disappointed at the miniature media frenzy that greeted his comments about Marmol's decision to throw a slider to Ryan Theriot in the Cubs-Cardinals series earlier this summer (as an aside, I'm really disappointed that Theriot did not get his hit off of Samardzija, because it would almost certainly lead to a replica of this conflagration-- in case you were wondering the number of times the hey this baseball player has early modern facial hair joke is funny it is decidedly less than two).

How can anyone be upset with a mere poor choice of words by Zambrano? Absolutely zero Gatorade containers were smashed with bats, not a one. As a Carlos Zambrano fan, I demand escalation, and this blog will no longer cover any Carlos Zambrano incident that does not involve him using some sort of anger-based sorcery to destroy every single Gatorade dispensing product within 3 square blocks of Wrigley Field, quenching neighborhood in an ocean of orange, lemon-lime, and blue, proclaiming he no longer answers to the authority of the umpires before ceremonially stripping the home plate umpire of his chest protector and giving it to the nearest bat boy, usher, or Ronnie Woo-Woo, and then disappearing into the clubhouse only to emerge riding a white stallion around the stadium as grateful patrons shower him with rose petals and valuables.

ANOTHER TIMELY UPDATE THAT HAS TO DO WITH KAISER WILHELM II

Many thanks to a sharp-eyed BYCTOM reader who sent me a spectacular article from New Zealand's Poverty Bay Herald from October 20, 1914 entitled "Is the Kaiser Insane? Russian Papers Quote Good Reasons." The article alleged that German prisoners, captured by Russian troops, divulged that the German press had not reported the Kasier's speech to rally the troops before the war:

Remember that the German people are the chosen ones of God. On me as German Empire the spirit of God has descended. I am His weapon, His sword, and his vice-regent. Woe to the disobedient. Death to cowards and unbelievers.

The article concluded that "Russian newspapers remark that his speech goes far to prove that the German Emperor is suffering from a familiar form of insanity."

What the article did not mention, however, is that I plan on using the final three sentences to end all presentations, job interviews, first dates, and casual conversations for the foreseeable future.

A medley of Kaiser hats, in order of aggression

RETURN OF THE NFL

Sound your ceremonial gongs, release the doves, and don your fanciest tunics, the NFL lockout is over. And, as if to compensate for subjecting fans to endless nonsense about arcane collective-bargaining nonsense, dozens of pictures of Jeff Saturday's suit collection, and an unfortunate reminder that the NFL is run by a cabal of tophat-wearing, cane-sporting plutocrats who spend most of their free time attempting to resurrect ineffective nineteenth century presidents in order to manipulate them into forming an unfathomable interlocking directorate that will allow them to take possession of the Moon and rotate amongst themselves for display in hastily constructed Moon atria in their favored summer palaces, the following week of free agency is going to be comically madcap.

The NFL players protested the lockout with a smart bulk
purchase of Soviet propaganda, giving them the ability to
denounce the owners as capitalists so greedy that they would
wear top hat/crown combinations, but occasionally mystifying
football fans with the poster on the right advocating that
"We will change the Soviet Republic of Azerbaijan into a
republic of abundant literacy"

Lost in the shuffle is the fact that two Northwestern players finally made it to the NFL after going undrafted. Quentin Davie will be heading to the Lions, hoping to contribute to their terrifying defensive front, while Corbin Bryant will be staying home with the Bears to join fellow Wildcat Corey Wootton. The Bears are also trying to re-sign Nick Roach lest they start the 2011 season with the unfathomable possibility of only having one Wildcat on their roster.

AN ANALYSIS OF THE RATIO BETWEEN INEPTITUDE AND COMEDY IN PROFESSIONAL SPORTS, WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO POSITION

The return of the NFL means that I can get excited about my favorite subplot of the 2011 season-- the camp battle between John Beck and Rex Grossman for the Washington Redskins' starting quarterback job.

As much as I enjoy Grossman's confusion at being handed a football helmet at
what appears to be the world's fanciest Lite Brite enthusiast convention,
Redskins fans should be more concerned about John Beck, who seems poised to
try to swindle dozens of them with counterfeit fan boat tickets

The reason why I'm so excited about this battle is because it further cements my theory that by far the funniest position in professional sports for someone to fail at is NFL quarterback. Every year, I run a fantasy football team that I call the Matt Millen Championship with the goal of putting together the most inept roster possible, and the idea of first overall pick Derek Anderson producing week in and week out, or taking a late round flier on Jimmy Clausen only to cheer as he fires pass after pass into the welcoming arms of the oppositions' defense, or racing to claim inexplicably starting Rex Grossman off the waiver wire makes me giddy.

Quarterbacks don't just have bad games. They self-destruct. They melt down. Maybe the only other position where comical meltdowns can occur is with crappy relief pitchers who usually have the decency to be morbidly obese or have stupid facial hair or extra digits (or, in the case of Antonio Alfonseca, have all of these combined).

Antonio Alfonseca, the platonic ideal of shitty relief pitcher. The photo at right was
supposed to be some sort of visual representation of the pouring gasoline onto the fire
cliche, but I admit that I got completely sidetracked google image searching for the
phrase "stuntman on fire" (it's mesmerizing) and then came across this bizarre
photograph of a man sprinting around on fire for a perfect number of spectators
(there are enough people there for people to know about it, perhaps through a blurb in
the local paper announcing "man to light himself on fire, flail around for our amusement,"
but not so big that it looks like it would be sanctioned by any sort of responsible organization).
It turns out that the man is Scotland's Keith Malcolm, valiantly setting a world record in
fire running, which apparently consists of donning a flame-retardant suit and then
seeing how long you can sprint, while on fire. I do not want to know how someone gets into
this activity or how the first record was set

There is something to be said about watching some guy waddle out from the bullpen, walk a couple of guys, and give up a backbreaking home run, but it is empirically less funny than a guy throwing interception after interception with a glazed look in his face. Goalies in soccer and hockey I suppose can also be subject to comical meltdowns, but their failures more often come from subtle lapses in their teammates that they have to do something utterly ridiculous and uncoordinated in order to be as funny.

PHILIPPINE PROFESSIONAL BASKETBALL

The NBA lockout is possibly even more depressing and almost certain to lead to the cancellation of at least part of the NBA season. Fortunately, NBA players stayed in the public eye by playing an exhibition in the basketball-mad Philippines against their staunchest opposition. I would say that this fact caused me to look into PBA basketball, but that would be a naked lie since I came to look up the league because I was curious as to what happened to Cedric Ceballos. Ceballos, a former All-Star Swingman, played for the venerable San Miguel Beermen of the Philippine Basketball Association in 2004, which is rare even for a globe-trotting NBA washout.

The best thing about the PBA is that teams take their names directly from their sponsor-- not content to veil team sponsorship with underhanded nonsense such as "Chicago Bears Football Presented by Bank One," the teams take their names directly from the product that they are associated with. This naturally leads to convoluted name changes as they are acquired by new companies or are shifted to promote different brands. The Beermen are now known as the Petron Blaze Boosters while also serving stints as Magnolia Quench Plus, and the almost unbeatable Magnolia Beverage Masters.

The Petron Blaze Boosters are owned by the ubiquitous San Miguel
Corporation, a large global conglomerate that does global
conglomerate things such as operating out of a giant plant
ziggeraut

The San Miguel Corporation owns two other PBA teams: the the Bangaray Ginebra Kings and the B-Meg Llamados, acquired in a merger with Purefoods. Unfortunately all of this corporate consolidation has created a nadir in Philippine Basketball team names. The B-Meg Llamados under Purefoods sported such spectacular names as the Purefoods Corned Beef Cowboys and, until last year, the Purefoods Tender Juicy Giants. The league this year sports significantly lamer teams such as the Powerade Tigers. The only fantastic names left are the Rain or Shine Elasto Painters or the Talk 'n Text Tropang Texters, which brings to mind a bench riddled with repetitive stress injuries to thumbs.

The Tender Juicy Giants jersey: a
casualty of corporate consolidation
if there ever was one

THERE IS NO NORTHWESTERN FOOTBALL NEWS YET

Stay tuned for occasional BYCTOM updates on Cub futility, European basketball championships, and any major breakthroughs in Kaiser-related topics in the coming weeks.

Wrigley Game

The possibility of a Northwestern-Illinois game at Wrigley Field heated up this week as Chicago Cubs president Crane Kennedy met with officials from both schools. According to this Sun-Times article, Coach Fitz remains hesitant about giving up a home game in front of what will certainly be an overwhelmingly pro-Illinois crowd.

Wrigley set up for Bears football-- the padding on the ivy gives it the feel of some sort of
jungle based arena league where you don't just play football but hunt the
ultimate prey: man

The argument about giving up a home game on the surface has merit, but on the other hand a decent Illinois team traditionally draws a crowd that dwarfs or at best matches the mustering of Wildcat fans at Ryan Field. More importantly, the Illinois-Northwestern rivalry is traditionally the worst rivalry in college football. A game at the Friendly Confines will surely provide the morale-boosting taunting, shouting, and potential drunken donnybrooks that will fuel this rivalry for years to come. More importantly, the game will attract both local and national attention to Northwestern football which may even distract from a media-created snit between Bears players rumored to equate teammates with various female genitalia. Giving up a home game is one of two ways to focus attention on the Land of Lincoln Trophy (the other involves dressing both coaches as Lincoln with Zook assuming the presidential beard and stovepipe hat look and Fitz as the younger clean-shaven Lincoln fist-pumping Stephen Douglas into a tiny submission).

A Wrigley Field game would give the Illinois-Northwestern game the cachet
and excitement depicted on this 1927 poster found at this blog full of vintage
football posters, including a 1936 clash between the Wildcats and the
Prisoner of Zenda

BASEBALL STEROIDS CONTROVERSY

This week, another bombshell broke in the never-ending national dirge about steroids in baseball as investigative reporters continued to name names and columnists began orgasmically quaking with moral outrage. The last round several rounds of outings have been spectacularly underhanded as players who thought they were submitting to anonymous tests have been ambushed by the pointed finger of the media. On the one hand, the test results continously demonstrate that the steroid problem has been endemic and that there absolutely nothing that anyone can do about it. On the other hand, it looks like it will continue providing hilarity as names continue to get leaked and eventually the steroid train gains enough momentum to crash resoundingly into the baseball's fortress of stodgy overreaction in the Hall of Fame.

The BBWA examines the credentials of a steroid-era player

The steroid scandal has pretty much everything one can hope for in a sports scandal: a posse of high horses riding out from major metropolitan newspapers, inevitable "what about the children" backlash, and the wonderful side effect that steroids occasionally made players develop comically swollen heads that has turned baseball fans into amateur phrenologists. The best part involves a player high-handedly denouncing steroid users before inevitably getting caught red-handed, like a bear reaching into a trap filled with salmon that would make it larger and more dangerously omniverous.

Rafael Palmeiro's "Never. Ever. Period." speech was the highlight of grandstanding
leading to invitable guilt, whereas Sosa attempted to make language learning a fun
adventure. According to this site, the text on Palmeiro's poster says: "Capital: I will
crush Soviet Russia in my fist!/But it only clenches its fist in impotent anger!"

Although one could probably become exhausted from the way that the steroid scandal is being played out in its predictable pattern of a leaked list, accusations, denouncements, tearing of the hair over the sacred history of a game marked by spitballing, sign-stealing, fake handshakes, trick mustaches, brawls, intentional vigilante beanings, segregation, Dominican birth certificates, and constant crotch manipulation in full view of polite society, the scandal has provided some bizarre sideshows. Take, for example, ex-White Sox pitcher Jim Parque's astounding 3,139-word confession to taking HGH printed in the Sun-Times last week. To say that Parque emerged from the shadows of anonymity granted to middle of the order pitchers is an understatement-- he tobaganned down from a Himalayan yurt of anonymity to a series of canoes, hand cars, dirigibles, and other obscure modes of transport in order to spray his mea culpa across the pages of a semi-reputable daily newspaper. In order to capture the full breadth of Parque's confession, I'll be placing it next to passages from Bukharin's confession of crimes against the Soviet state from his 1937 show trial:

Parque: I know that in admitting to this, I am a cheater, a villain and nothing more than a drug user in the eyes of the media and some fans.

Bukharin: I first of all wish to concentrate on my own theoretical anti-Leninist and anti-Marxist errors, in order to give a clear, general theoretical basis for the following exposition and in order not to repeat myself in my consideration of individual questions.

Parque: It was the sixth inning. There were two outs, and John Olerud was up. I had retired the last nine batters I had faced and was on my way to securing a Chicago victory. I threw a slider, striking him out looking, but I felt a pop in my left shoulder.

Bukharin: The substitution of dialectical flexibility and of the greatest degree of concreteness by abstract schemas of a renovated “theory of equilibrium”, with all assurances of mobile equilibrium, in reality meant a fixation on dead abstraction and stasis that hindered me from seeing the concrete changes in all of their multifarious and complex interweaving of appearances.

Parque: So, Kenny, as I have stated personally to you, I publicly apologize for putting you through what I did, mainly because you were the one responsible for giving me a chance. Your ability to separate the personal relationship we shared from business is a testament to why the White Sox won a World Series and have continued to be productive.

Bukharin: According to this notion the main road, the highway to the development of socialism in the countryside lay not through the productive unification of peasant households, but through a process of management, through attracting them by the market, by cooperation in trade, credit, the banking system, etc., during which the “kulak nests” would peacefully grow into socialism. In this way the most important question of the relationship between the proletariat and the peasantry was treated by me in a fundamentally incorrect manner.

Parque: Work harder, you say? Take vitamins and get in better shape? Did it, and I was rewarded with pathetic Triple-A stats, a fastball now in the low 80s and an average high school curveball.

Bukharin: Thus I was already beginning to create for myself cadres for the following struggle with the Party leadership headed by Stalin. In place were special ideological formulations, people, and their consolidation. The sense of closedness, fractional loyalty, conceitedness, anti-Party talks about Stalin’s supposedly low theoretical level, petty criticism, gossip and anecdotes about the leadership of the Party were made more serious by the fact that I, in a criminal manner, initiated the nucleus of this fraction to all the most intimate affairs of the Party leadership, acquainted this nucleus with secret Party documents of the CC, Politburo, Executive Committee and Presidium of the Comintern; I praised these young people and thereby corrupted them politically, sowed the seeds that would bring their own criminal fruit

Parque: I prided myself on working hard every day, eating properly and taking care of my body. For those of you who think otherwise, have you ever seen me in person? I stand 5-11 and weigh 185 pounds. I graduated high school at 5-5, 132 pounds. I looked like William Hung, another reason I spent many a dateless night in high school.

Bukharin: We gathered all possible information about the opposition to collectivization, about the various manifestations of peasant dissatisfaction, about the slaughter of farm animals, about the lack of bread, about the growth of price inflation, about various economic paradoxes (this was called “the economy rearing up”), we carefully gathered together facts such as that wagon-drivers were feeding their horses with baked bread because that was cheaper, etc. without end.


Jim Parque, mediocre baseball starter. Nikolia Bukharin, Bolshevik theorist,
communist fashion icon

Steroids in baseball are bound to continue popping up for quite some time. And, as each predictable revelation begets another round of breast-beating from baseball's self-proclaimed guardians, hopefully the Jim Parques of the world will come out of the woodwork and throw a monkey wrench in the proceedings until I get my wish of a Hércule-Poirot style j'accuse from one prominent player to another, igniting a hilarious Jose Mesa/Omar Vizquel-style blood feud that in the best of possible worlds involves Kyle Farnworth, leading to my surefire money-making scheme.