Somewhat Manly Nerd

This is why the Mets might actually make the playoffs this year, and why the Yankees got eliminated from the playoffs tonight. This is why the Mets traded a bunch of prospects and paid millions of dollars for the jewel of the 2007 offseason, and why the Yankees are kicking themselves.

If it weren’t for Tim Lincecum being an extremely talented and dominant man-child, Johan Santana would be getting consideration for the NL Cy Young after tonight’s performance. He delivered in the biggest game of the Mets season so far, throwing the most pitches in his career.

125 pitches, 86 strikes, 8 IP, 10 K, 2 ER. Just what the Mets needed.

As the season has progressed, Santana has risen to the occasion. Earlier in the season, he came out after 7 innings and 100 pitches regularly, allowing the bullpen to blow game after game for him. Tonight, he did all in his power to stop that from happening. He even hustled out a potential double-play, which allowed Jose Reyes to hit a bases-clearing triple to make the score 6-2. Santana made sure the lead stuck this time, as he has been doing as much as possible lately. It seems he throws more and more pitches every outing, all while lowering his ERA at the same time. Even though his fastball has lost a few MPH, he’s as dominant as ever. I can’t think of another ace pitcher whose best pitch is a changeup.

The Yankees sure could have used him this year, what with their young guns totally flaming out and all. I’m sure they’ll pick up C.C. Sabathia or Ben Sheets or another free agent pitcher next year. God knows the market is the best in years. It’s just a shame they had to fuck up the last year of Yankee Stadium after over a dozen years in the playoffs. But I’m sure Jeter has enough ladies lined up to give herpes in October and A-Rod has some more trannies to bang. 

Meanwhile, the Mets are in the midst of another playoff race, and this time they have Johan. If this were last year, they would’ve trotted Tom Glavine out there tonight, and he would’ve shit the bed. Of course, it’s impossible to be confident after watching this team for so long, but it does give me a bit of piece of mind knowing Johan will be the pitcher on the mound for the last game of the season if the playoffs are on the line — and not Glavine.

This shouldn’t be the end. There’s no need for a new stadium beyond corporate greed. And even that has apparently gone too far, as I’ve read and heard rumblings of illegal dealings in regards to the funding for the new Yankee Stadium. Not that it matters, as the Yankees are going to be playing in the new place next year either way, and that’s a shame. 

I guess there’s always two sides to the same coin, though. The new stadium will look more like the OLD Yankee Stadium — the one before the 1970s remodeling — that older people think of when they hear Yankee Stadium. These people have said this current incarnation of Yankee Stadium isn’t the same anyway. But these people aren’t going to be around much longer! Everyone 40 and younger only knows Yankee Stadium in its current form. And it’s still the same place, not a completely new building across the street.

Every baseball fan — even ones that hate the Yankees — can’t deny the intimidating amount of history that has occurred inside Yankee Stadium. For 85 years, it has been the home of the most successful professional franchise in North American sports. It has played host to the greatest collection of ballplayers the sport has seen. It is the place of the most famous speech by an sporting figure (which I doubt will ever be topped, unless Derek Jeter contracts a mysterious deadly STD and has it named after him). Not to mention a ton of other shit that has taken place there, like 3 Papal visits, some soccer games with Pele, some boxing matches, “The Greatest Game Ever Played” (until last year’s Super Bowl), and approximately 2342738 brawls.

And tonight, the Yankees had to say goodbye to their “cathedral” knowing they won’t make the playoffs for the first time in 14 years. The Curse of A-Rod rears its head once again.

Metallica – Broken, Beat & Scarred

The Mets would be the best team in MLB if that were the case. I was going to look up the numbers, but I wouldn’t know where to look for something like that, and I want to write this as quickly as possible, before I get too crazy. I hate myself for thinking that having Billy Wagner would help this team right now. I just can’t believe that is true.

Today was a Mets game like two dozen others this year. The Mets had a 4-2 lead on the Braves going into the 7th, and Mike Pelfrey had run out of gas, walking the first batter. Then the bullpen wasn’t able to keep that runner from scoring. Not a surprise. But not a disaster either — that came in the next inning, when the Braves scored 4 runs, giving them a 7-4 lead. At one point, Keith Hernandez mumbled something incoherent under his breath. I wish I could’ve heard what it was. No doubt it had the word “suck” in it. I know I’ve said the Mets bullpen sucks enough this season. After last year’s debacle, maybe Omar Minaya should’ve worked a bit more on the bullpen. He got Johan Santana, but not the guys to finish games for him — as evidence by the SEVEN games that have been blown for Santana.

The bullpen needs to be cleansed. Ship Aaron Heilman the FUCK out of here. Scott Blowenweiss needs to go. Duaner Sanchez is done. Billy Wagner may never pitch again. Joe Smith and Pedro Feliciano are only good for lefty righty matchup bullshit, and even then they’re not that good. I guess the only guy I can say to keep is Stokes. I’m still on the fence with regards to signing K-Fraud, as I have to see what other bullpen help is out there to pick up. If the plan next year is to move Maine to the bullpen, then I definitely say no. Hopefully Kunz will pan out, even though he got his shit ruined this year. 

The other problem is that the Mets offense seems to score right off the bat and then takes the second half of the game off. And that’s why I had no hope of them coming back in the 9th. But then Carlos Delgado hit yet ANOTHER towering home run to cut the lead to one. Unfortunately, Carlos Beltran and Damion Easley followed that up with two strikeouts to end the game, eliciting Tomahawk Chops from the racist and borderline-retarded Atlanta crowd.

The Mets are now 1.5 games behind the Phillies in the NL East and 1.5 up on the Brewers in the wild-card. I hope I don’t leave Shea Stadium on Saturday with the Mets eliminated from the playoffs.

Edit: Looks like Jayson Stark did this post — complete with stats.

If that title wasn’t enough to convince you to watch this video, I don’t know what could.

Years from now, kids will know George Brett not as a Hall of Fame Royals player, but as that guy who likes to talk about shitting his pants.

I should’ve have written this two months ago — right after I had finished the book —  when everything was fresh in my mind. As it is, I’m pretty surprised that this book won a Pulitzer Prize. Not that I know anything about the Pulitzer Prize, but I didn’t think this ambitious historical and geographical book was all that great. One of my history professors didn’t seem too enamored with it, either. Jared Diamond should stick to those Subway commercials. I’m not quite sure why I should bother to write this, as anyone can just check it out on WIkipedia, but I feel like I can give my own entertaining and educational summary of this book. And I haven’t written anything related to print media in a long while.

If you think Europeans became the dominant group in humanity because of superior genes, you’re an ignorant asshole. Eurasia — in case you didn’t realize, Europe and Asia are really one big landmass — had the advantages when it came to large domesticable animals and crops. Not to mention the proximity to the birthplace of humanity in Africa. You may think Africa would’ve become the center of human civilization since we originated there, but that continent’s animals don’t take kindly to domestication. And it’s pretty fucking hot there, if you didn’t notice. 

The orientation of continents also plays a role, as Eurasia spans mostly east-west, while the others span mostly north-south. Australia doesn’t count. They were still in the Stone Age when England decided to ship criminals there because farming wasn’t particularly advantageous compared to hunting. Even though I saw multiple hilarious pictures of Aborigines in Guns, Germs, and Steel, I still think of The Road Warrior when I hear Australia. I try to imagine cool shit like that occurs all the time in the middle of the continent, unbeknowst to the civilized people on the coasts. 

(You can stretch those last two paragraphs to about 200 pages.)

Even though Europe eventually became the center of civilization, for arguably a bigger portion of human history the Middle East has served as the hub for human advancement, as evidenced by the Babylon, Egypt (might as well be the MIddle East), Persia, and the Byzantine and Ottoman Empires. The Middle East used to be the Fertile Crescent! But then the farming capabilities of the area were decimated by desertification to create the hell that many people now consider the Middle East to be. Dubai is trying to change that by going SimCity all over everyone’s ass, but we’ll see how that turns out. Their financial planner is probably popping up every 2 minutes to annoy the shit out of them. If it weren’t for the desertification, the Middle East could easily still be the dominant force in the world, with the rest of us resorting to terrorist attacks on them. And Israel would certainly not exist. The Middle East — in addition to its head start in terms of native crops and animals — has central location in between Europe, Asia, and Africa, creating a whirlwind of cultural diffusion. And we all learned in school how cool and helpful cultural diffusion is! If only they knew of the growing menace that is anime…

And oh yeah, China was always so isolated because of geography. Actually, that’s just the whole book in a nutshell. GEOGRAPHY. Maybe already knowing my geography fairly well diminished the amount of satisfaction I could’ve possibly garnered from this book. Ok, so there was actually some discussion of social evolution in terms of different sizes of human groups, but I just did not find it all that enthralling. If you’re into reading about how a tribe handles growing from 5,000 to 20,000, maybe this is the book for you. I rather just read my 322nd science-fiction story in a row. More Philip K. Dick here I come!

Oh wait, I need to study financial mathematics instead.

I don’t know if these deserve their own post. I don’t know if it’s such a good idea to now have 6 GIFs on my front page. But I’m doing this anyway.

Less than 24 hours, people. 

Enough about the Mets. Let’s talk about something that’s actually good (which reminds me — I totally forgot to watch The Shield tonight, shit). Season 4 of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia starts on Thursday, Sept 18th, at 10 pm. Watch, or I will smash your face into a jelly.

I’ve made numerous posts about the show on here. And also made the first thread about it over on GAF (too bad it got only 15 replies ) I’ve just tried my best to inform the public about the funniest show on television. But now Hulu makes my job pretty easy. I can just point you to great episodes and clips. And if you like them, you can watch basically the entire series on there! And if you don’t, get the fuck off my blog.

Clips:

Night Man (I’ve already made a blog post dedicated to this)

He’s a Bear

Episodes:

Charlie Wants an Abortion

The Gang Finds a Dumpster Baby

And for the people who love the show, here’s an interview with the A.V. Club. I highly recommend it for fans and newcomers alike.

That should be enough to get you started. Allow me to close with a GIF displaying what I am doing in anticipation for Thursday’s premiere.

The Mets are now a 1/2 game back of the Phillies. I’m pretty sure they were 3 1/2 games ahead just 6 days ago. That’s an even quicker collapse than last year, comparatively. At this rate, they would’ve blown that 7 game lead in only a dozen games instead of 17.

Fortunately, they do have 12 games left this time. The season isn’t over. There’s still a chance that somehow the Mets will figure out how to beat the Nationals in the two weeks of the season. Maybe Ryan Howard will stop hitting home runs. Maybe the Brewers will continue their best impression of the 2007 Mets. And maybe I’ll actually study tomorrow instead of watching the Mets lose again.

The saddest part about this is that Mets fans have already lost heart (at least when it comes to baseball, they still love stacking cups). ItI’m a miserable, pessimistic bastard in almost every aspect of life, but apparently I’m not alone in thinking the Mets are destined for another October at home. During tonight’s SNY broadcast, the text poll was the following:

Where will the Mets finish?

Division Winner 32%
Wild Card Winner 12%
Out of Playoffs 56%

That’s faith right there. If the Mets don’t make the playoffs, they won’t have to demolish Shea Stadium — fans will burn it to the ground.

The best thing I ever remember happening is a fight breaking out at Yankee Staidum and someone yelling, “Kick his ass, Seabass!” Actually wait, no. It was watching an entire crowd throw shit on the field at John Rocker in his first appearance at Shea Stadium after those 7 Train comments. And the guy sitting behind my dad and I holding an effigy of Rocker. As a 14-year-old, that was totally awesome. Seeing Rocker get booed mercilessly on consecutive nights years later while pitching for the Long Island Ducks was pretty great too.

But enough of my shitty stories. This video tops all of that garbage. There should be a plaque put in Citi Field commemorating this amazing event. Even though it’s a long video, I highly recommend watching the entire thing, as it only gets better as it goes along. I would also like to remind you that hundreds of people in the Shea Stadium crowd were watching this. Keep that in mind while you watch this guy being used as practice for the World Series of Cup Stacking.

As always, thank you Deadspin.