Baseballhead:
Oranges & Clemens

Michael Cox

This World Series edition of Baseballhead is brought to you by the networks' new fall season: What crap will they think up next?

So far, the story of the 2000 World Series -- er, sorry, World Series 2000 (why does everyone suddenly seem to think it's a better idea to put the year after the title?) is: Yankees win. Yankees (yawn) win. The ninth-best team in Major League Baseball this year is about to parlay three hot weeks into championship bragging rights.

Someone on our Heckler's Haven message board recently intimated that our coverage of the Yankees was somehow not "balanced." Well, "balance" is another word for making up reasons why something crappy is actually good. "Balance" is Bob Costas explaining the Yanks' ALCS win by claiming the Mariners were also battling the ghosts of Ruth, DiMaggio, and presumably Steve Balboni.

It's ESPN's Jayson Stark using every trick he learned in journalism school to convince you that Game 1 was not a festival of crappy offense and iffy pitching that went on two hours too long, but rather a classic that will be remembered even after humans of the future lose all recollection of spectator sports.

It's an endless procession of cable sports "personalities" who are confident that their three years as a bench player for the Padres leaves them well qualified to explain that the Yankees "just know how to win."

Well, some of us just know better. This latter group seems to include the American public,whose favorite TV show from New York on Sunday night featured Regis Philbin. However, there are numerous reasons to watch the remainder of this World Series, above and beyond those that our own Jason Michael Barker enumerated recently, including:

• Bobby Valentine may get kicked out of a game, then sneak back into the dugout disguised as RuPaul.
• Joe Torre may get excited at some point. You may be interested in just what that might look like.
• Blue Jays might announce seven-year, $200M deal for Shannon Stewart just before Game 5, causing Bud Selig to burst a blood vessel.
• As the series moves to Shea Stadium, those endless shots of celebrities on Fox will include Joey Buttafuoco and the guy who played "Urkel."
• The Mets just may come back, at which time the sky will be engulfed in flame, the Manhattan skyline will tumble into a fissure in the Earth's crust, and giant mantises with glowing red eyes will walk the Earth. How cool would that be?

But most of all, there could still be an altercation between Roger Clemens and Mike Piazza. Probably not, but maybe.

In case you were vacationing on the planet Noc-tar this past weekend, Clemens kept his nose clean, vis-a-vis parting Piazza's coiffure with the horsehide. However, the Rocket (no, not Maurice Richard) took offense when the...er...Piazza's bat broke in his direction. Apparently believing some hitters have the skill required to purposely send half a bat hurtling toward the pitcher, Clemens picked up the remnant and chucked it at Piazza's feet.

Later, Clemens said he "didn't know Piazza was coming up the line" on the hit, which turned out to be foul. Furthermore, he said he was just "tossing the bat towards the on-deck circle."

So let me get this straight: not only did Clemens somehow tune out the game situation around him (batter makes contact and starts up the line towards first), but he also suddenly lost all ability to throw an object anywhere near its intended target. And this happened as Clemens was looking right at Piazza. Yep, I believe that.

But not to fear, because the amazing super-geniuses at MLB headquarters are investigating. Mind you, they're also "investigating" the Blue Jays' signing of Carlos Delgado, Paul Abbott's brushback pitch thrown at Jorge Posada during the ALCS, and no doubt that three-way trade for Griffey reported on the Internet last year.

In fact, between these investigations and Selig's comical pronouncements regarding the state of MLB (when you approve three-minute commercial breaks between half-innings, don't blame the hitters for postseason game times), the Series' sideshow has been more fun than the games themselves.

And unfortunately, no matter how TV ratings blow this postseason, FOX will think their bright idea of using graphics that make mechanical noises (I warned you about this two years ago) were a masterstroke, and saved the Series from losing to 60 Minutes II. They'll think the American public loves having Tim McCarver yelling at them. And Bud Selig will blame it all on there not being a Game 7.

The reality is that a good, crisply-played game between two of the best teams in baseball (i.e., not the current two) with good, intelligent play-by-play (if you can, dial in Jon Miller's radio broadcasts) will win back viewers. Making the World Series an NHL-style playoff free-for-all, hyped as if it's the exciting season premiere of Ally McBeal and presented to us as if we're ten-year-olds, will do more to kill the game than another strike.

Or, on the other hand, perhaps the lineups could be peppered with WWF wrestlers. Let's see Clemens try and knock down "Stone Cold" Steve Austin...

about the author

Michael Cox something, something else, and that too. Noun verb adverb conjunction adjective noun at mc@strikethree.com. If the editor leaves this fake text as is, it'll appear on the same site that ran that picture with the caption, "Dummy Head."