Remember Rinku and Dinesh? Those Indian reality TV show contestants who can throw kind of hard, but not really, but that’s still good enough to get you a contract with the Pirates? They finally got some game action yesterday.
Rinku Singh got knocked around a little in his inning of work; Dinesh Patel was better. And neither embarrassed themselves or the Pirates organization, which is a moral victory for everyone. And, as always, the two recapped their afternoon in hilarious broken English on their blog.
Just what the Mets needed: As their team bus pulled into Pittsburgh Wednesday night for today’s makeup game with the Pirates, they were greeted not by smiling bellhops at the Westin Hotel, but by that city’s annual convention of furries — Anthrocon ‘09 — which celebrates those who enjoy dressing as animals. If you’ve seen “The Shining,” how can you forget the scene in which Shelley Duval breaks in on two people in mouse costumes in one of the hotel rooms? That still haunts my dreams. Yep, furries.
All of this pretty much freaked out SNY broadcaster Kevin Burkhardt, who encountered several furries at the hotel and has been tweeting about it all day. But for real hilarity, take a look at this transcript of a conversation between Gary Cohen and Keith Hernandez during the game on SNY just a couple of hours ago: Read more…
For a decade and a half, the Pittsburgh Pirates have been one of the worst teams in professional sports. While lots of finger pointing and laughing has been spent on small-market jokes, the Pirates’ unprecedented run of futility has gone largely unnoticed and unmocked, even as the Chicago Cubs - among others - used the Pirates as their own private farm system.
(PNG at PNC.)
That seemed to change last week when the Pittsburgh Pirates dealt their only legitimate All-Star, Nate McLouth, to the Atlanta Braves this week for a handful of prospects. The Pirates were maybe sorta kinda starting to look like a real Major League Baseball team for the first time in years, and McLouth was seen as the team’s backbone and leader. Sensing a growing public relations disaster, Pittsburgh general manager Neal Huntington“penned” a letter to his team’s few remaining fans. Turns out, Huntington’s as good at PR as he is at putting together winning baseball teams.
Credit the Atlanta Braves for knowing how to manage a news cycle. They flipped three prospects to the Pittsburgh Pirates for Nate McLouth to answer the need for outfield help (which they failed to answer correctly the first time by not signing Adam Dunn in the offseason), and called up Tommy Hanson (pitching phenom) and sent down Jordan Schafer (outfielder phenom) and look at all the exciting news!
(Nate McLouth: interstate man of mystery no longer)
Braves GM Frank Wren swears it’s not about the money - which always means it’s about the money. McLouth is actually fairly inexpensive through 2011 with a club option for 2012 if he’s worth $10 million, but the team is replacing three minor league salaries with a major league one (roughly speaking).
Glavine will look for another job and has a decent chance of finding one if the price is right for a desperate franchise. However, no franchise has shown enough desperation to hook up with Sammy Sosa since Baltimore began its bizarre fascination with Chicago Cubs outfielders in 2005 and Texas took Sammy out around the block in 2007.
Some will celebrate their last chance to moralize about him before his Hall of Fame eligibility kicks in. Others will tell Sammy to put a cork in it because they’re sick of him. The best recommendation? Smash a boom box with a baseball bat. It’s like an aural piñata!
Finally, the U.S. Men’s National Soccer Team squirted the bed in a simply filthy manner last night in San José, Costa Rica. The U.S. squad gave up two goals in the first 15 minutes of a World Cup qualifier to Costa Rica at the notoriously difficult Saprissa Stadium (banned: alcohol, batteries, and coins) on their way to a 3-1 thumping that wasn’t remotely that close.
(A Costa Rican Superman? Well, that explains a lot)
The bastard out there at ESPN that thought it would help ratings if they jammed Jon & Kate Plus 8 in front of U.S. keeper Tim Howard instead delivered a showing that led the Galavision announcers to chastise the Costa Ricans for not stomping on the throats of the Americans even more and to compare one goal in particular to stealing candy from a baby.
(Actual photo of attempted defensive wall)
Because of two silly yellow cards received by two U.S. players, the American team will be short two people when they play against Honduras at Soldier Field in Chicago Saturday, in what promises to feel like an away game with maybe 25% of the 60,000 fans cheering for Uncle Sam’s boys. If the U.S. doesn’t earn three points with a win, there’s a very real chance they could miss next year’s World Cup in South Africa.
If U.S. coach Bob Bradley is still looking for a left back that has never played there before in a crucial situation, why not call on Tom Glavine? He’s available; he’s a winner; he’s looking for a job. At worst, he can help heave batteries back into the crowd at a gentle 83 mph.
One old baseball man who tabled his moment in the sun: Randy Johnson. His first attempt at 300 wins in D.C. last night got washed out by Mother Nature (whom Randy went to elementary school with) and will be played today at 4 pm ET with Mr. Unit on the mound.
Also filed under “not living up to expectations and therefore open to criticism”, please note the Serena Williams entry created when she lost in the quarterfinals. She showed up to the French Open out of shape mentally and physically, choosing to wear outfits that accentuated the latter and threw snit fits that proved the former. The only person this “athlete/actress” is cheating is herself.
Perhaps Serena just needs the proper motivation, just like this young lady race driver does: win a race, get a lawn mower.
It’s unclear what would motivate you and 13 of your closest friends to spend $15,000 on a suite for two Cleveland Indians games and one Cleveland Browns game, though. Perhaps you have a pathological fear of germs transmitted by $100 bills.
In other legal news, Yahoo! sues the NFLPA for their shot at fantasy stats sans royalties, same as CBS Interactive. Please remember to send the Players Association one dollar every time you think of an NFL player. (This should leave you free to think about Vince Young all day.)
The WNBA pushed back their season two weeks to accommodate the schedules of Russian and European women’s leagues instead of the other way around. So we’ll be taking the WNBA seriously any day now.
A José Lima sighting is a cheap excuse to run this photo again with zero apologies required:
Just when you thought things couldn’t get any weirder in sports crime - O.J. Simpson still hasn’t found his wife’s killer but we can’t be assured that Dirk Nowitzki’s baby momma didn’t have something to do with it - former NFL linebacker Eric Naposki is arrested for being the gunman who killed Newport Beach (Calif.) millionaire William McLaughlin. If you’re looking for more information on him, don’t check his former teams. The Patriots have already spiked his former alumni player page.
According to the ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER, Naposki — who was the paramour of McLaughlin’s girlfriend, Nanette Johnston — shot McLaughlin six times in an infamous 1994 slaying that sent shockwaves through the Southern California socialite circles and the medical aristocracy, since McLaughlin was the man who invented the process to separate plasma from blood.
Naturally, the case is being buried underneath all the Vick attention, but it’s a truly stunning turn of events. This is a cold case 15 years old, and suddenly dual arrests, one of which goes to a guy who played for both the Patriots and Colts in the late 1980s? Didn’t see that coming.
Then again, who saw the Magic win coming, either? After watching Cleveland breeze through its first two playoff series, sitting at home while waiting for the Celtics and Magic to finish beating each other up. When they finally returned to action on Wednesday, they jumped out to a lead, though that didn’t do anything to give them a win. No, instead, the Cavs dropped their first game of the playoffs, raising serious questions over whether the cast around LeBron James can keep up with Dwight Howard and a Magic team that looks more and more playoff tested.
Speaking of basketball, the Lakers are still in the playoffs, but they’re hardly the biggest basketball story going on in their own city. Ok, maybe they are the biggest story in L.A., but the Clippers are stealing some of their thunder, for good and bad reasons. First, they win the NBA Draft Lottery for the right to pick Blake Griffin. Then, less excitingly for fans of the red and blue (are any left?), is this incredibly damning portrait of owner Donald Sterling, who looks like a bigger and bigger racist with each article that gets published.
The most recent accusations were lobbed by ESPN The Magazine, which we tripped across via DEADSPIN, and they go into scary detail about his slumlording and overt racism in granting the right to live in his shantytowns. Here’s your gratuitous over-the-top pullquote, courtesy Mr. Sterling’s written records themselves (no one told him about this new invention called a “shredder”?)
When Sterling first bought the Ardmore, he remarked on its odor to Davenport. “That’s because of all the blacks in the building, they smell, they’r enot clean,” he said, accoding to Davenport’s testimony. “And it’s because of all the Mexicans taht just sit around and smoke and drink all day. He added: “So we have to get them out of here.” Shortly after, construction work caused a serious leak at the complex. When Davenport surveyed the damage, she found an elderly woman, Kandynce Jones, wading through several inches of water in Apartment 121. Jones was paralyzed on the right side and legally blind. She took medication for high blood pressure and to thin a clot in her leg. Still, she was remarkably cheerful, showing Davenport pictures of her children, even as some of her belongings floated around her.
Can’t David Stern steal back the top pick? I mean, top media market aside, is it really worth putting a talent like Blake Griffin in L.A. if it means helping Sterling make money? We’re certainly not sure it is.
Meanwhile, it was only a matter of time until the floodgates about Milton Bradley conspiracy theorists came out of the woodwork. Well, consider them here to stay, after two radio hosts on Chicago station THE SCORE debated whether Bradley was a good contributor for the Cubs. Not surprisingly, the takes of the two hosts were vastly different, though the boiled down to once major concern: Is Bradley a clubhouse cancer? Or is he just infairly maligned by the media?
The issue at heart is a legitimate one, since the media continues to trot out a ditribe about how Bradley brings only negatives to a team. According to analysis from MOUTHPIECE SPORTS, which we’ve always heard and read as well, Bradley is actually known as a terrific teammate, by Jake Peavy, Carlos Zambrano, Ryan Theriot and, most recently, Bobby Scales.
That sure makes it seem like Bradley is the victim of unfair media criticism, though who really knows with a guy so volatile he rips an ACL while arguing a call at first base. Not third or home, first. Yet that in itself seems to prove that he’s got a lot more passion that he’s getting credit for, so we’re not sure what Matt Abbacatola was talking about. Do you?
Evidently Larry King’s “Shattered Glass”-esque story about horse racing was only the latest episode in his career of lying about famous sporting events and moments. Paging you, Mr. Sandy Koufax.
Is it possible that Tony Kornheiser is just a jerk? We all know that Joe Theismann hated him. Did Mike Tirico burn out on him, too?
Speaking of Theismann, we’re sorry, but we can’t get enough of this whole Keyboard Cat fad, and if we don’t use this now, we’ll never get a chance to. Sure it’s macabre, but then there’s a cat! Playing a keyboard!
SI decides hockey is just relevant enough to compile a list of the sports most rugged players. Thanks SI. Of course, it is a pretty solid list, considering the fact that Owen Nolan is near the top. That’s all we needed to know.
And, just for good measure, the first triple play of the MLB season. If you had the Texas Rangers in your pool, congratulations. You probably got good money on them, too.
Even with the Orlando Magic leading the Boston Celtics by 17 midway through the fourth quarter in Game 7 of their Eastern Conference semifinal, you may have had an uneasy feeling in your stomach that it was a big set-up to a massive, heartbreaking, Stan Van Gundy-firing collapse. Of course Boston was going to make a run - especially with Dwight Howard sitting with five fouls. The only question was how badly would the Magic collapse.
After all, they had blown a 14-point lead in Game 5 of the series, and almost let a 28-point cushion slip away in Game 1, so why not save the “best” for last? And sure enough, after Ray Allen hit a three-pointer with 4:12 to play, the Celtics had cut the lead to 12 and were poised to make something happen. So, of course, there was only one man the Magic could turn to in their hour of need.
That’s right, Mr. Pizza Man himself, Hedo Turkoglu. Maybe the grease on his fingers from his pregame meal of pizza put extra spin on the ball, but he was out of his mind in Game 7, especially when the Magic needed him most. He responded to Allen’s three-pointer with one of his own, and then hit a fallaway jumper on the next possession to get the lead back to 17. Maybe he’s a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle, and pizza is his spinach?
After that, it was time for the Celtics to pull Allen and Paul Pierce for a final round of applause, and bring in the scrubs. (Otherwise known as “Gabe Pruitt Time!”) As for the Magic, they haven’t been this far since the Shaq and Penny days, so you can excuse the people of Orlando if they don’t exactly act like they’ve been there before.
So the NBA didn’t get the Cavaliers vs. Celtics match-up they were craving, but their consolation prize is nice: the most dominant big man in the game (Dwight Howard) vs. the most dominant anything in the game (LeBron James). As for Bron-Bron and the Cavaliers, you can see that they were clearly concerned about who they would play:
Let’s see Van Gundy draw up a defense for that.
As the NBA’s reigning champs were dethroned, the current NFL champs get ready to enjoy one of their spoils on Thursday: the traditional meeting with the President in front of the White House. But NFL Defensive Player of the Year James Harrison won’t be joining them. No, he doesn’t have a pressing personal emergency, and it’s not a political protest. His reason is a little more complex than that:
“This is how I feel — if you want to see the Pittsburgh Steelers, invite us when we don’t win the Super Bowl. As far as I’m concerned, he [Obama] would’ve invited Arizona if they had won,” said Harrison.
So let me get this straight: Harrison is upset because he thinks that Barack Obama is playing favorites and only inviting the Steelers because they won the Super Bowl and not because he’s their biggest fan? Apparently he didn’t see the bitchin’ helmet tattoo that the President got before the playoffs, or the new paint modifications he made to Air Force One once he took office:
Finally, the Stanley Cup playoffs started their conference finals on Sunday, and the Detroit Red Wings gave the upstart Chicago Blackhawks a welcome to big time hockey with a 5-2 thumping in Game 1 of their series. But the big story was almost something far darker, as the Blackhawks’ Adam Burish narrowly escaped a Richard Zednik/Clint Malarchuk moment when his neck was clipped by the skate of teammate Ben Eager.
Unlike the other two players, Burish only received a minor nick that didn’t require stitches. Still, he knows how lucky he was:
“I don’t know how my head was still connected there,” Burish said. “I saw his skate. It was like he did a figure skating move. He lifted his skate up and I just watched it go over my neck.”
If only they made some sort of device that could protect hockey players in case a blade happens to catch them in the neck. A “neck protector,” if you will. But I guess that’s just crazy talk.
THE STATE says South Carolina baseball player Casey Rihn allegedly learned the hard way why you don’t keep hitting the back of a police car with your hands when you are walking around drunk at 2 a.m.: you can wind up arrested after the cop in your car turns your face into Hamburger Helper on the ground.
I guess that Usain Bolt’s OK after the foot surgery following his car crash: The AP says that in his first meet back in Manchester, England, he set the world record in the 150 meters at 14.35. Yeah, he even has the world record for a race no one runs now.
Walls? After you’ve been through the kind of hell Josh Hamilton has, walls are nothing. Actually, the DALLAS MORNING NEWS says that the wall was a pretty decent adversary for the Rangers’ outfielder, as he suffered a mild groin strain while making a game-saving catch against the Angels.
Dear Bruno Junqueira: Thanks for qualifying our car for the Indianapolis 500 - we really appreciate it. But we hope you don’t mind that we’re pulling you from the ride and replacing you with Alex Tagliani. It’s nothing personal - it’s just that he’s our main driver and all, and he failed to qualify. Best, Conquest Racing. P.S. Please return your driving suit to us by 5 p.m. or you lose the deposit.
Manchester United wrapped up the English Premier League crown this weekend, but the biggest story might be the plight of former soccer heavyweights Newcastle United. As the TELEGRAPH reports, their 1-0 loss to Fulham puts them on the edge of relegation to soccer’s minor leagues, as they need a win in their final game to stay in the EPL.
NFL fans who don’t get the NFL Network might finally be in luck: SI’s Peter King says that the league is closing in on a deal with Comcast to make the network available on the regular digital cable package. Finally, I won’t have to pay a premium for my daily dose of Rich Eisen.
TROY NUNES IS AN ABSOLUTE MAGICIAN sat down with new Syracuse football coach Doug Marronefor an interview, but not during breakfast if their arteries know what’s good for them. After all, Marrone claims that he once ate “42 pancakes with two sticks of butter…or a stick and half of butter…no, two sticks of butter and a thing and a half of maple syrup. I take pride in what I can eat.”
As if the Colorado Rockies didn’t have enough problems with the Pittsburgh Pirates taking two of three against them over the weekend, BUGS & CRANKS says that they even had to dodge bats kicked at them by the umps.
It was apparently “Dress Like A Banana Day” in San Francisco for the Giants’ game against the Mets, but THE SPORTS HERNIA says that Jon Miller was the only person in the ESPN broadcast booth to get the memo:
What’s more American than baseball? The CHARLOTTE OBSERVER has an answer: beer and baseball. Since a local ordinance was changed allowing them to sell beer on Sundays, the minor league Charlotte Knights have seen attendance for Sunday home games go up by 30 percent.
The Major League Baseball season is well underway. But you wouldn’t know it by the lack of bodies filling the seats at big league ballparks.
As the first month of play winds down, MLB teams are facing some sobering stats when it comes to attendance. Across the board, from D.C. to NYC, stadium seats sit unoccupied. And it seems that even shiny new ballparks aren’t incentive enough for fans to want to be taken out the ballgame.
It was an incredibly tumultuous night in Cleveland, and the Cavaliers losing to the Wizards was the least shocking news of the night. (Although as the WASHINGTON POST’s Michael Lee points out, Washington joins the Lakers and Celtics as the only teams to beat Cleveland twice this season.) Yes, it’s not often that the best team in the league loses to the worst team in the league, but the Wizards are a unique case, with Gilbert Arenas and Brendan Haywood finally back playing after missing almost all of the season with injuries.
No, most of the evening drama in Cleveland involved the Browns. First came some fallout from Jay Cutler’s trade to the Bears, specifically reports that Cleveland had tried to work out a three-way deal with the Broncos and Redskins that would have sent Brady Quinn to Denver and Jason Campbell to Cleveland. Browns coach Eric Mangini spent Thursday night denying these reports; expect Quinn to demand a trade because the Browns tried to trade him sometime within the next week.
And later in the evening, there was news in the DUI manslaughter case against Browns WR Donte Stallworth, and it was more than just his first appearance at a court hearing. It turns out that Stallworth was already in the NFL’s substance abuse program at the time of his arrest, which opens him up to a whole range of punishment from the league. Of course, he’s facing charges that could land him in jail for at least eight years, and having a history of substance abuse issues is not going to help his case, so I’d say that Roger Goodell is the least of Stallworth’s problems right now.
Meanwhile, there were no problems at the opening of the Hard Rock Cafe Yankee Stadium yesterday, just a lot of unintentional comedy as reported by MLB.COM. What do I mean? How about Yankees’ Executive Vice President Hal “The Pretty One” Steinbrenner joining rock stars/C-list celebs with nothing better to do Ace Frehley of KISS, Scott Ian and Frank Bello of Anthrax, Darryl “DMC” McDaniels, Bernie Williams and members of the Seminole Nation to smash guitars instead of cutting a ribbon. And yes, this means rock and roll is officially dead.
(Oh yeah, “Late Show With David Letterman” band drummer Anton Fig was there, which only means one thing: even Paul Shaffer had too much dignity to show up to this thing.)
Other news while you were rioting in the streets of State College to celebrate Penn State’s NIT victory:
As PUCK DADDY notes, it must be like getting their hearts ripped out all over again for Hartford Whalers fans to see a Hurricanes jersey with the Whalers’ logo (and a God awful color combination). Although I’d love it if the Ravens wore Browns jerseys for “Turn Back The Clock” day against Cleveland.
While the Jay Cutler trade solved one long-running NFL saga, the Anquan Boldin/Arizona Cardinals mess continues to fester. The latest comes from NFL.COM which reports that Boldin told a Florida radio station that he would “love to” play in his home city of Miami.
I had hoped that the America’s Cup had gone the way of 1980s fads like The Lambada, Swatches and The California Raisins. But apparently it’s still happening, and it’s now the focus of lawsuits involving people with more money than they know what to do with. The AP has the latest news, as software tycoon Larry Ellison and his boat “Oracle” have won the right to challenge the current Cup holders, Judge Elihu Smails and his boat “The Flying Wasp” (seen below at its coronation):
If you’re a former NFL player who gets arrested on drug charges, you would hope that the headlines wouldn’t call you “forgettable.” But that’s just how NBC DALLAS FORT WORTH described former Cowboy Leonardo Carson, arrested yesterday on intent to sell charges, and I’ll be damned if they aren’t right.
Now that Tim Floyd has turned down Arizona, TUCSON CITIZEN columnist Anthony Gimino wants to know if there’s anyone left who wants the Wildcats’ coaching job. May I make a suggestion: Former Baylor coach Dave Bliss is available and ready to talk. Sure, he’s got a checkered past, but the guy knows how to win. Barring that, perhaps Jerry Tarkanian is available.
I can’t imagine why parents in Shenendehowa, NY are upset to find out that a part-time track coach had his teaching license revoked 11 years ago after an alleged sexual abuse case. WTEN-TV says that while Don Paretta was not convicted, he admitted to giving a former student a note at graduation saying he would “miss the student’s face and body.” And this guy coached pole vaulting: let the jokes commence.
According to the NEWARK STAR-LEDGER, Boston College DT B.J. Raji - a projected Top 10 pick in the NFL Draft - committed a crime worse than scoring single digits on the Wonderlic test: he reportedly flunked a drug test at the NFL Combine.
Finally, HOME RUN DERBY sends a hearty congratulations to Manatee Community College, which defeated the Pittsburgh Pirates 6-4 yesterday. Yes, those Pittsburgh Pirates, as in the “allegedly major league Pirates.” Bill Mazeroski would be rolling in his grave, if he were dead.
The 17-year-old son of former Pittsburgh Pirate Al Martin was found in a friend’s Scottsdale, AZ, apartment Monday morning unable to wake up. Brandon Martin was rushed to a local hospital, where he was declared dead. There were no signs of trauma on Brandon, a senior at Scottsdale Chaparral High School. However, there have been no results released regarding cause of death.
Brandon Martin was a football player at Scottsdale Chaparral and hoped to continue playing football at the college or junior college level next fall after helping his team make the 4A-I title game last season. He had not been ill to his family’s knowledge. Family and friends describe Martin as “easygoing” and “full of spirit”. Read more…
So they handed out a bunch of awards last night, and frankly, we don’t care. Until the “Academy” lifts their de facto ban on nominating sports movies with animals as the lead, we’re boycotting the Oscars and we think you ought to as well.
(Sweeping the Oscars in our hearts.)
And as if you needed further proof, The Wrestler, which was probably the best sports movie since Air Bud 2: Golden ReceiverRudy, was snubbed entirely by the Academy last night, as traditional Oscar-bait roles like “impoverished underexposed foreign minority” and “socially stigmatized overachiever” took center stage for the 90 millionth year in a row. But for Mickey Rourke and us, we’ll always have his exuberant speech from the Spirit Awards, which features insanely NSFW speech.
Oh yeah, he definitely did roids.
And there was one other nice sports moment at the Academy Awards: Will Smith, tripping over some pedestrian-at-best lines from the teleprompter, goes boom:
(”Nope, I see nothing wrong with 30 shots and 5 assists.”)
But back in the real world, we had another big individual performance: Dwyane Wade dropping 50 on the Magic. One problem–none of the rest of the Heat decided to show up, and Orlando ended up blowing Miami out, 122-99. Dwight Howard was the man for the Magic once again with 32 and 17… and this 75-foot shot, which didn’t count but makes me feel like it somehow should have. If you needed more evidence that going Berzerker like this was actually a bad idea on Wade’s part, the Heat are now 0-4 when Wade scores at least 44 points. The Eastern Conference is dutifully taking notes on giving D-Wade the long jumper all night long.
(Welcome back, man! But about those cornrows…)
And speaking of notes for the Eastern Conference, Delonte West is back for the Cleveland Cavaliers, and that is bad, bad news for everyone else. The Cavs dispatched the Pistons, 99-78, in a game that wasn’t really that close at all; the Cavs led 67-34 at the break (!!!) and coasted to a jarringly easy win. West led all scorers with 25 points, including a 5-5 performance behind the arc.
Remember the murder of Eddy Curry’s ex-girlfriend and their daughter? The man her family (and Eddy’s son) had been swearing was the killer has finally been arrested.
One of the guys fighting for the starting QB spot at Nebraska just decided to transfer amid ominous “really can’t go there” language. Yeah, the NFL’s going to love that dedication; great idea, man.
The Florida president thinks Urban Meyer’s the kind of guy who’ll just “burn out and quit” from Florida instead of taking another coaching job. To be fair, coaching a football team and fighting the Joker at the same time is both physically and emotionally taxing.
Name one sports announcer who can say “this bitch didn’t mean a thing to me”(skip to 6:33 in the video) and not only make it remotely SFW, but totally get away with it. If you said anybody but Don Cherry, set yourself on fire.
New disease you really wish you didn’t know existed, but thanks to sports, you now know about and can never ever forget: Eye cancer! DOUBLE FATAL ILLNESS BONUS: Same guy was the first major leaguer to wear an insulin pump on his belt. Dude, just admit it: God hates you.
Garret Anderson signs a 1-year deal with the Braves after spending a long career with Anaheim. This is like when Willie Mays finished his career with the Mets, except if Willie Mays had like 1 good year instead of 15.
