June 14 - Enough Larry, Enough Rasheed!

Enough is enough - I have had it with all this complaining that is coming from the Detroit Pistons bench and coach Larry Brown. It is unwatchable and it is just another reason why this is going to be the least watched NBA Finals since the games used to be shown on tape delay back in the early eighties. It is bad enough that the Pistons vigorously challenge every single call that goes against them but the latest effort is just too much. It seems the Pistons have come with empirical data that shows how successful they are with one set of referees and how poorly they do when other refs are involved. Save it Larry - this is basketball and not litigation. It is time for Brown and Rasheed to shut the fuck up and play basketball. Have you ever seen a championship team that is so obsessed with the quality of the officiating? This Pistons team has to be one of least emotionally sound I have ever come across. There is simply no mental toughness or accountability at work here. The Pistons aren’t a basketball team. They are a scorned and jilted chick. Enough already. The games are being called closely and the Pistons need to adapt. End of story.

What the hell was Philadelphia General Manager Ed Wade thinking when he agreed to give his shortstop - Jimmy Rollins - a five year contract extension that is worth $40 million. Granted, Rollins is still a kid, but this is a lead off guy who is hitting .260 with an OBP of just over .300. He has some pop and has cut down on his Ks, but $40 million? Jimmy should call up Colombians Edgar Renteria and Orlando Cabrera and thank them mightily for driving the price tag for solid but unspectacular shortstops up to stratospheric levels When I see a guy like Rollins get 5/40, I begin to wonder what Johnny Damon, perhaps the best lead off hitter in baseball - is going to get next December. And do you think Wade would have handed out such largesse three weeks ago before the Phils went on a 16-6 run? Back then, Wade was probably praying for his job and not too concerned about mortgaging the club’s future on a kid who had a nice 2004 but has done little this year to back it up. And now that Rollins is signed, what is Wade going to do with Pat Burrell who is just a year away from free agency? He is having a monster year and Wade will have to fork over big bucks if he wants to keep his left fielder in Philly after 2006.

Baseball Bytes: The Orioles weren’t busted, they just needed a little home cooking and a date with the Astros to get well. Larry Bigbie returned for the birds last night and got three knocks while Sammy remained hot and Senn Penn picked up his first MLB win. Morgan Ensberg strikes out way too much for Houston, but he has quietly smacked 15 bombs and is slugging over .550. Everybody assumes he is a blue blood with that ridiculous name but Morgan is actually a SoCal beach kid. The D-Train now has eleven victories after he shut down Chicago last night and that puts him on pace to win 28, which would be the most since Denny McClain won 31 in 1968. Trivia - who has the highest win total since McClain put up those 31 on his way to federal prison? One thing to keep in mind about this Marlins team - they haven’t played well of late and they still have an entire three game set to make up in Colorado. Two of those games are now scheduled for an off day early in August. That will surely put some pressure on a staff that has already chalked up a lot of innings.

The Red Sox were handed several cheap runs last night and that was more then enough for Matt Clement to chalk up his seventh win. Manny’s jack last night was gift wrapped but it feels like he is finally starting to get hot. His round-tripper came on a night when they memorialized the leftfield pole at Fenway as Fisk Pole. WEAK MOVE! Eric Milton got shelled for the Reds last night and his ERA is now hovering just below 8. Milty is running away with this year’s race to be 2005's worst off-season signing. Dontrelle and Pedro have gotten most of the attention, but the best pitcher in the majors right now is Toronto’s Roy Halladay. It isn’t even close. He completely shut down St. Louis last night while picking up his tenth win. Big Roy has now given up just four earned runs over his last 39 innings. With the win, the Jays moved 1.5 games ahead of their rivals from New York. Why in the world did the Devil Rays release Alex Sanchez? The guy was hitting well over .300 and that suggests he must have been a real pain in the ass behind the scenes. Jorge Cantu had three knocks for the Rays last night and he is quietly having a pretty nice year but Jorge, would it be too much to ask for a few walks. He has three free passes in more then 200 at bats. Alfonso Soriano jacked two long balls off Tim Hudson last night as the Braves hurler was unable to make it out of the third. The Braves are now just a game over .500 and it certainly feels like this team is about ready to collapse. The Braves remind me a bit of the German Army after the Battle of the Bulge. They have lost all their veterans, all their fuel and all their armor. What is left is a bunch of inexperienced kids who have no idea what it was like to play for a winning team. Chris Young is now 6-3 for the Rangers and is certainly a candidate to make the all-star team. Wouldn’t that be something if two Ranger starters were selected? The odds on that pre-season would have been something like 40-1.

It took a while, but Jose Contreras finally showed White Sox fans what he is all about. He gave up eight runs and four bombs in six innings last night. Has anyone in baseball been more productive then Dback Tony Clark? This clown is hitting .359 with ten home runs in only 117 at bats. This was arguably the worst player in baseball a few years ago and this year he is slugging over .700. That Scientology stuff must work. All good things must come to an end and that is what happened to the Nationals ten game winning streak last night. Vlad had a huge game against the Nats and he is now 9-16 since coming off the DL. Just imagine what will happen when Che Guerrero gets his timing back.

Trivia Answer - Robert Lynn Welch won 27 for the 1990 Oakland Athletics.

WFAN’s Mike Francesca has been getting away with a particular line for the past couple weeks that begs to be challenged. The Fat Man has been insisting that if given the opportunity, it is a layup for a contender to pull the trigger and take Barry Zito off Oakland’s hands. His thesis - Zito is young, left handed and already has a Cy Young sitting on the shelf. With credentials like that, the obese one thinks it’s a slam dunk. What lard ass forgets or disregards is that since Barry’s Cy Young year of 2002, the southpaw is 28-30 with an ERA around 3.90. Lard Ass couldn’t care less about these facts or the fact that Zito hasn’t been able to get a lefty out in two years. In fact, not only does he not care about these facts, but he is openly hostile when anyone suggests Zito is less then the pitcher he was a few years back. His repetitive refrain on this subject is nobody in their right mind could pass on a 27 year old lefty with Barry’s record. I wonder if wide load was saying the same thing about Fernando back in 1986. After all, in 1986, Fernanado was only 27 and sported a Cy Young and a 99-68 record. And what happened to Valenzuela from there on out? Well, he finished 14-14 the next year and never won more then 13 games after that. Wide load suggests that you can’t go wrong with a kid who has Zito’s track record but Fernando offers compelling evidence that proves him wrong. This is just another case of a pundit refusing to admit that a phenom may have lost it. What Francesca and other pundits are loathe to do is accept that you are what you are, not what you were. Zito may be able to pull it together in a new city, but this is certainly an open ended question, even though Lard Ass would like his listeners to believe otherwise. Perhaps if Mike watched Barry throw more then a couple of games a year, he might tone down the rhetoric.