don't quit, don't even quit.

In Case You’re Confused (Which You Definitely Are)

I spend more time than I would like doing the following 2 things:

• Listening to bad sports commentary
• Hearing about Brett Favre

As you can probably guess, the former has a lot to do with the latter, especially when watching a Minnesota game. See, sports commentators, I hate Brett Favre. A lot. And I know you don’t because you appreciate fundamentals, or because you’re old, or maybe because you’re white, and very definitely because talking about Brett Favre helps you fill miles of column inches/tv minutes during the NFL off-season. And because of this you seem not to understand why I hate him, which I get. But in order to alleviate some of the time I spend doing the things on that list up there and to help free up more of your time to be angry about steroids or whatever else you do, I would like to explain.

I do NOT hate Favre for the following reasons:

• Because he is not good at throwing a ball across a field
• Because he is “too old” or “washed up”
• Because he doesn’t have enough love for the game of football

So all the time you spend reminding me that he is a great quarterback (arguable) or chastising me for thinking old people should go off and die alone (possibly, that’s probably dependent on what happens with those death panels Obama likes so much), or how awesome it is to watch someone play who really cares (how you can see any emotion in that cold face, I do not know, but okay)? Wasted. It doesn’t matter. Even if you convinced me of all those things, which you probably could, I would still hate Brett Favre. Do you wanna know why?

Because he is either the least self-aware, most indecisive egotistical human being ever OR he’s an egomaniacal prima donna who can’t man up and be honest about what he wants. And, either way, he takes the NFL (or at least a team or two every season) and, more importantly, the ENTIRE sports media hostage every year while he decides whether to retire*. And no matter what you say, nothing will change that. If he stood up and said, “I might not be good at this, but I might, and I want to play, but I’m too old for training camp and I want a lot of money,” and then waited to see what happened, I would be thrilled to remain completely neutral on the subject of Favre. But he won’t. I don’t know why, I don’t really care. I just want him to SHUT UP.

Or, better yet, I want all the sports “journalists” to stop enabling him, but that seems like a bigger dream than that health care thing I mentioned earlier.

Until one of those things happen, I will continue to hate him. So, please just tell me what’s happening on the field and stop trying to convince me.

In other news? When it reaches the point where a team from Tennessee is forced to play football while wearing a picture of a Texas oil rig on their helmets, I think the AFL throwback shenanigans have gone far enough. I would lose miserably too if I wasn’t even wearing my own team name. Ridic.

*Kelly wonders what is wrong with him that he can’t just retire? Doesn’t he have anything else going on in his life? He has kids, a hot wife, and can be in Wrangler ads whenever he wants. And still, retirement just won’t stick. This is an interesting point and I suggest he develop a gambling problem. It seemed to work for other superstars who couldn’t let go of their sporting glory.

um.

I went downstairs and got stoned with my landlord and when I came back upstairs, Kelli Pedroia was in the booth, talking in a nervous monotone about the dangers of tanning beds while standing next to the Eckstache. I’m not the only one seeing this, right?

Joe Buck reading Hulu promo: “An evil plot to destroy the world. Enjoy!” sounds a little too natural (&enthusiastic) coming out of his mouth.

Buck & McCarver laughing because Fox saw a black guy with decent seats at Yankees Stadium & assumed it had to be a player’s dad. HILARIOUS!

Orel & Berman now discussing Berman’s vinyl collection, every time he says, “ALBUMS, I have over four hundred ALBUMS” I get stupider.

BERMAN (!?!) in the booth for Monday Night Baseball? I feel like I’m getting drunk and/or suffering a head injury just watching this.

Between David Wells & Dave Roberts both color-commentating, I’m starting to feel old. (Boomer is better than we expected, yes?)

b***h t**ts

(Just to be clear, I don’t care about steroids in baseball. I mean, I care in the sense that they seem to be bad for your body and you probably shouldn’t do them because if you do, you’ll end up like Eric Gagne. But! I do not care about how they have affected the sanctity of the game. Whining about how the numbers in the mid-90s will compare against, say, the numbers from every baseball game played prior to Jackie Robinson is stupid. The numbers were never pure, they have always been contaminated by the fact that the game gets played by real human people and not little porcelain figurines in a snow globe.)

That said, anything that happens wrt: A-Rod and steroids is hilarious, because it’s funny when bad things happen to A-Rod. It’s particularly funny when the WWL wants to report on new leaks from Selena Roberts’ book and has to print this:

Yankees teammates, Roberts writes, nicknamed Rodriguez “B—-h T—s” in 2005 because he put on 15 pounds in the offseason which included round pectorals, a condition called gynecomastia that can be caused by anabolic steroids.

Seriously. I can’t even decide what is making me more happy right now: A-Rod’s teammates called him “Bitch Tits,” or ESPN couldn’t resist reporting on it but had to call it “B—-h T—s.” I’m not sure how I’m going to convey the hyphens verbally, but I think that version is my new favorite insult.

Jon Miller: “Andy Pettite is an imPEDiment to base stealers.” & it’s only the bottom of the 1st. It’s gonna be a loooong night on the WWL.

this is the 3rd time jon miller has brought up OPS in 2 weeks

Joe Morgan just begrudgingly admitted on-air that the players who have the highest OPS statistic do somehow magically seem to be the best players in the league. Then pigs flew over Jon Miller’s giant dome of a head.