That Tumor is Outta Here!

So many things to discuss, so little time… so, in a tribute to legendary frontier gunman Buckshot Roberts, we’re going to attack these topics “scattershot” style:

First, from the “Why didn’t Arnold think of that” files, Braves right fielder Jeff Francoeur has pledged that he will donate $500 for every homer he hits to an organization called the “Tumornators.”

This, it goes without saying, is an organization that is attempting to raise money to fight a rare genetic disorder called Schwannomatosis (we may have eaten that at a restaurant one night in Germany), which results in noncancerous but extremely painful tumors that, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, “grow to the size of baseballs.”

Donating money is obviously a very generous gesture by Francoeur, but we have to admit that it has crossed our mind that if the tumors grow to the size of baseballs, perhaps Francoeur could just bludgeon them with a bat. That seems more like what a “Tumornator” would actually do. (Or perhaps a Tumornator would blast them with a shotgun.)

Okay, that’s insensitive (but you have to admit, a valid point).

Also, we’re currently investigating the veracity of rumors that Francoeur will up his donation to $25,000 every time he manages to see more than three pitches in an at-bat.

And it seems pretty clear that if there’s to be any promotional material whatsoever on this topic, it will have to include the famous line from Kindergarten Cop “It’s not a tooma!”, possibly followed by footage of Francoeur smashing a baseball-sized tumor with a mallet.

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Okay, switching gears – did you hear about the botched apology by troubled (and by “troubled,” we mean “crazed”) Devil Rays outfielder Elijah Dukes made the other day?

In a moment of nervousness, Dukes apologized “to the organization for sticking with me in a situation like this.”

Even though this was a clear mistake, come to think of it, it kind of makes sense, in the vein of I’m so sorry that you (the organization) have chosen to stick with me. It’s really an unfortunate decision that you’re making, and probably will end up being a huge mistake.

In all honesty, reading about this actually made us empathize with Dukes just the tiniest bit. Yes, he has done some rather messed-up stuff in recent weeks, but the fact that he was nervous to the point that he misspoke so blatantly humanizes the man – even if just for a moment – who’s otherwise been made out to be a complete and total monster.

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And speaking of questionable on-field tactics – were we speaking of questionable on-field tactics? – did you hear about the move A-Rod pulled last night against the Blue Jays? The man who immortalized the pathetic-looking attempt to dislodge the ball from the first baseman’s glove decided to pull another gem out of his back of tricks: The old yell out of “Mine” while running the bases so as to confuse infielders on a pop-up.

The Blue Jays, for their part, are absolutely furious, primarily because infielders Howie Clark and John McDonald were dumb enough to fall for one of the oldest and lamest tricks in the book. Rumor has it that A-Rod had been considering going with “Hey buddy, your shoelace is untied!” instead.

For the record, we don’t really condone what A-Rod did, but we also can’t really feel too much sympathy for the guys who actually fell for it. When you’re playing basketball and someone on the opposing team calls for a pass and you’re stupid enough to throw it to them, your immediate instinct should be “I can’t believe I did that,” followed directly by “I’m going to undercut that guy next time he drives to the basket.”

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And now that your mind is flooded with thoughts of baseball-sized tumors being blasted into the upper deck, botched apologies by menacing center fielders and generally questionable baseball ethics, we leave you with a much more pleasant thought:

Caron Butler recently got invited to some kid’s birthday party, and much to the surprise of everyone involved, he actually showed up. As jaded as we are about any good deeds in the world of sport nowadays, we approached this story with some skepticism, thinking that there must have been some sort of ulterior motive involved. And truth be told, as we realized that this was just a legitimate act of good tidings by an unusually cool famous dude, our slightly mischievous side had us hoping to read that Caron had at the very least announced his presence at the party by jumping out of the birthday cake arm in arm with a stripper as the kids screamed in glee.

But apparently he just showed up at the party, dropped off a gift, watched hoops with the kids for a little bit, and then left. Which makes it both a remarkable and altogether unspectacular story all at the same time.

The unfortunate thing is, as a reward for his good deed, Caron Butler will now clearly be invited to every dweeb on the Eastern Seaboard's fourteenth birthday until the end of time.

I Am Bear, Hear Me Roar

There are seemingly more sports-related memories than we can possibly count that make us proud to say that we attended Brown University.

There’s the time that we once told a much larger (and very angry-looking) opposing player in an intramural hoops game “That was for your mom” after hitting a three.

There’s the time that we hit a vicious line drive off the kidney of a guy who looked like Jesus in an intramural softball game.

There’s the time that we celebrated a Brown Ivy League football title by rushing the field only to see a guy get part of his finger ripped off in the twisting of the goal post and then saw the crossbar hit one of our roommates in the head as it fell (we have reason to believe that he was concussed).

There’s the fact that we had the distinct pleasure of competing against both John Krasinski (who plays Jim on the American version of The Office) and former Providence Friar Abdul Abdullah in pickup hoops.

This video of an abducted Penn Quaker makes us quite proud as well.

But when it comes to Tuesday’s news that former Duke lacrosse player Reade Seligmann will be matriculating at big Bruno this fall, “proud” is actually not the first word that comes to mind. But for that matter, neither is anger, horror or shock. The fact is, Seligmann's a free man, and he can go to school wherever the hell he pleases. And if he wants to live in our former dorm room and eat bacon, cheese and onion-laden hot dogs from Spike's Junkyard Dogs, then that is his Buddy Cianci-given right as a resident of the fair city of Providence.

In a way, we think that the headline chosen by Yahoo Sports for the AP story it posted on Tuesday really says it all.

“Associated Press Writer,” reads the bold print above the article, in what was clearly an error by whoever was in charge of posting that particular page but also, in a way, is very meaningful.

We’re still trying to figure out exactly how it’s meaningful, and when we do, we’ll let you know.

In the meantime... umm... let's go Bears?

Say it Ain't So, Murdoch

While perusing an article on SI.com about former Mets’ clubhouse attendant Kirk Radomski – who could emerge as a key witness in the ongoing investigation into steroid use in Major League Baseball – we came across an interesting passage:

“Many Mets staffers contacted acted as if they barely recalled Radomski, odd considering he worked daily in the clubhouse for 10 years. Most recalled that he was commonly called Murdoch – or Murdie, for short – though no one could say exactly why.”

Oh, they couldn’t remember why they called him Murdoch, eh? How convenient. Have they really somehow forgotten why they gave this man a nickname – the sort of thing people absolutely never forget – or is it possible that they’re protecting a secret, a secret so dark and ground-shaking that it will make any talk of drug or steroid use in the Mets clubhouse seem like idle chatter on the Number 7 Train?

That’s right – this whole thing is a huge cover up. But the truth can no longer be ignored, so let’s just get it out in the open right now, once and for all:

The New York Mets of the mid-to-late 80’s and early 90’s were absolutely and helplessly addicted to The A-Team.

Think about it – what other Murdoch was there of any relevance anywhere on Planet Earth during that time period? Answer: There was none. The man was an absolute icon to legions of television watchers everywhere. The lovable, goofy lunatic (played by Dwight Schultz) who was as quick with a nonsensical one-liner as Mr. T was quick to want to tear people’s arms out of their sockets.

Why might they have decided to refer to Radomski as “Murdoch,” you might ask? Not exactly a brainteaser. Murdoch had the reputation of being able to land a plane in absolutely any conditions. Bullet holes in the wings? No problem. The man knew how to get things done in the cockpit. And Radomski was clearly the Murdoch of the Mets locker room. “Crashing” hard on the heels of a particularly vicious high? Murdie’s got the medicine to help you land that plane. Need a syringe of steroids to shoot into your anus? Our main man Murdoch can make that needle “fly” right into your butt.

Need we say more? Seems that the evidence here is darn near incontrovertible. And it follows that MLB’s got a pretty huge P.R. crisis on its hands. Now that The A-Team – thought to be one of the few remaining beacons of good and heroic behavior left on this cursed planet – has been implicated in the steroids scandal, there’s no telling how big this thing could get.

Who Farted?

It’s remarkable to think that during a week featuring the NBA conference finals, the NBA Draft lottery and some compelling divisional baseball rivalries such as Yankees-Red Sox and Braves vs. Mets, the overarching question on everyone’s mind seems to be, “Does Josh Hamilton have diarrhea?”

Okay, in fairness, the question technically speaking is, “Does (or did) Josh Hamilton have gastroenteritis?” But for the record, as far as we’re concerned, anything having to do with stomach discomfort/illness can generally be lumped (poor choice of word?) into the larger category of “diarrhea.”

And it seems that everyone’s concerned as to whether or not Hamilton really had some discomfort in his stomach because of his sort of well-documented struggles with drugs in the past. (We say “sort of well-documented” because it seems that everyone knows that Hamilton had drug problems but no one’s really written the one definitive and all-encompassing story about his saga.)

But, we digress. The point here is diarrhea. And specifically, did Hamilton have it?

Look, we completely understand how and why people will start to conjure conspiracy theories when Hamilton misses time with anything other than a pulled quad, strained hammy or shredded labrum. But at the same time, can’t a man with a somewhat troubled past simply get a case of the back door trots and not be harassed about it?

Since this debate is likely to rage on (or more likely, fizzle out within a couple of days), we’ve got a proposition as to how we can settle the score once and for all: Hamilton is to appear at a Reds press conference in full uniform, holding a plastic bag, which he will then proceed to fill – right on the spot – with a stool sample.

What’s that you say – this won’t answer any questions pertaining to Hamilton’s alleged illness whatsoever? Okay, you’re right – it probably won’t.

But it would at least provide some solid (or loose, as the case may be) entertainment, which seems to be what you people are so ravenous for that you can’t even let Hamilton eat some undercooked sausage and pay the price for it in peace.

[Disclaimer: The above post was written with no true knowledge as to the exact nature of the illness known as gastroenteritis or any bodily repercussions caused by the disease therein. Any such research may have jeopardized the validity of jokes pertaining to diarrhea and/or bowel movements, and the writer(s) deemed this unacceptable. Thank you for your understanding.]

All Representatives Are Currently Helping Other Customers

If you happen to notice this blog preemptively quivering, that's because it's acutely aware that it’s going to get beaten with the neglect stick for much of the coming week.

Fear not -- there will be new entries this week, but they may not be on quite the same diligent schedule as normal because The OCC is currently overseas and loyal intern Bruce R. Stilton (who would normally handle these situations) is currently in rehab after OD’ing on Fun Dip over the weekend.

Please stand by (and keep checking back) – new material to come as soon as is humanly possible.

The Lastings Impression

There are many things we will do and say on this here particular blog, but there are also junctures along the road of this written journey where we have no choice but to draw the line. And one thing we will not do is spank Lastings Milledge – via the written word or otherwise – for his use of derogatory lyrics in a rap song with his friend Manny D.

Never mind that the lyrics don’t really seem to stand out as particularly offensive within the greater context of rap music as a whole (as one Mets player joked, "Language like that in a rap song? Shocking!"), the fact is it just doesn’t sound like that much fun to get up on the soap box and be the four-point-eight thousandth person to chastise the young Met for being overly vulgar.

What is fun, however, is singling out a handful of amusing subplots of this episode as a whole.

Consider first Mr. Milledge’s wardrobe, as pictured above. As one of modern cinema’s great villains (El Guapo from Three Amigos) gleefully said when he was handed a surprise birthday gift from his loyal soldiers, “It’s a sweater!”

And by the way, is that some kind of mock turtleneck underneath the sweater? In any case, it’s a pretty spectacular look. Though we’ve never really been fans of the v-neck sweater vest. Our mother knitted us an ill-fitting one of those back in first grade and forced us to wear it to school one day, and we really haven’t been able to even consider putting one on since. Kind of traumatic just thinking about it, actually. Also, they look stupid.

Now shifting topics because clearly v-neck sweater vests aren't good for anyone's mental health, here's a question: We realize that Manny D’s not the most high-profile rap artist out there, but couldn’t he have at least tried to get a more established athlete to help promote his album than Lastings Milledge?

Honestly, he probably would have been better off asking Damion Easley to twirl a few profanity-laden verses. At least he hit 27 dingers in a season once. To this point in his career, L Millz (to use his rap moniker) is pretty much synonymous with some reasonably spectacular braids, a cheap imitation of Gary Sheffield’s batting stance and a whole bunch of hype. Not necessarily what we’re looking for in a rap album.

But without a doubt the best element of this saga comes courtesy of New York City Councilman Leroy Comrie, who was very vocal in his disgust at Milledge’s behavior, and made certain that he wasn’t alone in that regard. Reports the New York Daily News, "Comrie said he played the song for two female interns who were 'horrified' by Milledge's words."

Okay, first of all, this is a hilarious image – a City Councilman playing a rap song for his interns? Is this really the best way that local government is able to determine how it will publicly react to so-called sensitive material? Can we do no better than throwing the CD into the portable boom box in the office and playing the song for two college kids?

And for the record, given that they’re interns (and therefore are probably close to college age), there’s no way that these two were actually "horrified" by the song from a moral standpoint. More likely, it just offended their sensibilities as fans of rap music.

Breaking News: Pam Oliver Spots Questionable Confetti

The following exchange took place during Pam Oliver's interview with Derek Fisher following Utah’s series-clinching Game 5 win over Golden State on Tuesday night:

Oliver: “I’m looking at the confetti falling down. It’s a pitiful display. The confetti guy might need to get fired, but it’s still a great moment, isn’t it?”

Fisher: “Yeah, this organization has been such a classy and winning organization for such a long time. Been down for a few years, so whatever they want to do, you know, let’s enjoy it, it’s just a great moment.”

There are a couple of great things about this dialogue (aside from the fact that it involves a sideline reporter invoking the rare technique of attempting to completely destroy the moment before asking a question about what a great moment it is):

First of all, Oliver's comments call to mind an image of the crazed, toothless and embittered “Confetti Guy” who, unbeknownst to everyone until right now, lurks in the bowels of the Delta Center (or whatever the hell they call it these days) and from this moment forth will spend every waking moment of his dark days plotting revenge on the woman who called his life's work "pitiful."

And Fisher’s response of “whatever [the Jazz] want to do, you know, let’s enjoy it” seems to be a non-confrontational rebuttal to Oliver’s lambasting of the confetti, with the Jazz guard suggesting that having really shitty confetti might just be a choice that a franchise would deliberately make (and would in fact be justified in doing so).

No one ever accused Derek Fisher of being stupid. Not only did he make sure to steer clear of agreeing with Oliver (and thereby didn't join in on her slight cheap shot at the Jazz organization), but more importantly, he managed to avoid angering a far more threatening entity.

Because from what we understand, Confetti Guy knows a little something about holding a grudge.

Report: Spurs Agree to Trade Horry for Stoudemire & Diaw

Some simultaneously very exciting and rather raw bid’ness went down in the closing minutes of Monday night’s Suns-Spurs game, as the Suns evened the series – moving one step closer to saving Planet Basketball from the dreaded Spurs-Pistons Finals matchup – but also potentially lost Amare Stoudemire (and Boris Diaw) to suspensions.

We’ve all most likely seen what happened by now: Robert Horry got frustrated and decided to show to the world that his shoulder is capable of knocking Steve Nash to the ground when the latter is going at full speed. Very hard foul, but these things happen, Horry was ejected and might be suspended himself, and that’s fine.

But here’s the problem: In the process, Stoudemire and Diaw both technically left the bench, which is a no-no, and by the letter of the law will result in a one-game suspension.

If it wasn’t apparent before last night, somehow, someway, this rule needs to be modified. Sure, the NBA wants to curb full-scale melees on the court. That’s understandable. But what Stoudemire and Diaw did ultimately amounted to a reflexive action – they saw their teammate get leveled, and understandably they stepped forward to respond. That’s instinct. And a second later – with some assistance from coaches and teammates – they realized they couldn’t go out there and stepped back.

Now, we’ll never know whether or not Stoudemire and Diaw intended to run out on the court and tear off Robert Horry’s limbs, but they certainly didn’t have the look of men who were about to unsheath hidden machetes from underneath the scorer’s table and turn the whole thing into an Anchorman-style street brawl. It looked more like, “Hey, what the hell was that oh shit we can’t go out on the floor” than anything else.

As we said before, based on the rule, these two will face a suspension, but the rule clearly needs to be modified. How exactly it can be modified, we’re not sure, but as it stands, the Spurs will most likely end up trading Horry for Stoudemire and Diaw for Game 5, which is just flat-out unjust, especially since Horry was the one who instigated things in the first place.

Was it his intention to stir things up and ultimately get some Suns players suspended? No. But it sure worked out brilliantly for the Spurs if that’s how it ends up going down.

Meanwhile, there’s no truth to the rumor that the Suns are planning to dress Pat Burke up as The Undertaker and have him repeatedly attempt to barrel roll Tim Duncan’s legs every time he attempts a lay-up in Game 5.

And for the record, it was hilarious to see how TNT handled all of this, with Marv Albert and Steve Kerr initially reacting honestly to the images shown on camera of Stoudemire and Diaw leaving the bench, followed by a report from Craig Sager, who essentially took on the role of sleazy defense attorney with his claim that Stoudemire had not left the bench to join the fracas but was actually going to check into the game as part of an offense-defense substitution.

This harebrained defense, coupled with Sager’s always absurd wardrobe, gives us the great pleasure of thinking of him as something of a new millennium, sports-oriented version of Vincent Gambini, the delightfully irreverent defense attorney portrayed by Joe Pesci in My Cousin Vinny.

Can’t you just picture Sages putting together an improbable and completely goofy yet ultimately unassailable defense of Stoudemire and Diaw that somehow includes an elderly female eyewitness with very thick glasses and convinces David Stern to rule in the Suns’ favor?

Okay, neither can we.

Perhaps as a compromise, we can agree to have Craig Sager fly to an anonymous town in the deep South and eat a whole bunch of grits. Does this seem like a fair solution to everyone?

Detached from Reality

Sometimes those of us who feed our children and hordes of needy relatives by writing about the world of sports have a tendency to remain far too focused on the biggest headlines, and in doing so, we neglect some smaller yet very compelling things that happen closer to the fringes.

We here at The Off-Color Commentator have never been accused of neglecting such minutiae, so the above paragraph actually doesn't apply to us.

In fact, we only really brought it up because we'd like to take this moment to briefly discuss a wonderfully unusual bit of baseball managing by skipper Ned Yost of the Milwaukee Brewers.

In case you haven't heard (and chances are decent that you have not), Mr. Yost has recently decided to take a dump in the face of conventional wisdom by having his closer, Francisco Cordero, take the mound six days in a row. (Please note the deliberate use of "dump" and "mound" in the same sentence.)

Look, we know that following convention can be boring (for the record, convention these days is that relievers should not pitch in a game more than three days in a row). And for the most part, we're in favor of shirking established coaching routines (Example: Don Nelson leaves Baron Davis in the game in the first quarter when he has two fouls. We applaud.)

But Yost's behavior pertaining to his prized reliever reeks at best of cluelessness and at worst of pure irresponsibility. Honestly, you just can't run a pitcher out there for six straight days unless you've found a highly lucrative means of selling severed arms on the black market and you figure that this is the most inconspicuous way to detach the coveted "Right-armed closer limb."

Clearly, the irresistible stink of victory has deluded Ned's capacity for lucid thought. With five straight games generating save opportunities (and wins), he's perpetually stuck in the ninth inning with a lead of three runs or less. At this point, it's only a matter of time before he attempts to bring CoCo in during the fourth inning, or -- even worse -- it's only a matter of time until this mentality seeps into his personal life. Soon, when one of the Yost children accidentally drops a glass of Ovaltine on the kitchen floor, the manager will calmly walk into the room, quickly survey the scene, and immediately signal for a right-hander as he gives his child a supportive pat on the butt and sends the bewildered youngster off to the showers.

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Speaking of supportive pats on the butt, was anyone else watching the Warriors-Jazz game last night when Derek Fisher made his emotional return to the arena?

While it was our initial impulse to wonder why the hell a man who averaged 10.1 ppg during the regular season was getting an ovation from the Utah crowd that made you think John Stockton, Karl Malone and David Benoit had just walked into the arena in full uniform, we've since softened our stance and decided that this was actually a nice moment (even if it was a bit overdone by the TNT broadcast crew).

However, what we can't figure out was how D. Fisher was allowed to check into the game apparently without having taken a single warm-up shot of any kind. Did we miss something here, or did he not walk into the arena in a green t-shirt, go into the locker room, come out in full uniform and walk directly onto the court without so much as breaking stride?

Look, we're all for legitimate emotional moments around here, and we're not going to argue with any coach or manager who attempts to find ways to fire up his team, but throwing Fisher into the game without him so much as having lofted up one casual j comes across as a move that's borderline Yostian in its recklessness.

Then again, the one shot Fisher took in the game was a three, and he drilled it, and it was essentially a big rusty dagger through the nasal cavity of the Warriors' hopes in Game 2, so perhaps we'll go ahead and be quiet.

As you were, slightly irrational managers of the world. As you were.

Where There's a Will

In case you were wondering what former New Jersey Net Jayson Williams was up to on your average early May Tuesday night in the year 2007 – mind you, we’re talking about unfortunate firearm incident Jayson Williams, not unfortunate motorcycle incident Jason Williams – well, he was watching basketball, of course.

What did you expect he’d be doing?

But you may be interested to know that he was not watching his former NBA squad drop Game 2 of the Eastern Conference semis against the Cavs. No, as it just so happens he was quietly sitting against the base of the bleachers in a gym on the fifth floor of an anonymous high school on the West side of midtown Manhattan. (We know this because we happened to have suited up and played in the game directly following the one he was watching.)

What exactly was Jayson Williams doing at such a smoking hot venue as this, where there was literally not an open seat in the house? (And when we say there wasn’t an open seat in the house, we mean that the bleachers were collapsed so it wasn’t possible to sit on them.)

To be honest, we don’t really have an answer as to what he was doing there. Though if we had to speculate, we’d say that the rather tall guy on the team wearing blue may have been Monsieur Williams’ kin. Whether or not this was his next of kin we cannot say with any certainty, because we don’t even know how many kins he has and what age or gender they are, nor do we know whether or not any of them plays on the blue team in what we believe to be League #7 or #8 in the New York Urban Professionals Athletic League.

Whatever the case, for a man who was known for having such a magnetic personality during his days as a player, Jayson Williams was shockingly anonymous in what was very nearly an empty high school gym. In fact, with his hat pulled down, we almost didn’t even notice him. (Of course, from his perspective, that’s probably not such a bad thing.)

One last thought: It’s interesting that a player whose career so precipitously slipped away was sitting in a gym watching a bunch of guys clinging to their right to compete.

Dinner Was Delicious, Thank You

Caught the Oscar De La Hoya-Floyd Mayweather fight Saturday night in a rather unique setting: a boxing gymnasium transformed into what an associate aptly described as something of a “boxing speakeasy.” For $30, an individual received a seat (some of which were actually inside a boxing ring), unlimited Corona and tequila, and free Mexican cuisine, which was exceedingly tasty even though some of it ended up dribbling onto our shirt at one point.

The fight itself never quite dribbled onto our shirt, but we also never felt compelled to describe it as “delicious” (as we did for the chicken and rice heaped onto our styrofoam plate). This isn’t to say that it was a bad fight – on the whole, we were definitely on the plus side of neutral about the whole experience. But much of that had to do with the environs and atmosphere and not the actual fight itself. After a time it became clear that De La Hoya really had no chance to win if he didn’t knock Mayweather out, and since he couldn’t get a clear shot at his head, it was obvious this wasn’t going to happen.

So while Oscar may have made Floyd wizz blood later in the evening by repeatedly bludgeoning his kidneys, if the “beating” Mayweather took was unpleasant, he definitely wasn’t showing it – he spent much of the time smiling at De La Hoya’s wild flurries of punches (you almost got the sense that he was smiling at the pro-De La Hoya crowd’s excited reaction, as if to say, “I find it hilarious that you all think he’s actually hurting me.”)

While we wouldn’t profess to be anything close to a boxing aficionado, it was clear that Mayweather perfectly manipulated the rules of the sport by taking less shots but landing way more of them to win by split decision. It was an impressive if unspectacular performance, one that left us glad we’d spent $30 on beer, food and a unique view of a big screen but also pleased that we don’t devote more than approximately 52 minutes per calendar year thinking and writing about the sport of boxing.

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In case you missed it:

-- Apparently the bridge of the nose is an area that tends to bleed quite a bit when it runs into Tony Parker’s face. And, apparently, the best that NBA medical staffs can do for severe lacerations in the closing minutes of NBA games is to throw a sticky bandage on them and hope for the best. Extremely disappointing for anyone who likes entertaining basketball that the Spurs managed to hold off the Suns in Game 1 in Phoenix. Though we will admit that the notion of the Spurs making Steve Nash “ugly” (a la Ed Norton’s character in 25^th Hour) pretty aptly sums up what San Antonio hoops is all about. Not particularly pleasing to look at but ultimately pretty effective.

-- Also, let it be known that from this day forth, all future important announcements pertaining to the Yankees organization will be made from the owner’s box – by Roger Clemens himself. Later this afternoon, The Rocket will be announcing a 2 p.m. early release for Memorial Day weekend.

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The Off-Color Commentator (OCC) would like to apologize for the lack of new material on the site today. He/it has been busy seeing to a handful of important endeavors and would like you to know that he/it will be back, as always, with more original sports commentary very soon.

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Time for Lights Out

Has it ever crossed your mind that it would be really hilarious to go down to the local electronics store, purchase one of those laser pointers, take it into the classroom and shine the little red dot onto your professor’s crotch as you and your friends snicker uncontrollably from the back row?

If it has crossed your mind, don't be ashamed – that idea actually is kind of funny.

But you know what’s not cool? Taking the aforementioned laser pointer or a similarly eye-stunning device and using it to distract players during a Major League baseball game. Or so say the powers that be with regards to a man at Shea Stadium who shined a high-powered flashlight at Edgar Renteria and Tim Hudson during an April 20^th game against the Braves (a game The OCC just so happened to attend, though we assure you that any flashlights in our possession were pointed directly into the eyes of Mets players and/or coaches, not the Braves).

For his transgressions, “The Flasher,” as we shall choose to call him, received 15 days in jail and a three-year ban from attending Mets home games.

Frankly, we find this punishment rather odd – we can understand the 15 days in jail, but a ban from attending games at Shea? This is supposed to be a punishment, right? We actually just purchased a 15-game ban from Shea last week. We get to miss six games against the Nationals, three versus the Rockies, two when the Marlins are in town and a four-game set against Pittsburgh.

Honestly, if they want to punish the guy, they should make him live at Shea until (and perhaps during) its demolition prior to the 2009 season. If you thought it was grueling watching that guy eat McDonald’s non-stop in Super Size Me, imagine how rough The Flasher would be looking after eating only Nathan’s french fries and Dippin’ Dots for an entire calendar year, all the while trolling about the bowels of Shea with only the beam of his high-powered flashlight to illuminate the way through the concrete and steel corridors during the long and seemingly endless nights.

Think about it: It’s The Terminal meets Super Size Me meets Gollum from Lord of the Rings.

We’ll call it, of course, The Flasher.

Now we’ve just got to figure out a way to sneak in the requisite “laser pointer shining on the college professor’s groin” scene…