Downright Filthy

In fairness, we live in a world where there's a lot of pressure to come up with new headlines.

And maybe it's just a severe case of jetlag skewing things to an extreme...

But it seems that when writing a headline -- even if it's for something as temporary and ever-changing as a website -- one of the first things you ponder is whether or not there's any way your audience might misconstrue what you wrote to mean something entirely different from what was intended.

So when we make a routine visit to a popular Internet sports site and see an MLB story with the headline "Peavy wants it now," you can imagine why we might be confused.

If we didn't read another word of the article (which, for the record, we did not), we would logically assume that what Peavy wants is sex, and that he has to have it immediately. After all, isn't this the most common everyday usage of the phrase "[Insert person's name here] wants it"?

Accuse this Off-Color Commentator of having a filthy mind all you want, but while you're doing so, think about it: What other logical assumption would a normal person make?

Certainly, if that person knew that Jake Peavy was a Cy Young-caliber pitcher for the San Diego Padres, he/she might assume that what he wants right now is the Cy Young award, or perhaps recognition as one of the game's greatest pitchers. But that person would only make that assumption after first having had the thought that Jake Peavy, according to this article, has a burning desire to fornicate, immediately.

Seriously, when one person says to another, "You know you want it...", what is the "it" that person is referring to? A punch in the gullet? A ride on a small but sturdy seafaring ship? No. That person is referring to sordid, possibly public and definitely loud sexual intercourse. That's just all there is to it.

Confession: After all this, we went ahead and read further in the article, and it turns out that what Peavy wants is to pitch on three days rest to help his team in the midst of a pennant race.

What a sick bastard.