Random Linearity 07-09-2011

The human brain is an amazing thing. Last night, reading one simple baseball tweet set off a string of randomly linear thoughts that led me to ask a not-so-simple question.

At 11:17pm last night, Joe Posnanski tweeted “Kyle Davies gave up five runs in six innings. His ERA went down.” Reading that tweet got me changing the channel to the Royals game. The Royals were playing the Tigers, which got me to thinking about Detroit, which led to thoughts about Joe Louis, who fought Max Schmeling, who was a pawn of Adolph Hitler’s Nazi propaganda. We all know the simplified history of how Hitler trumpeted the virtues of the Aryan Nation while he, himself, was not Aryan. Well, is Michelle Bachmann doing anything different? She preaches that women should submit to their husbands, who should be the heads of the households, but she is running to be the leader of this country. According to her own principles, how can she lead the country if she cannot lead her own family? Then again, Donovan McNabb often professed how he was the leader of the Eagles, yet his parents and brother did more speaking out for him than he did himself. Of course, I started thinking about the McNabb/TO drama in Philly. When you think about it, TO final season in Philly wasn’t all that different from Jim Riggleman’s last year in DC, was it? I know one of the things that pissed Riggleman off was knowing that he was the lowest paid manager in the majors, yet his management spent $18million a year for 6 years on a guy who never drove in 100 runs, and in his 3 years as a starter seen his batting average with runners in scoring position go from .274 (.268 with 2 outs) in 2008 to .186 (.139 with 2 outs) in 2010 despite hitting 5th in the best offense in the National League. In that way, Jayson Werth reminds me of Mark Texiera. They both put up good numbers—Tex’s numbers are borderline great—but they always seem to be inconsequential to their teams’ success. Texiera does, however, share the record for the most times homering from both sides of the plate in a Major League game. I’ve never seen a player do that in person, but I had to get on the internet to look up Danny Espinosa. He’s a switch-hitter and I’ve twice seen him hit 2 homeruns in a game (the first time, both came left-handed; the second time, both were right-handed). Danny Espinosa is from Santa Ana, the same town where Matt Leinart is from. Who can think about Matt Leinart without thinking of Vince Young and Jay Cutler? Those two obviously bring Nashville to mind. Nashville is in Tennessee, which is where Memphis is. Thoughts of Memphis reminded me of Toya’s conversation with Chill on The Morning Jones. Chill is from Miami, where LeBron plays. LeBron brings to mind Delonte West who leads to Michael Beasley, who plays in Minnesota. I wonder if Beasley has anyone in his life who really cares about him and will help him get his life together. I wondered the same thing about Eddie Griffin, who also played in Minnesota. Griffin was never able to overcome his demons. I hope recent events do not keep Josh Hamilton from continuing to overcome his. I do wonder, though, why everyone feels sorry for Josh Hamilton right now while Darryl Strawberry only faced ridicule and scorn when he relapsed into drug usage while undergoing cancer treatment. Whenever I think of Strawberry, I think back to the 1999 World Series and how I will always believe the Braves lost that series because Greg Maddux was afraid to pitch to him in the 8th inning of Game 1. Greg’s brother, Mike pitched for the Phillies. Philadelphia teams always have the wrong brother. Dom DiMaggio, Jeremy Giambi, and Harvey Grant are a few examples. Harvey Grant was brought to the Sixers to motivate Tim Thomas. Tim Thomas was foolishly brought to Philly by Larry Brown, who always fought with Allen Iverson, who tried to be a rapper, but wasn’t as successful at it as Shaquille O’Neal, who once admitted that the FU-Schnickens were his favorite rap group. Their first single featured Pfife Dog, who was in A Tribe Called Quest, whose documentary opened today. Why isn’t Beats, Rhymes, & Life playing anywhere near our nation’s capital?