I've been gone. Algonquin Park, located somewhere in Ontario, is a beautiful place to camp and canoe and get bit in the face by mosquitos. It ain't no RV park, either, so I've been removed from computers and TVs and even radios for the past week. I come back to find the Cardinals opting not to suck anymore, Rick Ankiel is once again a Major Leaguer (and a dang good one at that), and there's a wild card race a-happenin'.
Fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on whose side you're on) I caught B.Bonds' 756th homer just before I left. ...Caught it on TV. I didn't actually catch the baseball itself. If I had caught the baseball I'd be buying up Caribbean islands by now.
I returned just in time to read about Jose Offerman going ape over in the Atlantic League. I wouldn't have known that Offerman was still in organized baseball if I hadn't of re-stumbled across him while doing research for the All-Pena team a couple weeks ago. Anyway, I might be able to condone a bench-clearing brawl (the NASCAR equivalent of the guilty delight a big crash brings), but not if swinging bats are involved. If batters are allowed to charge the mound with bats in tow then pitchers should be allowed to carry guns.
HERE, by the way, is a fantastic collection of pictures of the incident. No video exists because nobody in their right mind would tape a Long Island Ducks game, but scroll through the photographs quickly and it sorta looks like it's in motion. Happily nobody was seriously brained.
And Scooter died. Phil Rizzuto was old and led a very full life, but it's still sad to have him leave us. I wish my best memory of him was something other than that holy cow knocking him over on Phil Rizzuto Day in 1985. They showed the incident at least once every season on TWIB.
Is that everything? Or at least everything of note?
What will NEXT week bring?
