Game 3 of the ALCS, played Saturday between the Yankees and the Red Sox, was quite a spectacle. I burned out on sports that day around the same time Oklahoma was doing the Red Riverdance on Texas's corpse, but I did catch the various dust-ups on ESPN later that afternoon.
I didn't see enough of the fracas in the bullpen to know who was really at fault, and I was surprised Clements didn't put on his usual American League class act of plunking batters with no fear of retaliation. The highlight of the day, however, was seeing 72-year old Yankee bench coach Don Zimmer charge Boston's Pedro Martinez in the 4th inning, only to have Pedro grab Zimmer by that huge melon of his and casually toss him to the ground.
Zimmer must've been hoping for an outcome like that between Nolan Ryan and Robin Ventura in 1993, when Ryan beat the crap out of the 20-years younger Ventura (still the best baseball fight of all time). I'm not sure what else Pedro could've done in that situation. If you whale on a guy 40 years older than you, you're a rotten bastard. If you let him cold cock you, you're a punk. Not exactly win-win.
Zimmer spoke briefly, through tears, expressing regret. "I'm embarrassed of what happened (Saturday)," Zimmer said. "I'm embarrassed for the Yankees, the Red Sox, the fans, the umpires and my family. That's all I have to say. I'm sorry."
And with that, the 72-year-old Zimmer stepped off the podium, weeping.
I'd be weeping too, if I had my ass handed to me like that. Take a seat and shut up, Don. ESPN's Jim Caple said it first; somewhere Bill Lee is smiling, if not actually laughing his space helmet off.
Boston police are looking for witnesses to the bullpen fight as they decide whether or not to press charges against two Yankees players, while NYC mayor Michael Bloomberg asserts Martinez should be arrested for hammer-throwing Zimmer. The only thing that would make Game 4 better is if Ben and J-Lo squared off against each other in the stands at Fenway.
Zimmer's head is shaped much more like a pumpkin, than a melon.
Still, I've got to give props the the fossil. For a nanosecond, he made me interested in baseball. In fact, if you check out the footage of Zimmer getting his shit tossed aside like a sack of pork chops, the fell very nearly on top of a lose baseball bat. Moreover, Martinez kind of kept his back to Zimmer afterwards. I was sort of hoping Zimmer would grab the bat and knee-cap Martinez from behind. Now THAT would have made a baseball fan of me forever.
Is it too late to disqualify these two excrementally overhyped franchises, tell their brain-dead fans to go home, and go ahead and install the Tampa Bay Devil Rays into the World Series?
The blog is awsome dude.
Dammit, all of the cool baseball fights hapen when I am out of the country. I am sitting im Tangier right now, without a chance in hell of seeing the playoffs. I have to rely on the BBCworld recap every morning to figure out what is going on. The Horror!