Supporting a terrible baseball team is a unique kind of sports fan misery.
If your favorite NFL or soccer team stinks, it’s one or two days a week. The team ruins your Saturday or Sunday or random midweek evening, and that’s no fun, sure – but there are five or six days each week to recover and, as foolish as it may be, begin to get your hopes up for a better result in the next contest. Basketball and hockey play more frequently, but there are as many off days as game days, allowing afflicted fans to regularly cleanse their failure palate and find respite in other diversions.
Baseball is not like that. Baseball is every day. It’s never ending. From the start of April through the end of September, a full one-half of every calendar year, it’s game after game after game after game. And it’s been that way for more than a century. For bad teams, it’s loss after loss after loss after loss. There are precious few ways to escape it. Throughout the middle of the season, in the heat of the summer, there’s no football, basketball or hockey to cling to for salvation. It’s only baseball. Losing baseball. Terrible, losing baseball. Errors. Strikeouts. Base-running mistakes. Men left on base. Bunts. Every day from April through September. Every year. It’s merciless. There is no way that rooting for such a team doesn’t impact and shape a person in some way.
I thought of all that this week as Jon Stewart begins his final four shows as the host of The Daily Show. Stewart is an unabashed supporter of the New York Mets. He can be seen frequently at CitiField, and will likely soon be spotted there even more without a 9-to-whenever-the-Daily-Show-finishes-taping job.
It’s long been said, to the point of cliche, that comedy comes from pain. The Mets are, unquestionably, one of baseball’s historically terrible franchises. Surrounding the joy of 1969 and 1986 there has been nothing but high-profile failure, all in the shadow of the historically dominant Yankees. Even in the last week, as the Mets inconceivably pulled closer to the NL East lead, they were a national punchline as Wilmer Flores cried on the field during a game.
Stewart isn’t the only accomplished comedian who is a Mets fan. Jerry Seinfeld, Chris Rock and Amy Schumer also root for the perennial losers. If someone listed Seinfeld, Rock, Schumer and Stewart as the top figures in American comedy, it would be hard for anyone to argue. Is it a coincidence that they’re all Mets fans? Is it unreasonable to think that they were all shaped, at least in a small way, by rooting for a losing baseball team? When six months of each year of your childhood is filled with failure and embarrassment, who wouldn’t resort to jokes to find some happiness?
The Mets are, of course, not the only baseball franchise with a sad history. Until 2004 (and 2007 and 2013), Boston fans loved nothing more than telling the world about the haaaahhhtache their miserable Red Sox caused them. Well, Louis CK, Conan O’Brien and Bill Burr are all Red Sox fans who were reared during the decades of failure. Coincidence, too?
Then there are the Cubs. The poor Cubs. The winners of baseball’s losing competition. Chicago is home of The Second City. It’s the birthplace of Cubs fans Bill Murray and Vince Vaughn, two of America’s most beloved comedic actors. Jeff Garlin is a Cubs fan. The late, great Harold Ramis was a Cubs fans. As was John Belushi.
Maybe it’s not that comedy comes from pain. Maybe it’s more specific. Maybe comedy comes from baseball-induced pain. It can’t be a coincidence that this many great comedic minds - the bulk of the top names in the industry - had their childhoods filled with day after day of baseball failure.
Bad baseball creates great comedy. That’s a fact.
Somehow still not convinced? Fine. Then take a look at this from the premier comedic performer working today:
Matt Harvey @Mets -- Don't let the @NYDailyNews get you down---nobody reads it. Play well.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 14, 2015
Game over.
Stat of the Week
45
Clayton Kershaw is 1st player in modern era (since 1900) to strike out 45 hitters in a span of 4 straight scoreless starts. (@EliasSports)
— ESPN Stats & Info (@ESPNStatsInfo) August 2, 2015
a) That’s yet another remarkable feat by Kershaw in this, what was supposedly a subpar season for him. (Is Kershaw having the greatest subpar season by a pitcher EVER?!)
b) Can we please stop qualifying baseball stats with the post-1900 “modern era” thing? Baseball prior to 1900 largely featured balls made out of old rags, gloves fashioned from street rat carcasses and players whose primary occupation was working double shifts at the air pollution factory alongside five-year-olds with black lung. Teams of that era would get destroyed by your company’s slow-pitch softball team. “Modern” records are the records. No need to qualify them. As much as we appreciate your old-timey names, baseball players of yesteryear, no one cares how many club-footed coal miners you struck out one day in 1874 on a gravel ballfield. Sorry.
This Week’s Horrible Fantasy Team That Crushed Your Team
Adam Eaton, OF, White Sox - 13-for-26, HR, 4 RBI, 2 SB
Aaron Hicks, OF, Twins - 11-for-23, HR, 5 RBI, SB
Ryan Howard, 1B, Phillies - 10-for-22, HR, 9 RBI
Didi Gregorius, SS, Yankees - 10-for-24, HR, 10 RBI
Hunter Strickland, P, Giants - 4 innings, 2 wins, 3 strikeouts, 0.00 ERA
Kevin Gausman, P, Orioles - 14.2 innings, 1 win, 11 strikeouts, 1.23 ERA
Reader Twitter Question of the Week
@DJGalloEtc whatever happened to Scooter, Fox's talking baseball?
— Derek C (@insomniacslounj) August 2, 2015
Wildly unpopular with viewers from his (its?) introduction in 2004, Scooter was shelved not long after. As Fox Sports executive Ed Goren said at the time: “It’s one thing to look at an enhancement in a lab setting. It’s completely different when it gets tested in the battlefield.” The battlefield. I very much like the idea of Scooter being blown up by a cartoon grenade.
So that’s the official story of Scooter. But I think most of belief the tiny cartoon baseball was injected with human growth hormone by Ryan Braun and grew into Brewers infielder Scooter Gennett.
Phillies-ness of the Week
The Phillies maintain a solid margin at the bottom of the MLB standings, but they also continue to have the best record in baseball since the All-Star break at 12-3.
Cole Hamels’ new team, the Texas Rangers, is 9-7 since the break. Jonathan Papelbon’s new team, the Washington Nationals, is 6-9. Ben Revere’s new team, the Toronto Blue Jays, is 9-6. The worst team in baseball trading their best players, only to send them to somehow inferior teams, could end up being the most hilarious story of the 2015 Phillies.
Chicago Cubs World Series Odds: On the Rise!
The Cubs have won five in a row to pull even with the Giants for the second wildcard spot in the National League. They also traded for Dan Haren, a solid veteran pitcher with a 3.42 ERA and 1.09 WHIP on the season. Sure, it seems unwise to trade for a fly ball pitcher when you play in Wrigley Field. But who cares about that?! No more than three World Series games can be at Wrigley this year anyway.
A-Rod-ness of the Week
A-Rod’s representatives have reportedly reached out to Fox about the new American hero appearing on the network’s postseason coverage if the Yankees don’t make the playoffs. Fox already employs Pete Rose for its baseball coverage. Imagine if they added A-Rod to the mix. The sport’s moral police would be apoplectic. Then all they’d need to do is add Barry Bonds to the team – and what an analyst he’d be with all that Google Glass knowledge at his disposal – and Fox would have themselves some must-see TV.
10 Things I Think We’d Think I’d Think
1) Congratulations, everyone! For the every-year-ever in a row, we managed to fool ourselves into believing that the 31 July non-waiver trade deadline is VERY IMPORTANT and the last opportunity to improve a playoff contender, completely ignoring - as always - the many deals that take place in August every year. It’s probably the best instance of pointless, self-induced panic by baseball fans after the announcement of Opening Day rosters. “What?! THAT guy is our No5 starter? We can’t win a World Series with him! We’re doomed!” There are six months after Opening Day to tinker with the roster. There’s a full month after the trade “deadline” to do more trading. If baseball has anything at all, it’s time.
2) Many were shocked that San Diego Padres GM AJ Preller didn’t make any big deals by the deadline after reportedly indicating he was looking to tear his whole roster down. Again, friends: trades can still be made. Chances are the entire Padres roster will be in the Blue Jays system by the end of the month.
3) I didn’t notice any instances of fake Twitter accounts duping baseball “experts” into reporting trades that didn’t actually happen this year. What happened, fake Twitter accounts? Not a good showing. On the bright side, this failure didn’t cause anyone to lose respect for you, as no one had any in the first place.
4) The Royals touched off a benches-clearing incident with the Blue Jays on Sunday. I wonder how the dynamics of this worked with the new players the Royals just acquired before the trade deadline. They wouldn’t be used to the Royals way of doing things. My guess is that when a player joins the Royals, they go through a new employee orientation process and have to watched a video titled: “Royal Assholes: How to Act Like a Dick and Enforce Baseball’s Code the Kansas City Royals Way.”
5) Is this an example of when the kids use the term “I can’t even”?
Jonathan Papelbon: "I was in the shower with Storen, I said ‘can you show me that slider grip tomorrow?’ He was really, really good."
— Chris Johnson (@masnCJ) July 30, 2015
Because I feel as though I am incapable of even after reading that.
6) Phillies interim manager Pete Mackanin has won 12 of 15 with a roster that wouldn’t be good enough to win one of those pre-1900 leagues in which everyone wore wool suits and had cholera. In 2005, he took over a 55-81 Pittsburgh Pirates team and saw them finish 12-14. Two years later, he stepped in for the 31-51 Cincinnati Reds and managed them to a 41-39 finish. Has anyone considered that Mackanin might be really good at this managing stuff? It might be time to give him the coveted title of “non-interim manager.”
7) White Sox first baseman Adam LaRoche pitched a scoreless inning of relief against the Yankees on Friday night, didn’t allow a baserunner and even struck a man out. He also unleashed a big curve. The joke everyone was making during his appearance was why a team in need of pitching didn’t acquire him at the deadline. But Adam isn’t the LaRoche teams need to be looking at: it’s his younger brother Andy. Andy was a third baseman and had a better arm than his brother. We think of him now as a failed hitting prospect. But maybe he was just out of position all those years. Maybe he could have been an ace pitcher -- an ace who could hit a little (for a pitcher), too. Andy LaRoche: the Madison Bumgarner that never was?
8) It’s pretty cool that new Blue Jays ace David Price sought out this kid’s parents to get him a jersey.
#jays fans please find out who this kid is and his or his parents Twitter handle!! His price jersey will be waiting pic.twitter.com/7L9IBJHs7o
— David Price (@DAVIDprice14) August 1, 2015
But it’s important we only reward little kids who create makeshift jerseys. We must not reward adults who do the same. In fact, people like this guy should be jailed.
9) Now that Seattle Seahawks quarterback Russell Wilson has an $87.5m contract to play football, my guess is that we’ll no longer hear him hinting about wanting to play professional baseball. Not that Wilson really ever had a chance of making big money as a baseball player. He’s pushing 27-years old and hit just .229 with five total home runs in two seasons of Single-A ball in 2010 and 2011. And Wilson would never be able to turn those numbers around either because his lifestyle won’t allow a slumpbuster.
10) Everyone laughed at the Astros back in January when they announced a Taylor Swift concert scheduled for Minute Maid Park in October would be changed if Houston made the playoffs. Well, that concert has now officially been moved to avoid any conflict with a very possible Astros playoff appearance. All those who laughed at the Astros – and that’s all of us – look pretty foolish now. But at least we can still laugh at Sports Illustrated for their cover from last year in which they declared the Astros “2017 World Series champs.” Ha! The Astros are going to win a World Series before then, idiots. Wow, you look so dumb.
