Autumn is in the air. The golden harvest! The apples are crisping, the trees are changing colors, the Kardashians are choosing new nipple attachments, and the postseason is winking at us like a cow halting traffic on the New Jersey Turnpike. In most years, this would mean it'll soon be time for the playoffs! This year, however, you'll get to go home and watch October horror movies with the wife and kids. Enjoy the carnage!
But but BUT... there remains one final, glorious month - September! - and that's why I write.
Listen: This is no time to get hot. This is no time to go on a tear and pad your personal stats.
Be honest.
Either suck or go home.
You know who you are. You are the stars who failed in 2023. This is no time to belt 10 HRs and buttress the illusion that you had a decent year. Nope. Let's be truthful to ourselves. The season is over. You sucked. So did the Yankees. No 10-game hitting streak can change what happened. The team collapsed. A few big hits now won't save your legacy.
Why lie to future generations?
We will have plenty of time - a whole winter, in fact - to ponder the owner and his cadre of front office brownnosers, the wonky country clubbers who assembled this disaster. Trust me: We will discuss them vigorously. (They will be better off not visiting this website. We might need to buy a sound truck and cruise their neighborhoods in Westchester County, reading aloud our posts.)
But let's keep this simple: This is no time for you to start hitting with runners in scoring position. That ship sailed in July.
Again, you know who you are. For example, there is a certain DH who recently lifted his batting average to above .200. Sir, this needs to stop. We admire your personal pride, which shows up whenever you jog the bases in stilted pain, or freeze like Mitch McConnell at a strike three fastball down the middle. But you spent most of 2023 batting below .200, and that fearsome number belongs on your record. To get hot now and achieve - say - 30 HRs on the year - that would be a boldfaced lie. Future generations would say, "Wow, he hit 30 HRs on that terrible team. He must have had a great year." Do you want to lie to your grandchildren? Of course, not!
This is no time for any of you to start hitting. What's done is done. See those youngsters around you in the dugout? They're here because of all your strikeouts in June and July, when you swung for the fences and missed, and when you couldn't lay down a gimme bunt against defenses situated on the outfield grass, because you never practiced bunting, because such things were beneath you.
Nope. Don't you dare get hot now. Don't you dare.
It's time to be honest. And, honestly, in 2023, you sucked.
Dear Leader:
ReplyDeleteAllow me to add that the only “gutsy performance” I want to see from this team is a rampaging bout of diarrhea.
Thanky Hanky!
"freeze like Mitch McConnell at a strike three fastball down the middle."
ReplyDeleteduque, you silver tongued wordsmith! Or is it silver keyboarded?
The question is, who's faster from second to home on a long single?
And, I bet ol' mitch can stare longer at a single off the centerfield wall. Maybe even get thrown out at first.
Well, Rufus, in the words of Mitch McConnell, "
ReplyDelete."
JM, do you need a minute? Don't answer, we'll just give you one.
ReplyDeleteFall down going around the bases like our President. Make sure Torres participates in every thrown ball.
ReplyDeleteAnd picking up on something Kevin wrote before...
ReplyDeleteYes, that's the Gleyber Torres we all know and, um, are resigned to, even as he continues on his hottest hitting in four years.
Yes, Gleyber you have to JUMP on those plays! BEFORE the runner barrels into you. Look up old-timey baseball photos, you can find middle infielders doing it all the time!
Yeah, that last game ended on another Gleyber Torres freeze frame moment.
ReplyDeleteI can't believe that Cashman did not trade Torres at the deadline this year. If Miami wanted Torres badly, you'd think that would've been the time to cut losses and move this guy for good. But instead, absolutely nothing happened at the deadline, save two bullpen lugnut moves that Cashman made just so he wouldn't be the only GM in baseball who didn't make a single trade .
And he let Bader go for nothing, instead of dealing him at the deadline. Damn it, at least get an ugly masseuse for the guy!