Chicago White Sox fans have to be chuckling today, because someone else suddenly found out how big a baby Frank Thomas can be. Thomas had a good season last year as designated hitter with the Toronto Blue Jays with 26 homers and 95 RBIs but that was after getting off to a slow start. This year, he started the season strong, hitting home runs in 3 consecutive games April 5th through 8th, but he has been horrendous since: an 0-13 slide and a .167 batting average with 11 runs-batted-in. So, the manager, John Gibbons did the up-front thing, he told Thomas that he would be playing less: two to three games per week.
Thomas, predictably, balked, causing all kinds of stink. “It’s pretty obvious,” Thomas said Saturday (quoted on ESPN.com). “Sixty at-bats isn’t enough to make that decision. I’m angry, I know I can help this team. My career isn’t going to end like this.” Thomas hinted that this was a monetary decision because his deal included a $10-million option for 2009 that would have kicked in automatically if he made 376 plate appearances this season. Thomas said the Blue Jays had benched him to prevent him from reaching that mark. Thomas once again showed what a spoiled petulant brat he is, by not shaking hands with his teammates following Toronto’s 3-2 victory over Detroit and left the clubhouse without speaking to reporters.
The next day, Thomas met with Blue Jays GM J.P. Ricciardi and as a result of this meeting, the Blue Jays cut the 19-year veteran “by mutual consent” according to ESPN. Ricciardi told ESPN that “(Thomas) doesn’t want to be here if he’s not going to play much, and we don’t want him to be unhappy. He handled it with class, and I appreciate that.” That is the public story, but in reality, the Blue Jays decided that Thomas was too big of a cry baby to remain on the team. By cutting him, the Blue Jays owe Thomas $7,081,967 – the remainder of his $8 million salary this year in the $18.12 million, two-year contract the 39-year-old designated hitter signed in November 2006. So, the “small market” Blue Jays would rather lose money than keep this malcontent around. “I don’t know that we have the luxury of waiting two to three months for somebody to kick in because we can’t let this league or this division get away from us,” Ricciardi said. And in a division with the Yankees and Red Sox, Ricciardi is absolutely correct; he doesn’t have the time to wait on somebody, but he should have known what he got when he signed Thomas.
Despite what Ricciardi said, Frank Thomas hasn’t shown much class his entire career. Despite being cajoled like a small child most of his career here in Chicago; he never realized his potential of being a fan favorite due to his petulant rants and childish antics. He blasted the White Sox when they released him in 2005 when the team signed Jim Thome. Thomas said that it was racism for the team to sign white Thome (a great clubhouse presence and a left-handed bat, which the team needed) instead of African-American, right-handed Thomas.
Finally, in one of Sox GM Kenny Williams’ finest moments, he called Thomas out in public and in private, reminding him of the loans that the team had made to him and standing by him, even as Thomas was blasting the team publicly. Williams, also African-American, also called Thomas out on the racial aspect of the situation (and probably said that he was going to kick the big baby’s ass, but we’ll probably never learn the full story.) Finally called on the carpet, Thomas apologized for his comments and “made his peace” with the White Sox. When else can you say that a 6-foot, 5-inch man backed down to a much smaller man?
I’m sure that another AL team that needs a DH will be giving Thomas a call, and Thomas probably can be useful to the right team. (In many ways, it gets a team who needs a big bat off the hook from having to consider Barry Bonds.) But, whoever considers Frank Thomas should know that they are getting a petulant baby and potential clubhouse cancer. Buyer beware!

The person I’m happiest for today is Danica Patrick. The Indy Car driver had been looked at as a freak: a woman in a man’s sport; the poster girl for auto racers – only racing because she is attractive. But all that is over now: she won the Japan 300 Indy Car race this past weekend fair and square – the first time a woman has ever won an Indy Car event.
I am no fan of auto racing; watching a bunch of cars going around in a circle for several hours is boring to me; no matter how much beer I am consuming. Once, a friend of mine and I went to the Indianapolis speedway and someone was practicing on the track and from our vantage point, the car was a momentary blur that, if you blinked, you missed it; and this was 17 years ago when the cars were averaging slower times than now.
I’m sure that, like any pioneer, Ms, Patrick has endured more abuse than has been leaked out to the media, but now, she can really state that she belongs. And, in a gracious gesture, she mentioned Billie Jean King as a pioneer and role model whom Ms. Patrick admired, which is definitely true. Ms. King is arguably the second or third most influential athlete of the 20th Century (with Jackie Robinson and Muhammad Ali in any order you wish).
I remember a fine film called “The Contender” by Rod Lurie in which Joan Allen is faced with accusations as she attempts to become the first female Vice President of the United States. On a day where a woman is trying to gain the nomination for President, I think of Lurie’s note at the end of the film that he made it for his daughter to tell her that she should shrive for As a father of a daughter, I always tell her (even though she’s only three) that she can do anything she wants to do. There should be no limits to her achievement. Now, I can add Indy Car driver to things she can do that have already been achieved. Of course, that is not my preferred vocation for her, but if she wants to race cars in a couple of decades, she can go for it.

In this political season, it is not unusual to dislike politicians on the opposite side of whichever fence you happen to sit on. (No need to bring up my affiliation.) However, I am disgusted by members of both parties today. If you think the hearings on performance enhancing drugs was a colossal waste of time and tax payers’ money, wait ‘til you get a load of this one…
Three members of the House of Representatives are pushing the Justice Department to investigate the NCAA. That wouldn’t be a bad thing considering all of the money that flows through that organization. So, are they suggesting investigating graduation rates, or lack of payment to “student-athletes,” or want to open serious discussion about the lives of young, often black, often poor young men who feel that they have no better route out of their economic situation than in playing sports? If they did, I’d be all for it; but these Representatives want to investigate whether college football’s Bowl Championship Series is an illegal enterprise. Reps. Neil Abercrombie (D-Hawaii), Lynn Westmoreland (R-Georgia), and Mike Simpson, (R-Idaho) announced that they are introducing a resolution claiming that the BCS places an illegal restriction on trade because only the largest universities usually play in the major bowl games. The resolution would require Justice’s antitrust division to investigate whether the system violates federal law.
SI.com quoted Abercrombie today, “Who elected these NCAA people? Who are they to decide who competes for the championship?” The Hawaiian Democrat spoke at a press conference Thursday on Capitol Hill, gripping a souvenir University of Hawaii football.
Is this a serious inquiry? Should Congress hold hearings? Of course not; this is pandering to football fans within these creeps’ jurisdictions, because all three of these so-called Representatives have home-state schools with reasons to take issue with the BCS. Both the University of Hawaii, and Boise State University in Idaho each posted undefeated regular seasons recently, but were denied a shot at the championship game. And Westmoreland admitted at the press conference that he is still smarting about his University of Georgia Bulldogs being passed over for the national championship game last year. (We know how crazy Georgians are for their college football.)
So, instead of voting to end the war, or strengthen personal freedoms from the intrusion of government spies and censors, or even investigating the current administration for criminal behavior, these three are wasting good time, money and hot air bringing a measure to Congress that exists solely to seek revenge against “those NCAA folks who screwed ‘their’ teams.” (And truth be told, Rep. Abercrombie earned a B.A. degree in Sociology from Union College in Schenectady, N.Y.; only attending the University of Hawaii for his graduate studies: a Masters degree in Sociology and a PhD in American Studies. Rep. Simpson didn’t even attend college in Idaho; he attended Utah State University and Washington University School of Dental Medicine in St. Louis, Missouri. Rep. Westmoreland’s website does not list his education other than founding a building company and working in the building industry before coming to Congress.)
This type of cheap, shameless antics may play big in Hawaii, or Georgia, or Idaho, but they shouldn’t. A serious look at the NCAA is long overdue, but for other reasons. Gentlemen, you have better things to do. There are too many people dying in a war to waste time on frivolity or to misuse your office as a means for revenge.

I’m sitting here listening to “4th of July, Asbury Park (Sandy)” from Bruce Springsteen’s second album that features a great accordion part by Dan Federici. We all knew that Federici had been battling cancer; he left the tour late last year as a result, and the last I had read, the band thought he was making remarkable progress and they were expecting him back soon. They were, unfortunately, wrong.
Danny Federici died yesterday at the age of 58. (It’s funny, I just called one of my dearest friends, Phil Yerby yesterday, which was his 58th birthday.) Another friend of mine’s nephew used to be Nils Lofgen’s guitar tech, so my friend had met most of the band. My friend e-mailed me this morning saying that he thought that Mr. Federici was one of the nicest people in the band, very genuine. He also told me that he has twin girls. As a father, I feel most for them.
I probably have no right to even speak on this topic, but looking back, I realize that I saw Springsteen for the first time 30 years ago at McGaw Hall at Northwestern University, which was the best concert I have ever attended. Since then, I have seen the E Street Band many times; the most recent time coming when they came through Chicago last October, and before Mr. Federici left the tour.
I know that as a fan, you feel as though you know someone, but you really don’t. They are a part of your life, but you aren’t a part of theirs. Even feeling sorrow is somehow intruding on someone else’s life to whom you were just another speck in the crowd. But that doesn’t mean that we who were touched by that person’s music don’t grieve also, and I am deeply saddened by the untimely loss of a husband, father, and member of the greatest bar band to ever rock the earth. My condolences go out to his family, Bruce, the band, and all of my fellow fans who will miss him.

It was announced today that Houston Astro shortstop Miguel Tejeda is actually 2 years older than he is listed: 33 instead of 31. According the ESPN, Tejada told Oakland A’s officials that he was 17 when he was signed out of the Dominican Republic in 1993, but he was actually 19, meaning he is now 33, two years older than his listed age in the Astros’ media guide and other baseball records. The shortstop made his admission after being approached Tuesday by ESPN.
He is far from the only Latin player to have questionable dates of birth. In fact, almost every Latin player has been tainted by the cloud of being actually older than he lets on. It makes sense; the kids are often trying to get out of the poverty of their home country, and want to get to America and make money as soon as possible, and since record keeping is “less than stringent” (to be generous) players pawn themselves off as older than they really are.
In the Major and Minor Leagues, it’s no harm no foul to my mind. Who really cares if Julio Franco is 48 or 68; he’s pretty remarkable that he can still play major league baseball at either age. Locally, there are whispers every time White Sox hurler Jose Contreras goes to the mound how old he actually is. However, when the lying begins ever earlier, you have the prospect of giving a Latin American team an unfair advantage. You may remember the pitcher in Little League who mowed through the competition but he was far from 12-years-of-age he was presented as, and eventually, the truth came out.
My joke has been for many years that the only true way to determine the true age of Latin athletes is to cut them in half and count the rings!

This story has only come to light after an ESPN reporter presented Tejada with a copy of a birth certificate, filed by his father in his hometown of Bani, that showed he was born on May 25, 1974. ESPN hired a Dominican law firm to go after the certificate after clerks at the town hall declared that his records were confidential. When asked if the birth certificate was the real one, Tejada said “probably” and walked out of the interview, saying that he considered the information “personal.” ESPN is reporting that Tejada has his real date of birth on his green card, driver’s license and other legal papers.
Of course, Tejada is one of the players prominently mentioned in the Mitchell Report on the use of performance enhancing drugs in baseball. The big question here is: if Tejada is lying about his age, what else is he lying about? Unfortunately, we will never know because MLB Commissioner Bud “Watergate would have worked if I had covered it up” Selig gave all of the players named in the report amnesty. So, Tejada gets to keep his American League MVP award. So does Jose Canseco. And I agree that it makes no sense to look backward on evidence that cannot be proved scientifically, I believe that the amnesty should have come with admissions of guilt from those involved. Come clean; tell the truth; and then, in the record books, give them the asterisk as being under performance enhancing drugs. But Donald “Head in the Sand” Fehr won’t let that happen. So, baseball in the 1990s and 2000s will always be looked upon as “the Steroid Age,” and in a sense, the statistics will remain meaningless. But baseball and the Players’ Union don’t give a damn.

The weather seems like it is finally turning for the warmer after the long, harsh winter of 2007-2008, and it is nice to have the birds starting to chirp and the flowers starting to bloom. I only hope that this coming summer is not like last summer which was like a scene from Hitchcock’s The Birds. Let me explain…
My family and I live in the suburbs of Chicago, and we have a large back yard, which was one of the big selling points when we purchased the house in 2005. The yard is surrounded by hedges with the tallest, thickest hedges on the north side of the yard. Both of the two summers that we have lived in our home; we have had birds nesting in the north hedges. We have gone out of our way to accommodate the birds; making sure that the hedges are undisturbed until after the baby birds grow out of the nest. In year one, the nest was right outside our back door, which was no hardship, but unfortunately, the poor baby birds didn’t make it (through no fault of ours – we came home one day and the nest was on the ground in the hedges and the babies were nowhere to be found, and they were too young to have survived). Last year, the nest was further away from the house, almost at the far end of the yard, but this was a problem because the nest was just a couple of feet from the gate to the alley, which is important because the garbage cans are right outside of our gate, meaning that I have to take the garbage and recycling out through the gate 2-3 times per week. If that weren’t enough, the bird parents made sure to protect the nest. I could hear increased noise as I got closer to the nest as the birds stood guard from the trees next door and across the alley.
One day, I was bringing the garbage out and one of the birds swooped down, about 1 foot above my head. Ignorantly, I tried to explain to the little bastards that I had no interest whatever in their nest, I just wanted to get the stinky refuse out of the house and my hand. Of course, since birds can’t speak English (or any other human language that we know of; except Myna birds and there’s no science to prove that they understand what they’re mimicking), my cries of innocence went without response.
After the “attack,” I did what any red-blooded male would do, I found a weapon, or at least a diversion. At first, I took one of my old baseball bats out with me, swinging it above my head; but The Indignant Wife didn’t like that idea. (Of course, she thought that I was over-reacting and that the close encounter of the bird kind never occurred. But she hardly ever takes the garbage out anyway.) However, I needed something. We had an old umbrella that we had somehow gotten from a restaurant that I couldn’t close. This was perfect: light, big enough to hold off any attack, and if I swung and hit one of the f#@kers, it would hurt like hell, but not necessarily kill the bird.
I never hit one of the birds, but after grabbing the umbrella, I never had another close encounter. I had to keep my daughter out of the backyard when I took out the garbage because I didn’t want her to hear Daddy swearing at the birds. “Come on down, you little motherf@#$ers; I’ve got something for you cocksu@#ers,” was the usual refrain. I’m sure that the neighbors thought that the cheese had finally slipped off my cracker. A couple of days, I actually threw rocks at the birds telling them that I was armed and wasn’t taking any shit off of them.
What remained weird though was feeling a bit Orwellian, feeling like I had bird “big brother” watching all of the time. The “father” a black bird with red markings near its head on both sides would be in the tree in my neighbor’s back yard, and I could hear clicking as soon as I stepped in the yard. The clicking (not unlike that of a Geiger counter) would be there even if I just went to the barbeque grill or on the padio, nowhere near the nest. But the clicks would increase in frequency and volume as I got closer to the nest. The Indignant Wife and our daughter must not have posed any threat since they said that they didn’t hear what I heard. Finally, around August, the clicking stopped; and I assumed that the little birds had grown up and gone away. I was free to take out the garbage without fear of reprisals.
But I went out in the yard yesterday, and there were a few black birds with red markings flying around. I hope they nest and have lots of healthy chicks, but not by the garbage. But I’m ready: the umbrella is still in the backyard and my bat is in the garage…