Off Wing Opinion

In Seattle just now, Devil Rays centerfielder Rocco Baldelli took a line drive to the forehead off the bat of the Mariners Ben Davis. With runners on first and second and no out in the fifth inning, Davis hit a screaming liner that Baldelli played perfectly -- until the ball skipped off the heel of his glove and straight into his forehead.

But Baldelli stayed in the game, because after all, he's a hockey player.

To add insult to injury, the play resulted in the Mariners, who are down 5-0, to load the bases with nobody out. Devil Rays Manager Lou Pinella must be wondering what he has to do to catch a break with this team.

Look for the endless video highlight on SportsCenter between now and Sunday night.

UPDATE: Mariners score three after Baldelli's misplay.

I had to take a break from my self-imposed hiatus to relay the contents of an exchange between the occasionally inarticulate Fran Healy and the urbane Keith Hernandez as they handled the play-by-play on tonight's Braves-Mets game from Atlanta.

The topic: the sale of the movie rights to the life of Braves pitcher Greg Maddux:

Healy: If they ever make a movie about Greg Maddux. . .

Keith Hernandez (deadpan): Why?

Healy: As a great athlete, someday. . . What do you think would play the role. He played in The Producers.

Hernandez (amazed): What are you talking about?

Healy: Look it, look it (camera focussing on Maddux in Braves dugout).

Hernandez (incredulous): Movie about him?

Healy (insistent): Matthew Broderick. . . . What are you saying, he's no good? He's a Hall of Famer! You're going to go up and look at his plaque!

(Hernandez laughs)

Healy: Two balls and one strike. . .

Hernandez: Woody Harrelson.

Healy: Ok, you think Matthew Broderick could play the role?

(Hernandez responds with silence):

Healy: In. . . No. . . No it is inside. So it's three balls and one strike. You're looking at, tonight you're watching a future Hall of Famer pitch, he's going to win 300 ballgames. . .

Hernandez: Um hmm.

Healy: You dismiss him. Look at him.

(Camera zooms in on Maddux, looking baby-faced in the Braves dugout)

Hernandez: I'm not dismissing him, I just don't think that movie is gonna make any money.

Now, I think Maddux, along with Roger Clemens, is perhaps the most dominating pitcher of his era. But a Hollywood feature? I think I'm with Mex on this call.

Ozzy at Wrigley -- the emperor has no brain. Neither do his fans.

The Chicago Cubs invited the Osbournes, Sharon and Ozzy, to Wrigley Field yesterday. Sharon got to throw out the first pitch, and Ozzy was accorded the honor of singing Take Me Out To The Ballgame during the seventh inning stretch. The results, as chronicled here by the Chicago Tribune's Jeremy Rothstein, were less than stellar:

Ozzy: "All right, Chicago. I want to hear a real crazy crowd start singing. Are you ready? Are you ready? I can't hear you. Are you ready?

"One. Two. Three.

"Let's go out to the ballgame. Let's go out to the bluhhhhhn.

"Take me a ee-yan eeya (humming) the field.

"I don't care if I ahh-uhn ack.

"Da da da da duh da da da eam. Duh ee, da da da da dahhh.

"For a fee, two, three strikes you're out at the old ballgame. Yeahhhhhh."

Sharon: "Now let's get some runs."

Ozzy: "Yeah. Let's get some runs."

Near the end of the broadcast, WGN-Ch. 9 showed a replay of legendary Los Angeles Dodgers announcer Vin Scully giving the thumbs up after Osbourne's rendition.

"If you get the seal of approval from Hall of Famer Vin Scully, you know you're doing OK," [Cubs announcer Skip]Caray said.

Now, if you read Rothstein's account, which ran in the newspaper that's owned by the same company as the Cubs, you'd think this entire event was suffused with hilarity. But if you watched the highlights on SportsCenter, like I just did early this morning, you would have actually seen how pathetic it was. And as for Scully's reported "thumbs up", it looked as if it took just about all of his might to restrain himself from striding across the press box at Wrigley and beating Osbourne to within an inch of his life.

Now, I understand that part of the reported appeal of the Osbournes is seeing Ozzy continually make an ass of himself. But I'm afraid that take has folded in on itself like a piece in the fabric of space-time, or just a work by M.C. Escher. Because now the joke is on us, as Ozzy's wife proves that she can still wring millions in cash out of the dried husk of a man who doesn't belong anywhere but a nursing home under 24-hour care.

We're coming up to the home stretch when it comes to Major League Baseball's charade that the Montreal Expos might actually find a permanent home next season. Sticking to all the details of the story until the bitter end is the Washington Times Eric Fisher, who seems determined to catalog every every last step in this agonizing process. In his latest pieces from the end of last week, Fisher reports on the imperative to complete MLB's schedule for 2004, and how that means the team needs to have its fate determined by September 1. As a result, expect the Expos to have just one home next year, in part to placate a players association determined to keep the team in one city after this year's vagabond existence.

About an hour after the Baltimore Orioles lost 8-0 to the New York Yankees yesterday, Kiley Bechler, widow of the late Baltimore Orioles relief pitcher Steve Bechler, spread his ashes over the mound and bullpen at Camden Yards. As many of you may recall, a Florida medical examiner found that Ephedra helped contribute to Bechler's death from heatstroke during Spring Training earlier this year.

On another note, a little more than two weeks ago, I noted that the makers of Stacker 2, a nutritional supplement sold as a weight loss aid, had started a new advertising campaign that took pains to mention that their product didn't contain Ephedra. Now, over this past weekend, I happened to see an ad for Xenadrine XFA, another weight loss supplement distributed by Cytodyne Technologies, also stressing that it is now "Ephedra-free." Why is this important? Because it was Xenadrine, which then contained Ephedra, that was found in Bechler's locker after his death.

And Philadelphia Phillies reliever Jose Mesa (referred to by baseball insiders as "Joe Table"), really should know better after 15 seasons in the big leagues. So, I'm going to be interested in hearing what his excuse was after he shoved an unidentified reporter after nearly blowing a lead in Philadelphia's 6-4 win over St. Louis on Sunday night.

Of course, Mesa doesn't exactly have the best of reputations. Traditionally, after games, he keeps himself in an area of the Phillies clubhouse where reporters aren't allowed to go (a situation that may have helped precipitate last night's confrontation) -- his way of avoiding the press. Why? In part, it's because of Mesa's very public feud with former Cleveland Indians teammate Omar Vizquel. Back during Spring Training, Mesa told everyone who was willing to listen that he wanted to "kill" Vizquel -- apparently in revenge for a passage in a book Vizquel wrote that he blamed Mesa for the Indians loss in Game Seven of the 1997 World Series.

I'd say that Mesa has to get his temper under control, but it's his pitching that could use the help first. Though he's managed to convert 21 of 24 save opportunities, Mesa still has an ERA north of six -- which means he's creating all sorts of excitement while getting the job done. A little more of this, and Phillies fans will probably be pining for the days of Mitch Williams.

Today's power outage throughout the Northeast gave me a few anxious moments today. Most of my family still lives in the New York metropolitan area, and I spent plenty of time this evening calling relatives to check to see if everyone was ok. For the most part, everyone made it home safely and gathered at my parents house on Long Island where they promptly fired up the gas grill and started cooking the contents of the freezer that were thawing rapidly.

For the most part, my mother is awfully careful when it comes to preparing for potential disaster. Unfortunately, living on Long Island, she's more accustomed to preparing for a blizzard, not a blackout. Needless to say, the grill was pretty full tonight.

The only member of the family not to make it home was my brother. He's usually based in Midtown, but this afternoon found him in SoHo for a business meeting. With the Long Island Railroad immobilized, he had to walk three miles to his brother-in-law's apartment on Sutton Place so he could stay the night.

Over in Queens, the Mets-Giants game was postponed (as were a number of other sporting events), evoking memories of the blackout of July 13, 1977. That night, the lights went out as Mets third baseman Lenny Randle stepped to the plate against the Montreal Expos.

The game that night was postponed, and when the power didn't come on in time the next day, the following one was as well. In fact, it's a shame the Mets' entire 1977 season wasn't blacked out as well.

Back on Long Island, I just remember running and laughing in the streets with my friends as my parents and some friends sat on the deck in our backyard and conversed by candlelight. But just a few miles to the West of us back in the city, thousands of people were rioting and looting as if it were their last day on Earth. Watching the live video today of thousands of New Yorkers leaving Manhattan in an orderly fashion was certainly a marked contrast from that chaotic night.

Something tells me that if you had asked a person on the street in 1977 whether things would get better or worse if there were a New York blackout in the future, the answer wouldn't have been too hopeful. I'm sure 9-11 has made a tremendous difference in the mindset of many New Yorkers, but I think the change started well before then.

After downing Boston last night, Oakland has taken over the AL Wild Card spot. I'm still waiting for that Seattle collapse. By the looks of this piece in the Boston Globe, folks in Boston are getting anxious.

I'm all for free will, but what's happened to the corpse of Ted Williams makes my stomach churn. And now, some latter day whack job may have stolen samples of Williams' DNA.

From the looks of it, and despite the public denials, it looks as if Major League Baseball is going to reinstate Pete Rose to the game, and perhaps even allow him to take a job with a big league ball club. I've already laid out where I stand, and I can't say I'm surprised to see Bud Selig heading in the direction of the easy way out.

In his "Sunday Conversation" with ESPN, Rose mentioned that his 14-year suspension had cost him $30 million. Somehow I'm having a hard time feeling sorry for him.

UPDATE: Jay Mariotti of the Chicago Sun-Times has it right when he talks about Rose's comments on Sunday night:

As a member of the Baseball Writers' Association of America, I would consider voting for Rose if he cut the cord to his demons, came forward and became an anti-gambling role model for millions of problem gamblers. Any man who effectively turns an evil into a positive deserves a second chance. But even as Selig considers a historic favor, Rose can't avoid saying the wrong thing in front of another TV camera. When all we want to hear is why he gambled and hung out with sleazy characters, all Pete wants to do is campaign for a managing job.

And how about this shot at the "Queen City" and its baseball fans:

It's quite pathetic, but at least one team would hire him as a manager tomorrow. That team is the Reds, who would tap into the blind amnesiacs of a small river town by selling All Things Pete. Because it's such an insignificant place, no one bothers to tell Cincinnati how ridiculous it looks in continuing to defend its native son.

I'm thinking the Sun-Times is going to get some angry letters today. Which only means that Mariotti is doing his job. Meanwhile, the AP's Jim Litke is offering similar thoughts.

After the trading deadline, the conventional wisdom around Major League Baseball seemed to be that the Oakland A's would catch the Seattle Mariners, and knock them from playoff contention -- leaving New York, Boston, whoever wins the AL Central, and Oakland in the postseason. But after the Mariners took two of three from the Yanks in New York (gotta love that Yankees bullpen), and Boston dropped a series to Baltimore in Boston, one has to wonder why everyone forgot to consider a Boston collapse into the equation.

Everyone seemed to forget that in the playoff race, the A's were pretty likely to pass Boston for the Wild Card before they could catch the Mariners for first in the AL West. And if you look at the AL Wild Card standings this morning, you'll see that Oakland is poised to do just that, only one game back of the Red Sox.

UPDATE: In Oakland, the A's have a 4-0 lead in the bottom of the sixth over the Red Sox.

Reports have just hit the wire that the Yankees have traded Armando Benitez, who they had just acquired from the New York Mets before the July 31 trade deadline, to the Seattle Mariners for pitcher Jeff Nelson.

Of course, Nelson was just recently in the news for ripping Seattle GM Pat Gillick for not making any moves before the trading deadline. Guess Jeff needed to be more careful what he wished for.

POSTSCRIPT: Peter White, white courtesy phone!