Last Friday, on September 17th, Kevin Millwood had a bad day. How does a guy who has fifteen losses and three wins have a worse than normal day? Oddly enough, he pitched well. He was in a jam early, but lasted seven innings for us, and gave up one run. His counterpart, A.J. Burnett, gave up three runs over that same span, and Millwood was poised for win number four. Everything was going too smoothly up until Alex Roidriguez' game winning three-run blast against Koji "Mutton Chop" Uehara. This was a familiar dose of what has become reality for us here at TPHB. Blown save, lost game, fireworks launched for visiting team...wait, what? Yeah, it's true. A-Roid hit a second inning softball into our bullpen, and some chuckle bucket working the fireworks stand bumped the big red button, shooting off a triumphant splash of pyrotechnics in center field of Yankee Stadium South. Millwood was, pardon my French, pissed. He mentioned the incident twice in the post game press conference, and Mr. Showalter joked about it before the game on Saturday. Kevin Millwood wasn't laughing.
My source within the Orioles organization stumbled upon a letter of apology from the Orioles to Mr. Millwood:
20 September 2010
Mr. Kevin A. Millwood,
The Baltimore Orioles apologize for not only the regrettable events which occurred last Friday, 17 September 2010, but for the rest of this abhorrent season as well. We understand that as a pitcher who has thrown a no-hitter, has led the AL in ERA (2.86), has been an All-Star, and has more career wins than the rest of our rotation combined, this season has been something of a disappointment. We, as an organization, feel partially at fault and we wish to offer a formal apology and announce our desire to pursue a more supportive relationship, given that there are thirteen whole games left this season.
We asked Koji Uehara if he had any words of apology for you, concerning the blown save. His response was in Japanese or Chinese or Korean or whatever, so we did not understand it. His face was full of remorse, so let that offer a measure of comfort to you.
On top of the continual blown saves, lack of run support, and sending you to start against the likes of CC Sabathia, David Price, and Clay Buchholz (honestly man, we don't have a whole lot of say in that, I mean, who else is gonna pitch? Chris Tillman? Jake Arrieta? Brian Matusz? Come on, dude, these kids just started shaving during Spring Training), then we go and shoot fireworks off when a Yankee crushes one of those flatliner "fast"balls you serve up on a platter. Yeah, we realize that celebrating a visiting team's home run is not cool, especially when it's the Yankees, but seriously, what's up with all the beachballs sailing lazily out of your hand? A-Rod had enough time to chase Jeter into the clubhouse for a tickle fight while he was waiting for your souvenir-to-be. Your ERA is 5.14!
You think we're not tired of hiring washed-up has-beens? Sammy "Slamma-Lamma Ding Dong" Sosa whiffed on enough pitches that the wind from them picked up in the harbor and spawned a Tropical Storm. Albert Belle was so old and tired by the time we got him; he didn't even bother to jog all the way to first base on groundouts. It took Miguel Tejada two tries to get out of here. And Raffy too.
To be honest, dude, you brought this on yourself. We haven't had a winning season since Monica Lewinsky was in the news, so you knew what you were getting into. So, yeah, screw you Kevin Millwood! You think you're better than us?! You get mad and surprised that we can't control explosives when you get rocked? Seriously? You think we know how to handle chemical reactions and deadly ignition devices? It took us thirteen tries to beat the Blue Jays, the fourth place team in our division, and baseball is what we do! You honestly can't expect us to know how to handle fireworks when a "successful" season is not losing 100 games! We didn't want to do this, but we are issuing this as a formal letter of reprimand, Kevin Millwood. The guy who has fifteen losses doesn't get the chance to criticize us. Honestly, you're not going to be around next year, so start packing your bags now, man, because you're through!
Cordially,
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