NYC Store Facing Ball Busting of Near-Epidemic Proportions

I saw this SNY commercial on network TV last night, and have watched it 72 times already.

SNY - Ball Buster - watch more funny videos

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Group Calls on Yankees, Mets to Boycott All Star Game

According to the Washington Post, when "...[President] Obama returned to Washington from Illinois Wednesday night, he walked back to the press cabin on the presidential aircraft and, in an impromptu Q&A, essentially declared immigration reform dead. He said "there may not be an appetite" for it."

So, since Arizona's "controversial" immigration law aimed at addressing the 400,000 illegals within the state's borders in light of the lack of a federal backbone on the issue has fallen on deaf ears in the White House, advocates are looking at bringing attention to the subject at the heart of America - the national pastime in the Big Apple.

Today on Cinco de Mayo, the American holiday celebrating the rich history of drinking tequila and Dos Equis while wearing sombreros, the New York Daily News reports that a supposedly influential group known as the Working Families Party "gathered more than 2,500 [more All Star votes than Javy Vasquez] signatures yesterday on a petition it planned to deliver to Yankees owner George Steinbrenner and Mets owner Fred Wilpon" reading:

Dear Mr. Steinbrenner and Mr. Wilpon,

Without immigrants, New York wouldn't exist, and we wouldn't have two of the greatest baseball teams in the world. We urge you to take a stand for your players, immigrants and all Americans by publicly pledging not to participate in the 2011 All-Star Game unless it is moved out of Arizona or Arizona repeals its anti-immigrant, anti-American law.

Sincerely,

WFP Director Dan Cantor notes, "If New York's baseball teams say they won't go, they could become leaders in a national push to move the All-Star Game out of Arizona."

What the Working Families Party neglects to acknowledge is that in recent years, the economic impact of MLB All Star games can reach approximately $60 million. With advocates pronouncing the contributions immigrants make to local economies and communities, in a state with such a large population of Mexicans, inevitably, pulling such an event out of the area will negatively impact the ability of these workers to earn an (illegal? untaxed?) day's pay.

In reality, the group is using these teams and their players as a press hit to draw light to the issue. But, please, leave your politics out of my baseball. There are plenty of advocates, politicians and citizens making a fuss about the issue. If anything, Arizona actually taking a stance has brought the issue to the forefront of debate - an issue that most acknowledge something has to be done on. While imperfect, use said stance to craft policy and discussion, not press gimmicks that will impact my ability to watch the mid-season classic.

Besides, Steinbrenner thinks he's an astronaut nowadays and used the petitions to wipe tapioca off his chin.

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Blogs With Balls Radio, Episode 13

This week’s Blogs With Balls Show on the JoeSportsFan Radio Network is now available.

Download Episode 13 Here.



Lucas is South of the border this week, so we get a pinch hit from HHR co-founder @ChrisIlluminati.

Chris has a harem of sites that we talk about, but also will soon be a published author with his NSFW-titled A**holeology that's due out in January.


Our guest is MetsBlog.com's Matthew Cerrone. Matthew is a full-time blogger who, despite an advertising agreement between the site and the New York sports cable station SNY, fully owns his product with complete editorial control over content.

Cerrone talks about how he was able to turn what started as a hobby and a way to follow his team when living out of market into his full-time job. We also talk about the Mets' prospects for this coming season and their focus during the current Winter Meetings.

This week’s links of interest:

• MetsBlog.com
• MatthewCerrone.com
• @MatthewCerrone
• ChrisIlluminati.com
• @ChrisIlluminati
• A**holeology
• On the Black
• GadJunk.com

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Expert Advice: The Most Misleading Cover Story Ever

Get yours today, Mets fans!

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Mets Marketing Team Taking Advantage of Playoff Fever

How sad is this for the Mets? While their rivals send out playoff ticket invitations/onsale info, they're soliciting high school kids.

Bet you wish you were still in high school so you could get a job as a Mets intern, don't you?

H/T: Bunch

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Jim Breuer Puts Being a Mets Fan into Perspective

Audio from the comedian's appearance on this morning's Preston & Steve Show (WMMR, Philadelphia): "They suck. It's like being in love with an alcoholic."

Photo: Christina Santucci

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From The D.C. Bureau: David Cone: Don't Jerk With Sonia

If you were going before the US Senate for a possible lifetime appointment as a Supreme Court Justice, who better to have on your character witness list other than David Cone?

Here are a couple of things to look for on the day Cone-y shows up.

At what distance will Capitol Hill's notoriously promiscuous interns be restrained from Mr. Cone's presence?

“Last week three other women brought an $8.1 million suit against Mets pitcher David Cone, charging him with various sexual outrages, including masturbating in front of one of them in the Shea Stadium bullpen in 1989. This woman says that as she left the bullpen Cone told her, "You're a big baby. You're not invited to showtime anymore." Cone and his accused teammates deny the allegations. In angry support, 31 Mets players have declared they will no longer speak to the media.” (Time)

Which Senator will ask for a box of autographed baseballs?

“Cone is routinely called a leader of the Yankees. One of his boredom-breaking practical jokes has become legendary: Cone told a clubhouse kid to take a cardboard box to one of Cone's friends on a visiting team and ask the player to autograph the baseballs inside. When the player opened the box, he found not baseballs but a pile of Cone's crap.” (NY Mag)

Does Cone-y know any G-rated Sotomayor Stories?

“Try Darryl Strawberry, who's known Cone since 1987 and played beside him in the hell-raising Mets days, and there's that same playful smirk. "Naw, man," Strawberry says with a rumbling laugh. "Not many of the stories about Coney are G-rated." (NY Mag)

Exclusive:

In an HHR exclusive, this intrepid HHR correspondent approached Judge Sotomayor to get her reaction to Cone's appearance on her witness list "Yeah," she said with a smile and a shrug, "I party."

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I'm Keith Hernandez

After garnering underground buzz and doing a tour of the film festival circuit, Rob Perri's short film, "I'm Keith Hernandez," has been released online for free.

From creating a more confident Joaquin Andujar to his influence on the '86 championship Mets to encouraging Don Mattingly's attraction by association, Keith Hernandez's influential mascualinity knew no bounds in the 1980s.

Needless to say, the film's widespread viewership is long overdue.

I'm Keith Hernandez from water&power on Vimeo.

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Topps Gives Us Head(s Up)

Knock. Knock.

Who's there?

Kebon Meeshle.

Kebon Meeshle who?

Kebon Meeshle who's hear to cut the head off of your cat.

Amazing the things I find in my basement.

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Have You Gotten Your BlogsWithBalls Tickets Yet?

Baba Booey Could Probably Crack the Mets' Rotation

From our good friend Eric G at the Camel Clutch: Like the Mets, Baba Booey Chokes.



See Also: Baba Booey Would Like To Submit His Tape For The World's Worst First Pitch (Awful Announcing)

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Have You Gotten Your BlogsWithBalls Tickets Yet?

Doc Gooden Has "(Uh) At Least Six Kids"

Dwight Gooden, by all accounts, has turned his life around after having a career derailed by off-field transgressions.

This morning on WFAN's Boomer and Carton show, he talked frankly about his career, his drug use and even his endorsement of a certain little, blue performance enhancer.

As he is frequent to do with big name guests, Craig Carton invited Doc over for a little July 4th BBQ/pool party. To which Gooden noted he'd be happy to come but would have to bring "the rest of my kids. I have (uh) at least six kids and one grandkid."



You can listen to the full interview here.

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Have You Gotten Your BlogsWithBalls Tickets Yet?

Mets to Open Citi Field with Sass

A Mets press release fabulously announced this weekend that Mets legend Tom Seaver, Piazza New York Catcher, and the cast of West Side Story will joining the ball club for today's home opener at the new Citi Field.

Word is Omar Minaya will be asking each of the actor/dancer to "show what their jazz hands are made of" and take groundballs for scouts prior to the game, citing that they "can't be a worse #2 man than Luis Castillo." Despite protests that they "aren't ball players or acutally even Latin American for that matter," most are likely to humor the GM.

It is yet to be confirmed whether or not the organization will be holding the obligatory Mike Piazza "I'm still not gay" press conference following the ceremonies.

When you're a Met,
You're a Met all the way
From your first cigarette
To your last dyin' day.

When you're a Met,
If the spit hits the fan,
You got brothers around,
You're a family man!

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Have You Gotten Your BlogsWithBalls Tickets Yet?

Jose Reyes Dons Mets Turban Beneath WBC Cap

As if he didn't already have a hard enough time putting his baseball cap on properly, it appears flamboyant Mets shortstop and Spanish tutor Jose Reyes is finding it even more difficult to wear his hat straight with an apparent (but thus far unconfirmed) conversion to Hindi.

Photo: Joel Auerbach/US Presswire

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Mets News

Port St. Lucie Florida is abuzz with anticipation as pitchers and catchers are set to report to Mets camp this weekend.

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Mets Patches

Yesterday we got a chuckle out of The Sports Hernia's look at "concepts the Mets whipped up before ultimately netting out with the victory you see above."

Seems the Hernia isn't the only one getting a laugh out of the new patches, as Big League Stew and Uni Watch were all over it as well.

Below are our submissions that apparently didn't even warrant a response from the team.

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Sports' Deepest Throats

Late last week, W. Mark Felt, better known as Watergate snitch "Deep Throat," died at the age of 95. Felt was responsible for Washington Post reporters Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward's biggest leads in taking down President Nixon.

In his honor, and in honor of whistleblowers everywhere, we present sports' top ten historical snitches.

Dis-Honorable Mention

Brett Favre: Rumor has it he used his Packer-issued cell phone to call Vikes coach Brad Childress and offensive coordinator Darrell Bevell while on his way out of Green Bay. Of course, he denied any inappropriateness and Favre is a man to take at his word.

10. J.P. Hayes

You know you are a real rat when you can't even help but out yourself, even at the expense of your own livilhood.

Hayes inadvertently played a non-conforming golf ball - one not on the list approved for competition by the United States Golf Association - for one hole of a second-stage qualifier in McKinney, Texas.

The 43-year-old Appleton native disqualified himself from the second stage of the PGA Tour Qualifying Tournament last week. The first DQ of his career was especially harsh because it left him ineligible to play fulltime on the PGA Tour in 2009.

9. Terry "Hulk Hogan" Bollea

Over the years we have seen Hulk Hogan's reputation, family life and ego more and more reflect the world of professional wrestling in which he made his bones. If not for the vison of Vincent K. McMahon, Hogan's career may very well have gone the way of, say, a Barry Horowitz.

In the 90's, years after Hollywood made his millions, he was the star witness against his boss, first scratching the All-American surface of the self-serving egomaniac that we know today:

In 1993, he was indicted after a steroid controversy engulfed the promotion. McMahon was put on trial in 1994, accused of distributing steroids to his wrestlers. As a legal move, his wife Linda was made CEO of the WWF during the trial. He was acquitted of all charges though he admitted to taking steroids himself in the 1980s. The prosecution made Hulk Hogan its star witness, and his testimony in the trial severely damaged the two's friendship, even though Hogan's testimony defended McMahon. After Hogan's testimony, McMahon went before the media declaring that he wished that Hogan had not lied about him on the witness stand.

8. Billy Wagner

Not a snitch, per se, but in the words of World Champion Pat Burrell, a "rat."

A club house cancer if there ever was one, Wagner, a perennial over-paid underachiever who crumbles in big moments, has never had any qualms calling out teammates in the media.

7. Paul LoDuca

Speaking of outspoken Mets hell-bent on destroying team chemistry...if not for Paul LoDuca, we'd have never known that New York's Latin ballplayers spoke a lick of English:

“I’ll do this, but you need to start talking to other players. It’s the same three or four people every day. Nobody else wants to talk...Some of these guys have got to start talking. They speak English, believe me.”

6. Kobe Bryant

Leave it to an adulterous, accused rapist to bring down those around him.

In his now-famous freestyle, Shaquille O'Neal explaned: "I'm a horse, Kobe ratted me out, that's why I'm getting divorced," in reference to Kobe's comment to Colorado police during his 2003 rape trial: "Shaq would pay his women not to say anything."

5. Anonymous 911 Caller

A woman police around 9:20 p.m. on Oct. 6 "to report some men had gotten out of a vehicle and urinated in her yard."

The caller told the dispatcher, "There was a big shuttle bus limousine that pulled up alongside of my house, and there was like seven black men who got out and stopped and peed all over my yard. There was like six or seven. There was a whole busload of them. But the bus driver stopped right alongside my house, and there was six or seven black men that got out, probably, I'd maybe say 19, 18, 19, maybe even 20."

The organizer, Viking Fred Smoot, put on quite a party for his Minnesota teammates.

Police described the Vikings sex boat incident as: "Masturbation, oral sex, woman on man, woman on woman, toys, middle of the floor, middle of the couches, middle of the room...Members of the entourage that were on both boats took enormously detailed photographs of a variety of sexual acts."

4. Jim Haslett

In 2005 the NFL player-turned coach outed one of the NFL's premier franchises (Steelers), coaches (Noll) and ownerships (Rooney) by saying that the "team's use of steroids during its Super Bowl championship seasons in the 1970s popularized the drug in the NFL."

Haslett later clarified: "It wasn't against the rules in those days, it wasn't illegal...I have a lot of respect for this league, but it's naive to think people weren't using enhancing drugs before they were illegal. The difference is that the NFL recognized that steroids would hurt the league and took steps to stop their use. That's what I was trying to show."

3. Brian McNamee

McNamee's ceremonious throwing of his former boss and baseball legend Roger Clemens under the bus in the heat of the Mitchell hearings was the ultimate sign of ungratefulness. Whether or not the Rocket was guilty of the accusations McNamee presented is besides the point. He ultimately betrayed his meal ticket and apparent friend and confidant, and continues to be a thorn in the would be Hall of Famer's side.

2. Jim Bouton

I wrote last year about Bouton's Ball Four, his "masterpiece that got his ass blacklisted from pro ball": Ball Four is a raw, unadulterated and no-holds barred piece written in a diary format by a witty, honest intellectual amongst his more physically focused contemporaries.

His references to player-team labor relations, "beaver shooting," amphetamine use and Mickey Mantle's skirt chasing were unprecedented at the time when sportswriters still held athletes on a pedestal for idol-worshiping fans to, well...worship.

1. Jose Canseco


What can be said about the Bash Brother-turned-reality star-turned author that hasn't already been said.

Bouton's book was viewed as getting him blacklisted, Canseco's was in essence a response to his perceived impression that he was already blacklisted. Consequently, it did little to help his cause. Bouton shed light on things we didn't know, Canseco's shed light on things we already assumed.

VOTE!



At a game and need something to stick deep in your gullet? Check out FanFoodie.

Penile Enhancement

AP reports that the Mets add Putz to go along with their Rod.

If they bring back Don Aase they can really add some strength to their back-end.

Snack Food Choking Hazard

Wise Foods, Inc. is warning consumers of the inevitable hazards of eating their potato chips and cheez doodles by affixing this widely-recognized symbol for choking on their snack foods.

Fans Have Fun with a Drunk at Shea

As the Mets bullpen fends off nightly collapses, Carlos Delgado makes the most improbable run for MVP we may have ever seen, and the Amazins' continue to teeter on the brink of destruction or an NL East crown, at least the fans at Shea Stadium are sending the old place out right.

At a recent game one super fan apparently ordered the meal of one 'Shea Shausage' and 17 beers. After passing out everyone in his section, led likely by his best friend, began messing with this guy by stacking cups on his head. Please view the nearly ten minute video (it is worth all ten minutes) as fans ignore the action on the field and pose for pictures with this passed out diehard.

Kinda makes the old magic marker peeshaleen on the forehead seem juvenile don't it?



H/T: NY Daily News

You're Fired!

One thing that bears mentioning in this year's unceremonious firings of playoff chasing managers Willie Randolph and Ned Yost: both we're brought about by the play of the Philadelphia Phillies, as much as the lack thereof of their own respective clubs.


AP: "But the team has gone into a September slump. After being swept in four games in Philadelphia, the Brewers dropped into a tie with the Phillies for a wild-card spot in the postseason...After the weekend series with the Phillies they decided the managerial change had to be made."

Yahoo!: "Randolph’s job security had been unstable since September, when the club suffered arguably the biggest regular-season collapse in baseball history, blowing a seven-game standings lead to the Philadelphia Phillies with 17 contests remaining."

Yet for a few years now, the Phillies, to the dismay of many Fightin' fans, can't seem to figure out a way to give their own manager the boot.