The Mourning After: Moonshots Galore

- No league can like it when, every time their commissioner opens his mouth, it immediately becomes a jenkem distillery (go ahead and Urban Dictionary THAT, I dare ya!), but that’s where MLB finds itself. Rob Manfred ran to the press, stood on the bucket he carries so we could see more than his forehead, and declared that his protocols are “working.”

To review, two teams have had major outbreaks within their ranks, and if anyone thinks that’s no big deal they should ask Eduardo Rodriguez about it. Six teams have more games to make up than there are days left in the season. They’re just making up a schedule as they go. So yeah, everything is going great. The car might be on fire and headed toward a cliff and the brake line sheared, but hey, the stereo still blasts “Mr. Brownstone” perfectly!

Manfred went on to spill garbage out of his maw by declaring that a majority of players had followed protocols, but that’s exactly the problem. This virus is so virulent that it required everyone to follow the rules, which everyone in this country has yet to learn. America’s pastime!

Here’s the kicker:

“We are encouraged by the fact that we’ve never had cross-contamination from one team to another. We’re hoping that the trend continues.”

The fact that COVID-19 hasn’t jumped teams isn’t due to anything that baseball did, but probably by sheer dumb, idiotic luck. Certainly any protection against that would have been employed when the Marlins first tested positive and then went ahead and decided they could play against the Phillies anyway. “Hope,” as Manfred says, is all they have.

The only goal Manfred has is getting this beater of a season to the playoffs to cash in on playoff money, and it appears nothing is going to derail him from doing so. Surgical masks on planes is his big play. Everything’s solved now.

-LeBron James finally got to say what everyone was thinking, and that was the NBA won’t miss Donald Trump’s viewership. The illiterate Oompa Loompa In Charge claimed that all the players kneeling for the anthem meant he couldn’t watch anymore, as if Donald Trump has ever watched a basketball game he didn’t get front row tickets for so he could solicit/assault the cheerleaders. The NBA has never needed the viewership of anyone like Trump’s kind, and while James clearly doesn’t want to engage in a social media fight (nor should he), there has to be some satisfaction in getting to belt this hanging curveball into orbit.

-Speaking of hitting things into orbit, let’s change gears and enjoy something. This time it’s Fernando Tatis Jr. sending a baseball off to another country where it can find a social safety net, universal healthcare, and most of all find happiness and possibility.

This one actually had a pretty cool ending, as Chris Taylor threw out Trent Grisham attempting to score on a sac fly to end the game.

Baseball highlights are nice, even if they’re a symbol of our society eating and throwing up on itself at the same time.

-I’m a sucker for a missed penalty. Not one that’s saved, but one where the entire frame is missed. Step up, Sergio Santos!

The crossing of himself after is a particularly nice touch. It’s rare we see an athlete ask Jesus for forgiveness on the field of play, but this definitely warrants that. This would have gone over a basketball backboard. Sometimes you just like to see someone at the top levels of any sport coming up with something you yourself might have on the weekend when you’re half-drunk. It reminds us we’re all connected.