Regular patrons of Wrigley Field will be glad to know that watery, intoxicating Old Style will continue to flow at the friendly confines. Also available to the discerning epicure? Black slime!

Fortunately, as you may have noticed in the Action News Video embedded abovely, we have a Television Journalist and Food Safety PhD on hand to break it down like a fraction …

Television Journalist: “They found black slime inside an ice machine. That sounds awful. Bad?”

Food Safety PhD: “Yes, it’s terrible.”

Terrible Black Slime!

It’s becoming increasingly evident that Peter Gammons’s “pocket tweets” are not actually pocket tweets at all. Unless Gammons’s pocket lint is able to form sentences like “You’re really helping me” and “I was worried it was the pancakes,” the more likely explanation is that he is unable to distinguish his phone’s texting interface from its Twitter client. Thus, rather than being sent discreetly to his intended interlocutor, these messages are broadcast to his nearly 100,000 followers.

Indeed, one of the great joys of Twitter is being there when one of these gems is set free into the internets. Gammons’s latest mistweet (presented for your consumption in LOLGammo form above) is like a puzzle and a joke all tied into one. The statement “Buy her a washing machine” raises a few questions:

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I wonder if that is ever going change.

“That is never going to change,” says Yankees supreme exchequer Randy Levine.

Fine.

“That” refers to the playing of “God Bless America” during the seventh-inning stretch at Yankee Stadium. And “that” is too bad.

I could argue that songs oozing religious certainties have no place in the public square (we the taxed mostly pay for these ballparks, after all). I could even argue that Mr. Berlin’s “GBA” is a saccharine load that sounds like it was composed on a low-end Casio. And I could absolutely submit that the Yankees were creepy “Dear Leader” types about the whole thing for far too long.

But mostly it’s the idea of making a baseball game — a light, airy thing when not intense for reasons independent of world events — into something solemn. That’s why “GBA” should go away. Dead-ass Bin Laden is enriching the sea floor and being stripped for parts by gilled beasts. The Arab Spring, to continue the metaphor, flowers apace. So after almost 10 years of this, where’s the harm in letting baseball be baseball? Is it that we’ll … forget?

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Reader Adam (and also my former roommate Pete) have been so kind as to tip me off to this excellent cartoon featuring Ryan Braun and Prince Fielder spending a night together on the Miller Park grass beneath a beautiful Milwaukee night sky.

The relationship between Ryan Braun and Prince Fielder — two, at least on the surface, very different people — has always been a point of interest for me, the consummate Milwaukee Brewers fan. Prince, the gruff, brash slugger. Braun, the renaissance man bringing the bold flavors of the coast back to the midwest. The two seem hardly compatible, and yet they’ve formed one of the most productive (and just plain awesome) friendships in the major leagues.

And now, we finally get a glimpse inside this friendship:

#Feastmode.

Life: Mike Hampton could pitch, man. When he wasn’t injured, at least. And he could swing the stick, too, a baseball player born to ply his trade in the National League. It’s hard to believe now, looking back, that Hampton, from 1995 through 2004, was good for, at the very least, 150 or more innings. Mike Hampton, defined by injury, threw over 200 innings a year from 1997 through 2001. He pitched, and he pitched well, to the tune of 3.3, 2.4. 5.1, 4.4 and 2.9 WAR those five years, respectively. In 2001, in 86 plate appearances, Hampton hit seven home runs, scored 20 runs, and drove in 16. He hit .291, and put up a wOBA of .366. Mike frigging Hampton!

Spiritual Exercise: Mike Hampton disappeared from baseball in 2005, only to return in 2008, to give it one more shot. And another shot after that. Ask yourself: Faced with adversity, richer than your wildest dreams, would you leave the game you love, leave it behind, and throw in the towel? Or would you have surgery after surgery on your elbow, in order to one day pitch again?

A Prayer for Mike Hampton

Michael William Hampton!
You were so much more than the injuries.
Yet they’re what define you,
And what I remember.
Why?

You won 22 games in 1999.
You have five Silver Sluggers to your name.
Fuck the injuries, I say, Mike Hampton.

But it’s hard.
Colorado won’t forget, they can’t forget.
And after signing you to an eight-year, $121 million dollar contract,
The richest in pro sports history at the time,
Can you blame them?
I don’t. I can’t.
But I don’t blame you either, Mike Hampton.
I would have signed that contract, too.

Tommy John surgery in 2005.
Goodbye, 2006.
“I’ll be back as good as new,” you said.
And I believed you.
A torn oblique muscle in 2007.
Then, the unthinkable: More elbow pain,
Another elbow surgery.
Goodbye, 2007.

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I know what you’re thinking: “What is UETAMEJ, and what can it do for me?” Like the best acronyms, UETAMEJ is pronounceable (our own Bradley Woodrum pronounces it “you-da-mage“) and fits conveniently on the full complement of CafePress swag. As you’ve probably already guessed, it stands for, “Using Ellipses Toward A More Evil Journalism.” I hardly need to say this, but the practice of UETAMEJ, which is as ancient as it is sacred, entails the use of the ellipsis in tandem with words and phrases ripped from context and stripped of intended meaning.

This week’s victim is America’s Step-Father Dan Shaughnessy, who recently declared from on high that neither the Red Sox nor the Yankees will win the World Series. Yawn, it would seem. But what’s really going on? Peer more deeply and you’ll find an old Shaughnessy staple: the sexy tone-poem!

Release the UETAMEJ!

[S]tare at one another from a distance … Why not? … collision … bursting … four hours and 21 minutes … Deep … every night. Dominant and … laden. Let’s start … A bone … buffeted … in … a bust. [I]s anyone uncomfortable … ? Let’s not forget … the toilet. Mocking the … shape … the mound … the rotund … favorite … ball … Nobody feels good … for the next three weeks.

Behold the evil journalism!

Brawlin’ Brouhaha.

The word embraces two sides of an invisible line somewhere. A ‘brouhaha’ is a uproar and hubbub of some sort, there’s no doubt about that. But, even if the word might make you think of cold brews and a good laugh, the particular shade of that uproar, however, is up to debate. It’s not all bubbles and blow jobs.

Many definitions focus on the sounds and sights of a brouhaha. But most contain a hint of the negative, though. Here it’s a “commotion” or a “confused noise”, there it’s “clamor” or “confusion” over a “minor or ridiculous cause.” There are other signs of the dark side. Synonyms like “fracas” and “melee,” for one. And the origin, from French:

Origin:
1885–90; < French, orig. brou, ha, ha! exclamation used by characters representing the devil in the 16th-cent. drama; perhaps < Hebrew, distortion of the recited phrase bārūkh habbā ( beshēm ădhōnai ) “blessed is he who comes (in the name of the Lord)” (Ps. 118:26)

There’s definitely something to this. To call something a brouhaha is to belittle it slightly.

We can follow the same path of discovery if we start our game of google baseball: brouhaha. Plenty of uproars. Fights! Cheating! Violence against old men! Angry old men doing violence! You know, your typical baseball-related uproars.

But then you run into a few references that give you pause. The sort of thing that makes you think “they’re using this silly word because this whole thing is not very serious.” Like, to talk about the brouhaha between Dusty Baker and Bobby Valentine about icing a reliever while on a goodwill tour in Japan, that is to take slight digs at the whole situation. Or when the word is used to as a transition between a World Series win and a Quidditch match, you know it means the author is laughing inside just a little bit. But when you see the word used to describe a fictional tournament between “the most scandalous juice-heads in the business,” you hear the derisive tone loud and clear.

In the end, though, we know that alliteration wins the day, even (especially?) when used in a derogatory fashion. And so therefore, this poem from Schech’s Place represents a home run in today’s google: baseball brouhaha.

BASEBALL BROUHAHA
When beer hits brain
in Fenway’s bleachers,
that bellicose breed of
bragging, banging,
bare-chested beer bellies
begin bellowing and bleating
like beached, blubbery belugas
boiling to breed.

Alas, there are no endangered species
in Section 41.

September 22, 1991

Thanks to Hannah for the word. Shenanigans and hogwash came before.

The Burj Al Arab in Dubai: where every member of Family Violence was conceived.

The following aren’t necessarily real bands, but they are real phrases taken from this morning’s real-live baseballing headlines.

Family Violence
A tongue-in-cheek Garage Rock Revival quintet with members from Oxford, England; Tokyo Prefecture; and effing space. Their haircuts cost either nothing or $1000, but you can’t tell.

Red-Hot McCarthy
All Punkabilly, all the time. (Thanks a lot, Denver.)

Nyjer Morgan
Is actually just Kool Keith. (Did not everyone know that?)

Lackey’s Stuff
Sort of like Chris Isaak, if Chris Isaak were five mostly overweight quality management specialists from Chelmsford, MA.

Cryptic Swisher
A horrifying Christian-/Anarchopunk group from Paramus, NJ. They have, and will again, try to have sex with your mother.

In which the Royal We insert Dick Allen’s name into various works representative of the Western Canon, thus adding to those various works the patina of blessedness.

In today’s episode, Mr. Dick Allen finds himself astride a contemporary work of sky-scraping importance: that email John Mayberry Jr.’s agent sent in an attempt to hook him up with that mermaid …

“I hate to even be sending you this e-mail, and I’m quite embarrassed to say the least, but we have a young client on the Philadelphia Phillies who asked us if we knew any agents at Innovative Artists and could connect him to Dick Allen.

I know you’re not a dating or set-up service, but Dick Allen would love to meet Dick Allen or invite himself to a baseball game sometime. Would this be possible?

Here’s a bio of Dick Allen to give you some more info on him (he’s a great guy, down-to-earth, humble, Stanford-educated, etc.) Thanks for considering this as you know how this business is and servicing clients.”

This has been the latest episode of Inserting Dick Allen’s Name Into Works of Literature.

Sí, soy familiar con la tercera base.

News from the internet today reveals that curiously utilized Giant rookie Brandon Belt will play in the Dominican League this fall (or winter or whenever it happens).

To make Belt’s transition to life in a Spanish-speaking nation more comfortable, here are some Spanish phrases from which he’ll derive no little benefit.

[To his coach] ¿Qué veterano del envejecimiento sostendré?
Which aging veteran will I back up?

[To a lady] Permita que ayude con su protector de pecho.
Allow me to assist with your chest protector.

[To clear up confusion] No soy una jirafa real.
I am not an actual giraffe.

[To a lady] Permita que demuestre la posición lista.
Allow me to demonstrate the ready position.

[To a lady] No, gracias. No cuido para tocar con la punta del pie la goma.
No, thank you. I don’t care to toe the rubber.