The Water Cooler

SOMETHING BAD: I understand that Justin Verlander is the best starting pitcher in Major League Baseball.  I understand that he's an All-Star, workhorse, centerpiece of a franchise that you can build multiple championships around.  The numbers are undeniable.  He led the American League last year in strikeouts, innings pitched, and complete games.  He's also just two years removed from 2011 when he won the Cy Young AND the MVP award in the same freakin' season.  He's also bangin' Kate Upton, a Sports Illustrated supermodel.

Yeah, yeah, I get all that.  I just don't understand how you justify giving him $180 million over seven years.  Ladies and gentlemen, the new standard has been set: raise your kids to be starting pitchers in professional baseball.  They'll want to deviate and try some random crap like boy scouts or stamp collecting but you make sure you get their little asses back out in the yard and practice pitching!

Seriously?  One hundred and eighty milllionnnnnnnn duealllers!  I almost stroked out writing that!

The man works every five days, minimum.  If he gets hurt and misses a start or two, now we're paying a man $180 million to rub his hamstrings with petroleum jelly.  And he'll be able to buy that fancy petroleum jelly with the gold flakes in it.

I'm not going to look into the logistics of the contract, well, because I'm lazy and also I want to try and stifle my vomit this evening.  However, a basic mathematical breakdown goes something like this:

$180 mil over 7 years = $25.7 mil a season.  Verlander worked 238 innings last season in 33 games.  That's an average of 7.2 innings per game, which means that if he averages about the same pace this season that Verlander will be earning $107,983 per INNING and roughly $750,000 per GAME.

If I make $750,000 in my lifetime I've probably robbed a bank at some point and Verlander can potentially make that on a night he loses a baseball game.  Commence the jealousy-fueled hatred!


SOMETHING GOOD: UCLA has recently removed the man that was previously their men's head basketball coach and is now looking for a new man to take up that spot.  That man was rumored to be Butler's current head basketball coach, Brad Stevens.  But Stevens has come out today and said, "No dice" to UCLA.  I'm not really sure if he actually said, "No dice," but he's not taking the job.

I commend Stevens.  I always admire coaches sticking with the little guy that made them famous to begin with and not bolting to the first flashy name to open up.  You don't ever hear about Butler until it's NCAA Tournament time but when the big dance comes around, those scrappy bastards put on their best shoes.

Plus, leaving Butler and going to UCLA is like a "ruler in Hell, servant in Heaven" type of thing.  Why on Earth would you go to a place where you are always going to be compared to John Wooden, the greatest college basketball coach of all-time?  You're never going to fill those shoes.  Literally.  John Wooden had enormous feet.

I mean the man was so fiercely competitive that he lived until he was 99 years old.  99!  Give it up already and leave some air for the youth!


SOMETHING WEIRD: Tiger Woods is dating Lindsey Vonn.  Finally!  We've got that "Word's Greatest Golfer and World's Greatest Skier" pairing that we've always wanted!  When I first heard that they got together I wondered how they even met in the first place.  Then I remembered that one of the individuals is Tiger Woods and he probably met Vonn when he was banging her sister...or her mother...or both.

Things seem to be going well for Tiger.  He's number one on the PGA Tour again and he's dating a hot, young, blonde athlete.  But he used to be married to a hot, young, blonde model and that ended with a nine-iron through the back window of his SUV.  Remember ladies, once a cheater always a cheater and for Tiger's sake it can't feel good to get stabbed with one of those ski sticks.

Enjoy your Easter weekend, kids!

Still Here

My dog has this recurring conundrum where she thinks every time that I leave the room I will not be returning.

And I'm sure this worries her more from a sustenance perspective than a companionship sort of way.

I always come back and her simple dog brain is all happy again and everything is heavenly in the world.  Yet the reality is that I probably just went pee, or grabbed a beer, or went shopping for turnips, and just ended up walking back into the room afterwards.

Note 1: I just mentioned a turnip. Think about it.  When's the last time you walked into a grocery store and said, "Hey, there's a turnip!"  That's what I thought.  Never.  The turnip is just a propaganda vegetable made up by the Republican media used to instill fear in the hearts of regular grocery store users who know that there are really only like four or five vegetables that are edible by man.

But she sees me come back into the room and for the split-second that the world was over for her, it was rightly resolved and everything was back to the natural order of things as quickly as it started.  This is, after all, a dog brain.

And I feel magnificent.

"What's that, tiny dog?  You felt like you couldn't survive without the likes of ME?!"

I usually yell out the "me" part, that's why it's in bold.

I'm only going to briefly touch on the part that I talk to the dog because I feel like any self-respecting pet owner should indulge in small conversations with their animal from time to time.

Note 2: I'm a loser.

So here we are, you and me.  And I am immediately sorry for you.  You don't deserve this.  Neither do I, but yet here we are!

There was a time, not so long ago and not in a galaxy not so far away (I'm lost), where a burgeoning young journalist could go out and report back to their newspaper that Team A beat Team B by a score of X to Z.  And the universe thrived and little teddy bear-like creatures would come out of their hovels and sing in harmony!

But, this is in no way a "you did this!" piece.  This is a "hey, this guy is still here" piece.  I'm writing.  What for?  No idea.  There's no agenda here.  There's no advertising here (I could get them, shut up!).

It's you, me, and the loyal ass dog who needs to make sure I am not leaving the room for good this time.

I need a beer.