BASEBALL (Cause after all, this is a baseball league, right?)
ANNOUNCERS (Always a favorite subject of the NPL.)
HBO – TV (Why not.)
And by the way…… The off-season fan fest of the San Diego Padres is called “FRIAR FEST.” At least they have some imagination out there.
BASEBALL AWARDS:
THE MOST DEPRESSING QUOTE CONCERNING YOUR PITTSBURGH PIRATES AWARD:
This trophy goes to Tim Kurkjian of the ESPN media family, who issued this quote on the State of the Pirates back in December…..
“The Pirates streak of 15 consecutive losing seasons is the result of a toxic combination of mismanagement, poor drafting and inadequate player development. Peers say new GM Neal Huntington might need as many as eight good years to turn it around.”
Sure makes you want to grab the credit card and order up that Bobble Head 8-Pack of tickets, doesn’t it? But enough about the poor Pirates. Believe it or not, there are MLB teams out there who may have bigger problems… Consider those teams from the sunshine state of Florida….
THE WE THREW AN EVENT AND NO ONE SHOWED UP AWARD:
And the winner is the FLORIDA MARLINS. A few weeks ago the team had one of those “Select-a-Seat” days for prospective season ticket holders, in which you can show up in person at the ballpark, check out all the seating and pick your seat for any type of Marlins season ticket package. Well, the Marlins were sorry to report that LESS THAN 50 FANS SHOWED UP!!!
THE LET’S GET THE DEVIL OUT OF THIS FRANCHISE AWARD:
The winner is TAMPA BAY! You have no doubt already heard that with the 2008 season, the Tampa Bay Devil Rays are dropping the word “Devil” and will now just be known as the Tampa Bay Rays.
Along with eliminating the Devil, Tampa Bay management is evidently trying to eliminate some bad MoJo that has occurred with this club since it’s inception as an expansion franchise in 1998. Why may they feel that way? How 'bout these top 5 moments in Devil Rays history……
1. The Devil Rays select Bobby Abreu from the Astros in the 1998 expansion draft, and immediately trade Abreu to the Phillies for Kevin Stocker!
2. Wilson Alvarez is the team’s first big free agent, $35 million for five years. He wins just 17 games in five years.
3. Opening Day, 1998: Devil Rays sell out the inaugural game – and don’t sell out again for more than six years.
4. Wade Boggs celebrates his 3,000th hit by French kissing home plate at Tropicana Field.
5. The D-Rays sign 34 year old Greg Vaughn to a four-year, $34 million dollar contract. Greg is released after hitting .163 in year 3 of the deal.
THE I FLEW UNDER THE RADAR FOR STEROIDS IN THE 90’S AWARD:
Your winner is ALBERT BELLE. Can you remember what this nut case was like? For some reason Belle has been consistently omitted from Steroid Era discussions for reasons that are never entirely clear. The guy was completely insane. Remember when he was Joey Belle and for no known reason changed the first name to Albert? He always seemed to suffer from violent mood swings; had one of the best physiques in the league; put up some of the greatest power seasons in the decade, including 103 extra-base hits in 1995 and 99 extra-base hits in ’98. Joey was also known to dabble in the cheating department. Remember that crazy story when teammate Jason Grimsley snuck into the umpire’s locker room to switch his corked bat? And when Belle fired a baseball at a fan in the outfield seats at a visiting stadium during warm-ups? Did he do Steroids? Well, by the time he hit his 30’s, the dude needed an artificial hip!! I may be going out on a limb here, but I think maybe something was up. But you never hear his name associated with the dreaded “S” word.
ANNOUNCER AWARDS:
In general just known as the “Rob Pratte Awards.”
THE I MAKE UP MY OWN WORDS DURING A BROADCAST AWARD:
Our winner is RON PITTS of FOX SPORTS’ NFL coverage.
Come on Ron…… “Trickeration” is not a real word. You’re supposed to be a professional, my man.
THE ‘OH SHIT’, I CAN’T BELIEVE MY CELL PHONE IS RINGING IN THE MIDDLE OF THIS SHOW AWARD:
Yeah, this one was a real classic. The look on DAN MARINO’s face was priceless when his cell phone inexplicably starts ringing while he’s giving commentary during CBS’s NFL TODAY show during last weeks Giants – Packers game. I guess it could have been worse. What if Dan happened to have some Gangsta Rap song as his ring tone? James Brown and Shannon Sharpe may have started getting down if Dan’s phone ring went into “In Da Club” by 50 CENT.
And while on the subject of this CBS NFL TODAY show……. Two things bother me…. Why was Bill Cowher ALWAYS called “Coach Cowher?” After all, he’s not a coach anymore. And I’m not going to miss that silly little promo where all four guys are standing next to each other in their suits, tossing a football back and forth, and then one of them ("Coach" Cowher) drops the ball and they all laugh hysterically! I know what you’re thinking….. These little things shouldn’t bother me, but…….. And I’ve saved the best ROB PRATTE announcing award for last….
THE I HAVE MADE REFERENCE TO, AND MANGLED A LINE FROM ONE OF THE MOST INSPIRATIONAL SPEECHES OF OUR GENERATION, WHILE ON NATIONAL TV AWARD:
You may know him as a winner of “Dancing with the Stars”, or perhaps a running back with the Dallas Cryboys. But EMMITT SMITH takes the prize on this one. As part of ESPN’s post game show for Monday Night Football, Emmitt was evidently excited that his former team, the Silver and Blue, made a fantastic comeback to nip the Buffalo Bills back on October 8th, week 5 of the NFL season. As they went to Smith for his comments, he said the ‘Boys “took on the words of Jimmy V, and they told themselves – Don’t quit, don’t ever quit.”
WHAT??????? Emmitt you Jackass!! The famous words of the Jim Valvano speech are…. “Don’t give up, don’t ever give up.” Holy crap….How in the world can anyone screw that up???????
IT’S NOT TV. IT'S HBO AWARDS!!
THE BEST NEWCOMER TO A COMEDY SERIES AWARD:
Just when you thought “Curb You Enthusiasm’s” Krazee Eyez Killa couldn’t be topped, along comes Larry David’s new house guest “Leon.” The episode in which Leon strong-arms back Larry’s Joe Pepitone Yankees jersey off some poor schmuck on the street is pretty good.
THE BADDEST MO-FO ON HBO, NOW THAT TONY SOPRANO HAS MOVED ON AWARD:
It’s pretty tough to find a better choice than “Adibeice” from OZ, but “Omar” from “THE WIRE” is a character like Tony, who is by society’s purposes a bad guy, but the audience loves him. In Omar, you have a skinny, black, shot-gun tottin’ thug with a huge scar down the middle of his face, who is also of all things – Gay, and has a touch of Robin Hood in his personality. Now there’s a combination that makes Omar a beloved character for all fans of this show.
THE I HAVE MADE REFERENCE TO, AND MANGLED A LINE FROM ONE OF THE MOST INSPIRATIONAL SPEECHES OF OUR GENERATION, WHILE ON NATIONAL TV AWARD:
You may know him as a winner of “Dancing with the Stars”, or perhaps a running back with the Dallas Cryboys. But EMMITT SMITH takes the prize on this one. As part of ESPN’s post game show for Monday Night Football, Emmitt was evidently excited that his former team, the Silver and Blue, made a fantastic comeback to nip the Buffalo Bills back on October 8th, week 5 of the NFL season. As they went to Smith for his comments, he said the ‘Boys “took on the words of Jimmy V, and they told themselves – Don’t quit, don’t ever quit.”
WHAT??????? Emmitt you Jackass!! The famous words of the Jim Valvano speech are…. “Don’t give up, don’t ever give up.” Holy crap….How in the world can anyone screw that up???????
IT’S NOT TV. IT'S HBO AWARDS!!
THE BEST NEWCOMER TO A COMEDY SERIES AWARD:
Just when you thought “Curb You Enthusiasm’s” Krazee Eyez Killa couldn’t be topped, along comes Larry David’s new house guest “Leon.” The episode in which Leon strong-arms back Larry’s Joe Pepitone Yankees jersey off some poor schmuck on the street is pretty good.
THE BADDEST MO-FO ON HBO, NOW THAT TONY SOPRANO HAS MOVED ON AWARD:
It’s pretty tough to find a better choice than “Adibeice” from OZ, but “Omar” from “THE WIRE” is a character like Tony, who is by society’s purposes a bad guy, but the audience loves him. In Omar, you have a skinny, black, shot-gun tottin’ thug with a huge scar down the middle of his face, who is also of all things – Gay, and has a touch of Robin Hood in his personality. Now there’s a combination that makes Omar a beloved character for all fans of this show.
I wonder if Omar will make it through Season 5, which is currently in progress, but the previews show him grabbing his shotgun and heading back to Baltimore to seek revenge on Marlo’s crew for the torture murder of his blind friend, the old man – Butchie, as Omar says……”Sweet Jesus, I’m going to work them!” Yikes… Duck for cover!!
And for the YOU-TUBE offering for this blog entry, we’ll go away from baseball…. After all, it’s the middle of hockey season with the NHL All-Star game and all…… This 1:28 minute clip is from a playoff game in Edmonton in 2006. It’s the singing of the Canadian National Anthem – O’Canada. But shortly into the song, the Edmonton fans take it over and start singing louder and louder and it gets pretty crazy. Towards the end of the anthem the hairs on your arm may be standing up!
And for the YOU-TUBE offering for this blog entry, we’ll go away from baseball…. After all, it’s the middle of hockey season with the NHL All-Star game and all…… This 1:28 minute clip is from a playoff game in Edmonton in 2006. It’s the singing of the Canadian National Anthem – O’Canada. But shortly into the song, the Edmonton fans take it over and start singing louder and louder and it gets pretty crazy. Towards the end of the anthem the hairs on your arm may be standing up!
