The Morning Wood - 10/11/2006

Stud: Brandon Inge
Detroit Rock City! Brandon Inge, the catcher turned center fielder turned 3rd baseman, went 3 for 3 with a home run, 2 RBI's and a walk leading the Tigers (meow!) to a 5-1 victory over soon to be overpaid Barry Zito and the Athletics in game 1 of the ALCS. At least we know the A's woke up to the fact that they shouldn't even be in the championship series. I am so impressed with his exploits that I'm officially changing the name of my favorite hobby to "inge" drinking. Catchy!

Dud: Lawrence "Bumper Car" Phillips
Now Larry, let's just forgot about the fact that you Roy Tarpley and Ike Turner'd your way out of the NFL despite having an abundance of talent. That's been done. But man, you are a pretty sore loser. I've lost my fair share of pick up football games. Here's what you do: you take your Nerf turbo and you go home. You don't try and run your opponents over after. Well, now you're convicted of seven counts of assault with a deadly weapon and looking at up to 20 years in prison. Just so you know, “The Longest Yard” wasn’t actually a documentary and Adam Sandler isn’t going to be your QB, he’s not even in jail. Although I wouldn’t mind if he was.

Talk Around The Cooler:
So apparently Joe Torre is coming back after all of these needledick journalists said that he was already out the door. Yeah, needledick. I personally was hoping that he was leaving because I think he is a very good manager, especially in a hostile environment like the Citay. George Steinbrenner is a grumpy old man but he is no longer as wild and stupid as he once was. The long and short of it isn’t Torre, or even A-Rod for that matter, it’s the fact that you can’t win a five game series unless you have competent pitching. The sparkling Wang seems to be quite the find, up until the point he goes all Irabu/Contreras on them. But who else? Mousse the aged? Only Randy after popping Levitra Johnson? Until they find a reliable #2 who wasn’t around to march in protest of Vietnam, the Yankees aren’t going to win a World Series. And that isn’t Torre’s fault.

Quick Hits:
Watch out for the Celtics. And for people with porn mustaches. The NBA is going to cut down on complaining after foul calls, enforcing its zero tolerance policy. This is going to be a problem, especially for Antoine Walker, who has never actually commited a foul in his pro career and should have the right to plead his case each time. Democrat hopeful Heath Shuler is attempting to gain some votes by attaching his name to NASCAR. Yes, because NASCAR is such a blue state sport.