Senseless Crime Part 3

So it's all over. My third and final act of senseless crime has finally come full circle. My court date has passed. I will tell you my sentencing later but for now here is Senseless Crime Part 3.


The Brick

It was a cool spring night. Mid April I believe. It was a Thursday. My girlfriend and my a buddy of mine went to a bar called Shiloh. On most Thursdays we'd have gone to Harpos but for whatever reason we decided on Shiloh that night. It was a pretty slow night, not many people were out.

As we sat down to drink our first bucket of Bud Light bottles we began to talk about various things, we were having a good time. After quickly downing our first bucket (mostly myself and my buddy Weebs) we ordered another. The buckets came quickly that night as the three of us became increasingly intoxicated, especially myself. After probably four or five buckets we called my fraternity's sober driver and headed back to the fraternity house.

We arrived back at the fraternity house to find some what of a party going on. It wasn't anything big but people were drinking and we decided to join them. That's when the alcohol consumption took a massive spike, thus fully equipping me to commit random/retarded acts of crime.

After a while I found myself outside smoking a cigarette with my girlfriend and an interesting subject came up. For whatever reason she decided to bring up an incident that had a occurred a few weeks ago. The incident she spoke of was about how a random fraternity had taken a few cheap shots at my fraternity during a serenade to her sorority. Confused? Basically some dudes were talking shit.

Normally, I wouldn't think twice about it. I would just shrug it off, or I'd just go vent on this website. However on this night things were different (I was shitfaced). Something inside of me (beer) demanded action. I immediately went to round up some troops to take revenge on this fraternity. We were gonna do what any respectable group of drunken frat boys seeking vigilante justice would do, throw a brick through the other fraternity's window and run like hell.

My girlfriend tried to plead with me. She told me to stay. She said (more or less):

"No, don't throw a brick through that window, let's go home and have sex instead."

"Nay woman!" I replied "This offense cannot go overlooked, the offenders must be given their just desserts."

Little did I know I was turning down sex with my girlfriend for what would turn out to be a very sexless night in jail. Although once I was in jail I was hoping that the night would be sexless. Either way, I rounded up three guys, K-Bear, Ginger, and Sk8r (I didn't know what else to call him on this site but I figured since he's kind of emo the Avril Lavine spelling of "skater" would suffice).

The four of us grabbed two bricks and the sober driver. We piled into the sober driver's two door shit hole of a Mustang and made our way over to "Frat Hill", where the offending fraternity was located. I had the driver drop us off two blocks away so that we could sneak up on the fraternity. We made our way through the neighborhood, four drunken frat boys holding two bricks (totally inconspicuous), until we were about half a block away from the fraternity house.

We then made our way up the driveway of a random house. For those not familiar with throwing-bricks-through-windows strategy, it is best to sneak up on the house in question instead of walking up to the front door. So we snuck into the backyard of some random house, all the lights were off so we assumed we were safe. The house's backyard was more or less just a driveway. There was no fence and all the adjacent houses' backyards were not only visible but accessible just by walking through them.

However where the houses stopped was where the fraternity house started. Unfortunately the fraternity house about eight feet higher than the land these houses were on. On top of this there was a five foot or so fence on top of the retaining wall that seperated the back yards from the fraternity property. There was no way four drunk idiots could scale that fence without being heard, either by the people in the fraternity or the people who lived in the other houses. We began to look for an alternate route to sneak behind the fraternity house.

We quickly found that alternate route. Behind the row of houses (as well as the fraternity house) was a graveyard. Only a small chain link fence seperated the back of the houses from the graveyard. The four of us quickly hopped the fence and were in the graveyard. This, after turning down sex, was probably the second sign that I was making a poor choice. A good general rule of thumb to have is: if you are doing something that you are pretty sure is illegal, you're drunk, and then a graveyard becomes involved, it's time to leave. I came up with that rule the next morning.

Now in the graveyard we could see the back of the fraternity house. We slowly crept towards it until we were directly behind the fraternity house in the graveyard. The small chain link fence that seperated the houses from the graveyard was now replaced with the five foot high fence that surrounded a portion of the fraternity house. The four of us knelt down and whispered our plan.

"Okay, we hop the fence, brick these motherfuckers and run". I said, cocksure.

"What? Won't people chase us?" Sk8r asked.

"Dude by the time they get outside we'll be long gone." I replied, I had all the answers that night.

"We should call Dalton and have him pick us up." K-Bear suggested.

"Yeah a get away car might be a good idea." Ginger agreed.

"If they see the car they can get the plates!" I said firmly. "We have to run."

"What if Lil D [the sober driver] parks close so that we can run to his car and then peace out." Ginger said.

"Okay, that's probably a good idea, I don't think I can run for very long actually." I agreed.

I pulled out my phone and called the driver. I told him our plan, he told us we were retarded. I told him it was the only way the plan would work. He agreed and decided to park his car in the Streetside Records parking lot about half a block away. It was about this time I could sense dissent amongst the troops. K-Bear and Sk8r were looking nervous.

I was actually surprised that K-Bear was even with us. Usually he is the most responsible person I know, always avoiding trouble. But he's also the sneakiest person I know. In retrospect he was probably just there to watch me crash and burn. K-Bear is, despite his responsible side, pure evil. He is a manipulator. He enjoys seeing others get hurt and fail. I love him. But I should have realized what was going on, damn I was drunk.

As K-Bear and Sk8r voiced their concern for my flawless plan Lil D called me. He had decided to switch locations to a parking lot across the street. I told him I didn't care as long as he was close. About two minutes later he called again. He had switched locations again to the further parking lot, it was the lot for a dorm. He was about 600 yards from where we were going to throw the bricks.

Hearing about how far away Lil D was put K-Bear and Sk8r over the top. They decided to leave. I asked them to stay but it was done. They turned around and went back from whence we came. Now it was just Ginger and I. We discussed shortly how we thought the other two were pussies and then got back to business. We hopped the fence and were now hiding behind the fraternity's shed. We stayed there for a moment. My heart was racing. We peaked out from around the shed and noticed that there were no breakable windows. Seeing this we moved around to the side of the house, in the fraternity's parking lot.

Now crouched behind a silver Jeep we laid our eyes upon a buffet of big breakable windows. We didn't take long. Neither of us wanted to linger in a random fraterniy's parking lot with two bricks. We both ran up at the same time, threw the bricks and bolted. The parking lot is terraced and as we lept off the first terrace I ate shit, hard. I broke the fall with my hands. I got up, I couldn't feel pain, my adreniline was going way to hard. I looked at my right hand, there was a huge open sore on it with dirt and asphalt in it. I didn't care I just needed to run.

I caught up to Ginger at the street and despite moderate traffic and a "Don't Walk" signal we bolted across the street. We were halfway up the first parking lot (where Lil D was supposed to be parked) when I looked behind me to see if we had any pursuers. We did. One. He was about a hundred yards behind me and running fast, really fast. I thought to myself Oh SHIT! and tried to run faster but I was about spent. I had already just sprinted about 200 yards. At the time, I was a smoker, so you can imagine. Adreniline and alcohol can only get you so far (I was dissapointed to find that out).

As we reached the top of the parking lot the pursuer reached me. He was fast as shit, like Usain Bolt's gay cousin. He pulled me to the ground, and I peeled a rather large chunk out of my left palm this time. Luckily I couldn't feel that pain either. I was out of breath, caught, and my hands were both fucked up. I was screwed. I told Ginger to keep running but he held back. He was thinking about attacking the pursuer but in the five seconds it took him to make up his mind about ten other guys from that fraternity showed up. We were caught. I thought I was going to got my as stomped.

Luckily this fraternity happened to be the gayest most pussy house on campus. Any other fraternity would have beaten me pretty handily. These guys just sat around making fun of me. One of them had brought with him, in his pursuit of us, a gigantic fence post that I am frankly surprised anyone could have run with in the first place. God these guys sucked. Then Gay Usain Bolt barked an order to one of the others.

"Call the police"

Well this'll make a hell of story I thought. Goddammit.

The police showed up after about two minutes of verbal abuse from the ten biggest tools I've ever had the pleasure of being harrassed by. The cops showed up, cuffed us, and took us to the station. My girlfriend frantically tried to call my cellphone about 100 times, not realizing that when under arrest you aren't allowed to use your phone. Clearly she had never been to jail.

The booking was pretty tame compared to my first trip to jail. I slept mostly. The cops were pretty sympathetic to our cause actually. They agreed that "People shouldn't be talking shit". One cop even said "Yeah those guys sound like fags". That made me feel at least a little better.

By the time I got to the police station, the adreniline was gone and my hands hurt like fuck. I cannot even begin to describe how horrific these wounds were. It looked like I had 2/5's of the Stigmata. An officer gave me some rubbing alcohol to rub on them before I put bandages on them. Let me tell you, nothing sobers you up like pouring rubbing alcohol into gaping hand wounds, except maybe getting arrested.

In the end we didn't even need bail. Myself and Ginger were issued tickets, TICKETS, for throwing bricks through the windows. The technical crime that was written on the ticket was as follows:

Tampering with the intent to cause extreme inconvenience

Yeah that's a crime apparently.

Lil D picked us up from the police station, we had been there for maybe two hours. As we drove back to the fraternity house we got pulled over (actually about fifty feet from the police station). When the cop asked us where we were coming from Lil D had a pretty interesting answer to give him.

When I got home my girlfriend was pissed. I didn't care though, I was high on that post-jail euphoria. There's nothing like breathing the sweet breath of freedom and laughing so that you forget about the horrible decision you just made. I drank a few more beers and then went to bed. I woke up the next morning with two rather large bloody reminders of what I had done the night before.

In the end we were forced to pay for the windows and do 15 hours of community service. Each window cost $67. Totally worth it. Also it took about a month for my hands to heal. That was a shitty month. But I didn't care, after all it was just another senseless crime.

...

Evil People are Bad

Hitler Was a Pussy, and Only Had One Ball

This story just came out confirming the age old legend that Hitler had only one testicle. Apparently it is in fact true. There was some document that was just released that included a WWI German medic's account of treating Hitler after he had suffered a battlefield injury at the Battle of the Sommes. The injury caused the loss of a testicle, among other things.

What is even funnier than it being true that Hitler was only half a man is that apparently all the German medics knew Hitler as "the screamer". Of all the injured people on the battlefield Hitler screamed the loudest. Pussy.

Unfortunately for the medic he specifically remembered Hitler after the war (probably due to all the whiny screaming) and when the Nazi's rose to power he blamed himself for saving Hitler's life during WWI. That's a fuckton of guilt.

America is the Least Racist Country on Earth

I'm not really up to date on all my Al-Qaida threats and fuck America-isms but this one has got to take the cake. They called Barack Obama a "house negro" in their latest video.

Is that ridiculous or what? They say that he only does the bidding of white people and won't change American policy, etc. etc. Basically they are trying to cover for the fact that Muslims don't hate Obama.

But seriously, as if terrorists couldn't have a worse rep. How do you top being blood thirsty murdering fanatically religious anti-semites? Throw some good old fashioned racism in there, that's how. I can't believe they forgot something as simple as that (I understand anti-semitism could be construed as racism but stay with me here).

Well terrorists I'm glad you decided to say that just before Obama begins his plan to refocus our military efforts on Afghanistan, ie WHERE YOU LIVE!

But onto my point that America is the least racist country in the world, and I base this on three things, these alone will prove my point and there is no need for further evidence one way or the other.

1. We elected a black guy as president
2. Terrorists hate black people (see above)
3. French people used to throw bananas at Thiery Henry (sp?) and other black players before and during soccer matches.

If number three happened in America that would be the sports scandal of the century. Yes things have been thrown at Barry Bonds but that nothing to do with him being black. Here in America we believe in equality. We throw things at you based not on the color of your skin but rather the content of your character (or in Philly if your last name happens to be Drew).

So thank you terrorists for making us look even better.

Firejoemorgan.com

So the greatest blog ever just ended.

Go check it out.

You'll learn more about baseball from this site than you will anywhere else, oh and also it's fucking hilarious.

I'll miss it forever.


www.firejoemorgan.com

Senseless Crime Part 3

So it's all over. My third and final act of senseless crime has finally come full circle. My court date has passed. I will tell you my sentencing later but for now here is Senseless Crime Part 3.


The Brick

It was a cool spring night. Mid April I believe. It was a Thursday. My girlfriend and my a buddy of mine went to a bar called Shiloh. On most Thursdays we'd have gone to Harpos but for whatever reason we decided on Shiloh that night. It was a pretty slow night, not many people were out.

As we sat down to drink our first bucket of Bud Light bottles we began to talk about various things, we were having a good time. After quickly downing our first bucket (mostly myself and my buddy Weebs) we ordered another. The buckets came quickly that night as the three of us became increasingly intoxicated, especially myself. After probably four or five buckets we called my fraternity's sober driver and headed back to the fraternity house.

We arrived back at the fraternity house to find some what of a party going on. It wasn't anything big but people were drinking and we decided to join them. That's when the alcohol consumption took a massive spike, thus fully equipping me to commit random/retarded acts of crime.

After a while I found myself outside smoking a cigarette with my girlfriend and an interesting subject came up. For whatever reason she decided to bring up an incident that had a occurred a few weeks ago. The incident she spoke of was about how a random fraternity had taken a few cheap shots at my fraternity during a serenade to her sorority. Confused? Basically some dudes were talking shit.

Normally, I wouldn't think twice about it. I would just shrug it off, or I'd just go vent on this website. However on this night things were different (I was shitfaced). Something inside of me (beer) demanded action. I immediately went to round up some troops to take revenge on this fraternity. We were gonna do what any respectable group of drunken frat boys seeking vigilante justice would do, throw a brick through the other fraternity's window and run like hell.

My girlfriend tried to plead with me. She told me to stay. She said (more or less):

"No, don't throw a brick through that window, let's go home and have sex instead."

"Nay woman!" I replied "This offense cannot go overlooked, the offenders must be given their just desserts."

Little did I know I was turning down sex with my girlfriend for what would turn out to be a very sexless night in jail. Although once I was in jail I was hoping that the night would be sexless. Either way, I rounded up three guys, K-Bear, Ginger, and Sk8r (I didn't know what else to call him on this site but I figured since he's kind of emo the Avril Lavine spelling of "skater" would suffice).

The four of us grabbed two bricks and the sober driver. We piled into the sober driver's two door shit hole of a Mustang and made our way over to "Frat Hill", where the offending fraternity was located. I had the driver drop us off two blocks away so that we could sneak up on the fraternity. We made our way through the neighborhood, four drunken frat boys holding two bricks (totally inconspicuous), until we were about half a block away from the fraternity house.

We then made our way up the driveway of a random house. For those not familiar with throwing-bricks-through-windows strategy, it is best to sneak up on the house in question instead of walking up to the front door. So we snuck into the backyard of some random house, all the lights were off so we assumed we were safe. The house's backyard was more or less just a driveway. There was no fence and all the adjacent houses' backyards were not only visible but accessible just by walking through them.

However where the houses stopped was where the fraternity house started. Unfortunately the fraternity house about eight feet higher than the land these houses were on. On top of this there was a five foot or so fence on top of the retaining wall that seperated the back yards from the fraternity property. There was no way four drunk idiots could scale that fence without being heard, either by the people in the fraternity or the people who lived in the other houses. We began to look for an alternate route to sneak behind the fraternity house.

We quickly found that alternate route. Behind the row of houses (as well as the fraternity house) was a graveyard. Only a small chain link fence seperated the back of the houses from the graveyard. The four of us quickly hopped the fence and were in the graveyard. This, after turning down sex, was probably the second sign that I was making a poor choice. A good general rule of thumb to have is: if you are doing something that you are pretty sure is illegal, you're drunk, and then a graveyard becomes involved, it's time to leave. I came up with that rule the next morning.

Now in the graveyard we could see the back of the fraternity house. We slowly crept towards it until we were directly behind the fraternity house in the graveyard. The small chain link fence that seperated the houses from the graveyard was now replaced with the five foot high fence that surrounded a portion of the fraternity house. The four of us knelt down and whispered our plan.

"Okay, we hop the fence, brick these motherfuckers and run". I said, cocksure.

"What? Won't people chase us?" Sk8r asked.

"Dude by the time they get outside we'll be long gone." I replied, I had all the answers that night.

"We should call Dalton and have him pick us up." K-Bear suggested.

"Yeah a get away car might be a good idea." Ginger agreed.

"If they see the car they can get the plates!" I said firmly. "We have to run."

"What if Lil D [the sober driver] parks close so that we can run to his car and then peace out." Ginger said.

"Okay, that's probably a good idea, I don't think I can run for very long actually." I agreed.

I pulled out my phone and called the driver. I told him our plan, he told us we were retarded. I told him it was the only way the plan would work. He agreed and decided to park his car in the Streetside Records parking lot about half a block away. It was about this time I could sense dissent amongst the troops. K-Bear and Sk8r were looking nervous.

I was actually surprised that K-Bear was even with us. Usually he is the most responsible person I know, always avoiding trouble. But he's also the sneakiest person I know. In retrospect he was probably just there to watch me crash and burn. K-Bear is, despite his responsible side, pure evil. He is a manipulator. He enjoys seeing others get hurt and fail. I love him. But I should have realized what was going on, damn I was drunk.

As K-Bear and Sk8r voiced their concern for my flawless plan Lil D called me. He had decided to switch locations to a parking lot across the street. I told him I didn't care as long as he was close. About two minutes later he called again. He had switched locations again to the further parking lot, it was the lot for a dorm. He was about 600 yards from where we were going to throw the bricks.

Hearing about how far away Lil D was put K-Bear and Sk8r over the top. They decided to leave. I asked them to stay but it was done. They turned around and went back from whence we came. Now it was just Ginger and I. We discussed shortly how we thought the other two were pussies and then got back to business. We hopped the fence and were now hiding behind the fraternity's shed. We stayed there for a moment. My heart was racing. We peaked out from around the shed and noticed that there were no breakable windows. Seeing this we moved around to the side of the house, in the fraternity's parking lot.

Now crouched behind a silver Jeep we laid our eyes upon a buffet of big breakable windows. We didn't take long. Neither of us wanted to linger in a random fraterniy's parking lot with two bricks. We both ran up at the same time, threw the bricks and bolted. The parking lot is terraced and as we lept off the first terrace I ate shit, hard. I broke the fall with my hands. I got up, I couldn't feel pain, my adreniline was going way to hard. I looked at my right hand, there was a huge open sore on it with dirt and asphalt in it. I didn't care I just needed to run.

I caught up to Ginger at the street and despite moderate traffic and a "Don't Walk" signal we bolted across the street. We were halfway up the first parking lot (where Lil D was supposed to be parked) when I looked behind me to see if we had any pursuers. We did. One. He was about a hundred yards behind me and running fast, really fast. I thought to myself Oh SHIT! and tried to run faster but I was about spent. I had already just sprinted about 200 yards. At the time, I was a smoker, so you can imagine. Adreniline and alcohol can only get you so far (I was dissapointed to find that out).

As we reached the top of the parking lot the pursuer reached me. He was fast as shit, like Usain Bolt's gay cousin. He pulled me to the ground, and I peeled a rather large chunk out of my left palm this time. Luckily I couldn't feel that pain either. I was out of breath, caught, and my hands were both fucked up. I was screwed. I told Ginger to keep running but he held back. He was thinking about attacking the pursuer but in the five seconds it took him to make up his mind about ten other guys from that fraternity showed up. We were caught. I thought I was going to got my as stomped.

Luckily this fraternity happened to be the gayest most pussy house on campus. Any other fraternity would have beaten me pretty handily. These guys just sat around making fun of me. One of them had brought with him, in his pursuit of us, a gigantic fence post that I am frankly surprised anyone could have run with in the first place. God these guys sucked. Then Gay Usain Bolt barked an order to one of the others.

"Call the police"

Well this'll make a hell of story I thought. Goddammit.

The police showed up after about two minutes of verbal abuse from the ten biggest tools I've ever had the pleasure of being harrassed by. The cops showed up, cuffed us, and took us to the station. My girlfriend frantically tried to call my cellphone about 100 times, not realizing that when under arrest you aren't allowed to use your phone. Clearly she had never been to jail.

The booking was pretty tame compared to my first trip to jail. I slept mostly. The cops were pretty sympathetic to our cause actually. They agreed that "People shouldn't be talking shit". One cop even said "Yeah those guys sound like fags". That made me feel at least a little better.

By the time I got to the police station, the adreniline was gone and my hands hurt like fuck. I cannot even begin to describe how horrific these wounds were. It looked like I had 2/5's of the Stigmata. An officer gave me some rubbing alcohol to rub on them before I put bandages on them. Let me tell you, nothing sobers you up like pouring rubbing alcohol into gaping hand wounds, except maybe getting arrested.

In the end we didn't even need bail. Myself and Ginger were issued tickets, TICKETS, for throwing bricks through the windows. The technical crime that was written on the ticket was as follows:

Tampering with the intent to cause extreme inconvenience

Yeah that's a crime apparently.

Lil D picked us up from the police station, we had been there for maybe two hours. As we drove back to the fraternity house we got pulled over (actually about fifty feet from the police station). When the cop asked us where we were coming from Lil D had a pretty interesting answer to give him.

When I got home my girlfriend was pissed. I didn't care though, I was high on that post-jail euphoria. There's nothing like breathing the sweet breath of freedom and laughing so that you forget about the horrible decision you just made. I drank a few more beers and then went to bed. I woke up the next morning with two rather large bloody reminders of what I had done the night before.

In the end we were forced to pay for the windows and do 15 hours of community service. Each window cost $67. Totally worth it. Also it took about a month for my hands to heal. That was a shitty month. But I didn't care, after all it was just another senseless crime.

Bleacher Report

So I haven't done anything retarded in a while so I really don't have any good stories to post. Good news though I get to go to court on October 15th to finish up what was my 3rd act of senseless crime. On top of this I am writing a screenplay for my screenwriting class based on my 3 acts of senseless crime, I will one day post that too. In the mean time I decided to stop posting sports articles on this site and start posting them on the website Bleacher Report. I figured I'd put them on Bleacher Report because A) it is a really cool website and B) more people than my girlfriend and my BFF Willa and whatever random awesome but ultimately weird people I don't know read this site. So here is my Bleacher Report profile that contains links to all my articles (two of which were previously written on this site...sorry)

http://bleacherreport.com/users/53727-Rob-Fox

***EDIT*** I've already made the front page of the Atlanta Braves section for Bleacher Report, pretty cool, although if you don't check this anytime soon I probably won't be up there anymore

Also I'm ranked as the number 5 writer for the Braves

Pretty cool I think

http://bleacherreport.com/atlanta-braves

It's Been A While

Sorry it's been so long. I'm in this screenwriting class that literally requires me to write 3 pages a day, by hand. Needless to say that kind of burns me out on writing. I will try, at the request of my biggest fan, to post more stuff.


So I'm in class right now and I thought I'd give a little blip about baseball because I'm bored and I have been reading sports websites for the last hour. Also I've been watching the Rockies-Padres game online, I highly recommend that every baseball fan get MLB.TV. It's expensive but awesome.

Anyway..............

I Hate the American League!

I hate the American League for so many reasons. I hate the DH. I hate how much more attention the Red Sox and Yankees get compared to everyone else. I hate all the American League teams that have beaten the Braves in the World Series. But most of all I hate how much better they are than the National League. Oh and I hate that everyone always talks about how much better they are than the National League.

People talk about how the teams are better, about how the overall talent pool is better, about how the races are better, and about how play is better. Well I disagree with at least the last two. I always shudder when more fuel can be thrown onto the "American League is better" fire. But it looks like someone is about throw an oil tanker on that fire.

For the last few weeks everyone in the baseball world has been ejaculating over the amazing play of Manny Ramirez and C.C. Sabathia since their trades to the Dodgers and Brewers respectively. This ejaculation is warranted so far as to say that they have been nothing short of awesome since coming over. Here's what they've done.

Sabathia
9-1, 1.82 ERA, 107 K's, 8.82 K/9 in 14 games started........basically he's been making hitters look retarted.

Ramirez
.401 Avg, .481 OBP, .745 SLG, 1.227 OPS, 14 HR, 44 RBI in 43 games.........awesome.

However the praise should end at "OMG Manny and C.C. are awesome what good pick ups by the Brewers and Dodgers!!!!" Unfortunately there has been some decently serious talk of Sabathia winning the Cy Young and Ramirez winning the MVP. That would suck balls. As awesome as they've been neither of them deserve it. They've only played in the league for 1/3 of the season.

Can you imagine the cries of superiority from AL supporters if these two even finish in the top 3 of voting in either of these awards?

"Oh look, we loaned the NL two career AL players and they almost won the MVP and Cy Young only playing a third of the season there, how bad is the NL?"

Ugh that would be terrible. I don't even want to think about it. I especially don't want to see the Sox fans laughing about how their reject Ramirez came to the NL and was immediately the most dominant hitter in the league. AL fans would never look at how NL lifer Josh Beckett came over to Boston and won the Sox a World Series in the same way Sabathia switched leagues . Nor I'm sure would they equate Ramirez's dominance of his new league to Jason Bay's dominance of the AL since coming to the Sox from the Pirates.

Here's what Jason Bay has done since switching leagues.

.300 Avg, .358 SLG, .544 OBP, .901 OPS, 8 HR, 34 RBI in 40 games

Clearly not as eye popping as Ramirez, still very good however. The Red Sox have sustained a few potentially devastating injuries in the second half and Bay has helped keep that team together. The guy went from playing in the NL Central to the AL East. Pretty big change of pace pitching wise. Also, and this really isn't affected by league but still worth mentioning, Bay is a massive defensive improvement over Manny Ramirez.

I don't think either one will win the Cy Young or MVP. Brandon Webb and Tim Lincecum will block out Sabathia for the Cy Young. Meanwhile Albert Pujols has been playing on a different level than the rest of baseball (as usual) with one arm. Also Berkman and Astros are suddenly competing for the Wild Card. Still even a top 3 finish, as I said earlier, could warrant more claims of AL superiority. And I really really don't want to hear any more of it. Really there's only one way to quell those annoying claims.

GO CUBS!!!! WORLD SERIES CHAMPS '08!!!!!!!!!


***I realize that the Mets, Phillies, Astros, or D-Backs could also win the World Series and help keep the AL quiet for a little while but I hate the Mets and Phils, meanwhile the Astros and D-Backs might not even make the playoffs. Also the Brewers or Dodgers winning the WS would still allow AL supporters to claim that those teams wouldn't have won the WS without AL players.***

Morning Pages

So I'm in a screenwriting class this semester and as you can imagine the class involves a lot of writing. Usually these professors like it if the students write everyday to stay sharp. It's an old rule of writing that writing everyday is the only way to be and stay good at writing. I agree kind of. That's one of the reasons I started this blog. So anyway this professor is no different and wants us to wake up and write three pages of whatever the fuck we want to everyday. While I am not going to write three pages a day first thing in the morning (I prefer to masturbate, shower and eat lunch when I wake up) I am going to write three pages a day (since these will be collected for a grade at some point).

The first thing I decided to write was a take on a Nathaniel Hawthorne short story I had to read in a World Lit class. It was a pretty stupid story about some guy leaving his home on a journey who runs into another guy who later turns out to be the devil. It takes place in Puritan times. It kind of reminded me of the Devil and Daniel Webster. Anyway I thought it was stupid because within the first three hundred words anyone not retarded could tell that this one guy was the devil. I'm not just talking about readers, but actual characters in the story should have been able to guess that this guy was the devil. I guess people were stupid back then though. The story is about morality and the main character's name is Goodman, as in he is a Good Man. Also pretty retarded. Hawthorne really wanted to just beat his readers over the head I guess. But enough of me, a blogger, ripping on a brilliant American author. This story is a variation on that Hawthorne story, only updated to modern times. I tried to follow the format and action of the story as closely as I could remember. I even put a few notes at the bottom just like the book I read it in did. I'm not promising this will be good, but I figured I throw it on here anyway.

The Tale of Goodman, John

There was a man once, from near a corner of Missouri. His name was Goodman, John Goodman, but not that John Goodman. Goodman was an honest and moral Christian. On forty days past he had wed the young daughter of a farmer two counties over. Goodman and his young wife lived on the outskirt of town, their home was humble and mobile. Goodman's wife was a gorgeous bride. Her name was Faith. John and Faith Goodman were very much in love and everyday that Goodman left for the market to purchase his 2x4's* Faith mourned his absence. It was for this reason Goodman felt regreat that he again had to leave his wife, although this time for much longer than the usual nine hours. Goodman was to set off on a journey to Steeleville for seventeen days. Goodman's compatriot Jasper had come across more than 700 logs of firewood and planned to sell them individually to college students floating on the nearby river for three dollars a log.

Goodman kissed his wife goodbye. He wished he did not have to leave so young a wife alone for near three weeks. Only fiffteen, he thought to himself, tis a shame.

"Goodbye my love." Goodman said to Faith.
"Write me Goodman so that I may know you are well." She wishfully requested.
"Ain't got no money for stamps, but maybe after our logs are sold I may be be able to phone you." Goodman replied.
"Then on the seventeenth day, if you are not yet returned I will wait by the pay phone at Dairy Queen for your call." Faith said.
"Then on the seventeenth day, if I'm not returned, I will call that pay phone outside Dairy Queen. Now you go back inside, the time will pass much more quickly than you think." Goodman said to his wife.

Faith nodded, kissed Goodman again and closed the door. Goodman began to walk down the road and as he did he turned back for one last look at his home. He noticed Faith watching him through the rear window. When Faith saw him turned towards the home she smiled to Goodman. Goodman knew though that sadness remained in her heart. Neither her wide smile nor her pretty pink Hannah Montana shirt could hide her saddness over Goodman leaving. She is a good wife, Goodman thought.

Goodman now was far down the road and his home was out of sight. He was making his way to the rendevous he had arranged on Craigslist. A fellow had answered his ad about a ride to Steeleville. Goodman was to meet him on this road. No sooner had Goodman thought of the fellow than did he appear from behind a tree.

"Goodman." Said the man as if he had already known it was Goodman.
"Are you the man from Craigslist?" The man who's to guide me to my destination?" Goodman asked cautiously.
"Yes, I am indeed." Replied the man.
"Where is your truck?" Asked Goodman.
"Come with me, we will retrieve it." The man said, beginning to turn towards the forest.

The two walked side by side through the woods. Although similar in build and height the other man some how seemed much older than Goodman. To an observer they may have appeared to be father and son even. As they continued through deeper into the forest Goodman began to fatigue. The five 2x4's he had consumed on the journey thus far had sapped his strength.

"Are you tired Goodman?" The man asked. "So early into the journey too! Take my walking stick if you'd like."

The stick was painted black and had lightening bolts up and down it. On the top of the stick a cobra's head was carved. Goodman was still weary, his eyes were fuzzy. This and the coming night tricked Goodman's eyes, the cobra appeared to him to be alive.

"No more." Exclaimed Goodman. "I have not travelled this deep into the forest before. Neither I nor my father nor his father have been guided this far. I must turn back."

The man starred at Goodman for a moment and then replied:
"Goodman sir you are wrong though. I myself have guided many of your family this deep. I took your father through here while he was a part of a lynch mob, your grandfather too I knew when he bootlegged gin and whisky through here, and also that time when he was in a lynch mob."

Goodman began to walk again against his conscience's advice. The cobra atop the stick again appeared to move and come to life.

"I am surprised they never spoke of me." Said the man.
"Are you the devil?" Goodman asked suddenly.
"What?" Replied the man taken aback.
"Are you the devil?" Goodman asked again.
"Why would you ask that?" The man asked straight faced.
"Well let's see. I'm pretty sure this cobra head on the walking stick is alive, oh yup in fact it's moving right now. That's a little weird since it's made of wood. Also you said you helped my dad lynch someone and my granddad smuggle liquour. That's also kind of strange since A) both those things are bad and B) if you knew my granddad out that would put you at about 100 years old but you don't look a day over 43. So you tell me. Are you the devil in human form come to assist me in sin in exchange for my soul or just some lying asshole put LSD in my 2x4?"

The man paused for a moment.

"Actually yeah, I'm the devil. Now do you want to make some decent coin selling overpriced firewood to college kids or not?"
"Yes sir I do." Replied Goodman.

And with that the two men began to walk again.



*2x4's are 24oz cans of beer, hoosiers and homeless people often drink them.

Senseless Crime Part 2

To continue the theme..................


Summer 2005

It had been a few months since my first brush with the law. Still that night in jail was on my mind constantly. I had spent the night behind bars. A night in prison is never easy and mine had been no exception. I was released at 7:30 AM the following morning. Charged with littering and minor in possession of alcohol. Since then my life had been quiet. I laid low. Partly to keep from acquiring a reputation with the law, but also because that night changed me. I truly thought I wanted to lead an honest, peaceful life. Apparently the fates had other plans.

I finished my first year at school and headed home to St. Louis for a summer internship with a law firm. I decided I would get to know lady justice from a different perspective. I had seen her firm hand, now I decided to examine her righteous mind. The lawyer I worked directly under handled my case from the spring. I got off light. The MIP was dropped and I paid a small fine for littering. I felt like that orange child rapist from Sin City. Above the law. That criminal urge inside me began to rise again. Working for the firm wasn't as enlightening as I thought it would be. My days were full of dull busy work. Each day I had to file away pictures and documents pertaining to murder cases, death penalty trials, serial rapists and so on and so forth. I once found a picture of a murdered black woman with a kitchen knife in her neck. The whole thing was incredibly boring. I spent most of my days sleeping in the file room in the basement. A hunger for action was slowly boiling within me.

But as dull as my knife wound filled days were at night I was still having fun. Almost every night I would head over to someone's house and hang out with friends and drink. I still had my fake ID. I was taking full advantage of it. After that close brush in the spring I told myself I would never take my fake ID for granted again. I didn't, I used it just about every night. Most of the time my friends and I would head over to a girl's house whose name will further more be known as Banana. She lived in Clayton. We would hang out on her back porch, drinking and having fun. It was great, not only was it a cool place to hang out but it was also only a 5 minute drive from my house.

Just around the corner from her home the city of Clayton had erected a new statue at the intersection of Wydown and Hanley. It was the ugliest statue ever sculpted. It was this.......






















We all hated it. It was the talk of the town. Everyone thought this statue, Fat Man on a Horse by Fernando Botero was the ugliest thing ever created. It looks like Louie Anderson is being immortalized after winning an equestrian medal in the Olympics. When I first saw it I thought it was hideous like everyone else. Little did I know this statue would soon become another notch in my crime belt.

The night was humid, as so many St. Louis nights are. My friend Lennie was on his way to pick me up. After a long day of work I needed to unwind. We were heading to Banana's house for the night. After Lennie arrived we swung by my neighborhood Schnucks to pick up some beer. At this point I had the fake ID game down pat. I strolled in so confident in my ability to purchase liquor that I probably seemed 21 to the employees. I grabbed a 24 pack of Natural Light and headed to the cashier. Tareesha wasn't working that night. No matter, I thought, I had plenty of other options now. I purchased the beer and headed back to the car. Lennie was waiting. I got in and headed towards Banana's. We had to make one more stop along the way though. We drove to our friend Skinny's house to pick him up. The car pulled up to the curb in front of Skinny's house. After a quick phone call he was heading out the door and towards the car. He got in and we were on our way.

When we got to Banana's house several of her friends were already there. We sat down and began to converse. After a few hours the spirits had gotten to our heads. The group talked and laughed, enjoying the night. Then the subject of the statue came up.

"It is so ugly" Banana said.
"It looks retarded" I said in agreement.
"Who thought that was a good idea?" Lennie wondered aloud.
"The tail looks like a turd" commented another of Banana's friends.

The conversation continued. The theme circled around the group, each of us musing about what we would do with the statue if such a decision were ours. We wondered what could be done to show the city of Clayton how stupid that statue was. Suddenly an idea hit me like a bolt of lightening. Condiments, I thought.

"Let's fuck with it." I said. The group was silent.
"How?" Banana replied.
"Lets throw shit on it." I replied. Again the group sat silently.
".....Like what?" Lennie asked hesitantly.
"I don't know like....some ketchup or something." I knew this would convince them. "Any takers?" I asked. There were none at first.
"Come on it'll be hilarious. They won't catch us we'll just run right back here, no one will ever know. Skinny lets do it." I pleaded. Skinny agreed.
"Okay." He said.

We headed into Banana's kitchen to create our condiment arsenal. I grabbed a bottle of Super Smokers BBQ Sauce. Skinny grabbed a jar of mayonnaise. Banana walked into her kitchen to watch us prepare. It didn't take us long. Skinny and I went over the plan. Run through the alley out onto the street, throw our respective condiments, run like hell back to Banana's house. The plan was flawless.

Skinny and I headed down the alley to Wydown. The alley was lit by a few lights on telephone poles. We were the alone except for a group of young professionals gathered in the adjacent park. We walked out to the street acting as inconspicuous as possible. We stood on the sidewalk for a moment staring down our foe. Perhaps it was the liquor, perhaps the importance of our cause, but at that moment I was ready.

"Throw it." I said to Skinny.

Skinny threw. His jar flew across the statue littering it with mayonnaise. I was next. I stood for a moment. Considered my target. Adjusted for wind and drunkenness. Then I stepped forward, wound up and threw. The bottle exploded on impact. The noise was tremendous. What I hadn't realized is that the statue was hollow and bronze. The impact echoed up and down the street. Skinny and I were too drunk to care. We stumbled back to Banana's house, our laughter screeching through the night air. We came up on Banana's back porch, everyone's face was stunned. Skinny and I were still laughing. Soon everyone else began to ease and laugh as well. We had pulled it off. I never thought I would commit a crime again. But I had, and this time I was in the clear.

After about 20 minutes Lennie decided it was time for him to go home. Skinny, Lennie, and I said our goodbyes and headed to Lennie's car. The whole drive to Skinny's house we laughed about what we had just done. We hoped this would teach Clayton a lesson. As we pulled up to Skinny's house my phone began to ring. It was Banana calling. I answered.

"Hey what's up?" I said curiously.
"You guys need to come back and clean up the statue" Banana said, her voice a little shaken.
"Um no, why would we do that?" I said defiantly.
"The police are here." Banana said. I paused. I shot of adrenaline went through me. Then I remembered who I was talking to. Banana liked to fuck with people sometimes, I was sure this was a joke.
"Whatever no they're not." I replied.
"There is a police officer on my back porch right now you guys need to get back here." She said annoyed.
"Okay if there's a cop let me talk to him." I said cleverly. Lennie and Skinny were now watching me with interest.
"No, just get back here." Banana said even more annoyed than before.
"Just let me talk to him" I insisted, proud of my clever ploy to unravel her rouse.
"No just get back here now." She demaned, now angry.
"Whatever, good night." I hung up the phone.

I told Lennie and Skinny about Banana's attempt to fool us. We laughed. Skinny exited the car and we said goodbye. He began to walk across the lawn towards his house. My phone rang again. It was Banana. I laughed and answered.

"Hello?" I said lightheartedly.
"This is Officer ***** ******** of the Clayton police department are you Foxxx?" Said a man's voice I didn't know from the other end of the phone.
"Uh yeah." I replied, skeptical of if this was actually a police officer. Before we left Banana's house she had told us some guy friends of hers from her school were coming over.
"I'm not entirely convinced this is actually a police officer, what's your badge number?" I asked, thinking I was clever.
"How about you come back to the statue and I give you the badge number then. I have your address if you'd like we can come to your home and pick you up." Replied the man sternly.

At this point I was pretty convinced it was a police officer. Even if it wasn't I did not want to take the chance of having a police car come to my house at 3 AM and wake up my parents to arrest me. I called Skinny who was now in his house and explained the situation. He snuck out of his house and came back to the car. We asked Lennie to take us back to the scene of the crime. He was not happy. He had been drinking a bit so the prospect of driving up to police officer under the influence was not pleasing to him. Understandable.

The ride back to Banana's was silent. We all hoped it was a joke. As we approached the back of her house on Wydown we found out that it was not. There were six police cars waiting for us. Lennie was pissed. I took out my wallet and put my fake ID in his glove box. At first he was against it but I assured him the cops would just let him pass. Skinny and I got out of the car and headed up to the police officers.

"Hello. Officer." I said trying to get someone's attention. "We're the idiots who messed with the statue." A police officer turned to us.
"Come here." He said.

Skinny and I walked over to him and gave him our information. I was worried. I thought I'd be going to jail again for the second time in four months. The police told us we needed to clean the statue. We called Banana. She answered.

"Hey can we get some cleaning supplies from your house, we have to clean up the statue." I asked.
"Yeah. I guess" She sounded angry.

Banana opened her back door and let us in. The three of us went down to her basement. Skinny and I began to grab cleaning supplies.

"So thanks for telling the cops my name." I said to Banana, a little disappointed in her.
"Well they came up to my back porch, which had beer cans all over it. They said if I didn't I would have gotten an MIP. So considering this is all your fault I figured it was fair to give them your names." Banana retorted.
".....I guess." I replied.

I wasn't too upset Banana turned us in. The table on the back porch was covered in beer cans. On top of this she had just had some legal troubles of her own. I could understand her not wanting to be in any more trouble than she already was. I was essentially in a similar but much shittier situation. I'm sure had $150 dollars worth of alcohol not been strewn across her back porch she would have lied for us.

After gathering the cleaning supplies and a hose Skinny and I headed out to the street. The police were there waiting for us. Just as the TP'ing incident was in the spring, this apparently was the crime of the night. Half the department had shown up. Again I marveled at how little police actually have to do. As Skinny and I walked up to the group of cops they discussed what to do with us.

"I say just have them clean the statue, get their info, and let them go." Said one cop.
"Fuck that lets arrest 'em!" Another, much douchier cop suggested.
"Eh it isn't a big deal lets just make them clean it and let them leave." An older cop, presumably the one in charge replied.
"Fuck 'em, lets take 'em in." The douche cop again declared. I have never wished so hard for someone to literally drop dead as I did right then. Thankfully the other officers did not agree with the douche.

The police told us we could just clean up the statue and head home. This was a relief. Skinny and I didn't even care that we no longer had a ride and would now have to walk home. Skinny's house was about a 20 minute walk from Banana's, mine was more like 40 minutes. We began to clean. I marveled at how much mayonnaise was on the statue. All my BBQ sauce was concentrated in one place but the mayo was everywhere.

"Dude this was a miracle throw." I observed. Skinny laughed.

As we were cleaning a girl I knew drove by. She saw me mopping the statue and stopped in the middle of the intersection. She rolled down her window and yelled.

"What are you doing?"

Since she was probably drunk and there were about nine police officers standing around me I figured it was a good idea to send her on her way.

"Don't worry about it, just get out of here, you don't want to be here, I'll call you tomorrow." I yelled back.
"Um...okay....call me." She said confused, she then drove off.

Skinny and I continued to clean the statue. At this point in the night it was probably about 2:30 AM. I had to be at work at 9 AM the next morning, we had probably an hour of work left. I began to scrub the BBQ sauce off the statue while Skinny concentrated on his mayo. As I scrubbed away at the BBQ sauce I noticed what I thought were odd brown stains underneath the sauce. I soon realized that they were scratches. Scratches from the glass bottle hitting the bronze statue. I knew we were screwed. No longer was this some condiment stains. I had severely damaged a very expensive statue. I had no idea how much damage I had done monetarily speaking. For all I knew this could a felony. I began to freak out.

The police weren't paying close attention to us. It turned out that they didn't really care about what we had done. They also hated the statue and thought that what we did was hilarious. The only reason they came was because some people who were hanging out in the park (the young professionals) called the police. Since they weren't too concerned about what we had done I knew I might be able to lie about the scratches if I disposed of the evidence. I began to pick up the pieces of broken glass and put them in my pocket. After it all was collected I probably had about 20 pieces of jagged broken glass in the pockets of my shorts.

When Skinny and I finished cleaning we walked over to police to inform them we were done. They spoke with us for a while. We bummed cigarettes off one cop. Then they got our phone numbers. They asked for both home and cell numbers. Since I was working for a law firm I figured I might be able to take care of this without my parents ever knowing. I gave them my cell phone number and then gave them my brother's cell number, claiming it was my home number. The police then inspected the statue. Everything seemed fine at first. I hoped they wouldn't notice the scratches. Of course they did. We played dumb. I said that it was a stain but I couldn't get it off. Skinny said he had seen it on there before today. The police weren't convinced. They said they would have to turn this over to a detective.

We left the police and began to walk home. We were exhausted and just wanted this night to be over with. On the way home I reached into my pocket to grab my cell phone, forgetting the shards of broken glass I had recently stashed in them. I pulled my hand out of my pocket cut to shit. I was bleeding everywhere. That sucked. I had to use my shirt to try and stop the bleeding. I finally got home at about 4 AM, I had work at 9 AM the next day. I went to sleep though safe in the knowledge that my parents wouldn't find out about this.

I awoke the next day to my mother standing over me. She looked angry. This was going to be a long day.

"Why did a Clayton police detective just call your brother's cell phone?" She asked with a curious rage.

Apparently my plan to give the police my brother's cell phone number as my own backfired. My brother had left his cell phone downstairs when he went to bed. My mother happened to be getting ready for work when the phone began to ring. She looked at the incoming number and recognized it as the Clayton police department (my mom is a lawyer and worked in Clayton for some time as both a lawyer and judge). She answered and from what I can imagine had a very interesting conversation with the detective.

"Don't worry about it, it's a big misunderstanding." I said, too tired to think of a good lie.
"You need to call him back." She said, really really pissed off sounding.

I was exhausted, angry, scared, ashamed, and on top of all this drunk. I know I said that the fear of police had sobered me up the night before but the alcohol didn't leave my system. Actually the only thing to leave my body that night was a decent amount of blood from my severe hand wound. So I was still drunk when I awoke. To go along with being drunk my mother woke me up at 7 AM, an hour before I was going to wake up.

I got in the shower, tried to jack off, probably failed due to drunkenness and a preoccupation with a pending arrest. I then got out of the shower, got dressed and went downstairs. My mom was waiting for me. I tried to make breakfast but she insisted on bothering me about why the police were calling my brother's cell phone asking for me. I explained what happened the night before. The look on her face was a level of dumbfounded that I had never seen before. It was the kind of face I would make if I met someone trying to poop in their own mouths.

After that lovely conversation I returned the Clayton detective's phone call. He was all business. He told me to come down to the station so that I could recount what happened the previous night. I got off the phone and called Skinny, he said he was about to leave to talk to the police. I then told my mom I was heading to the police station before work to talk with this detective.

"Are you an idiot, if you go down there they'll arrest you!" My mom said quickly.
"They didn't say they were going to arrest me. The cops last night were cool I think I'll be fine."
"No, you're not going down there. They'll arrest you." She said matter of factly.
"Skinny is going down there right now, it's fine." I pleaded, not wanting to anger a detective.
"What!?!?" She yelled.

My mother then called Skinny's mom, who she was friends with, she told her not to let Skinny talk to the detective. My mother, as I said before, is a judge and a lawyer, so I figured she knew what she was talking about. She eventually convinced me, there was no way I was going to get arrested this morning. So I headed into work. However there was still one complication. The detective was expecting me. My mom said not to even call him back until I got to the law firm. Unfortunately the detective called first.

"Are you coming down to the station?" He asked me, a little annoyed.
"Yes, I'm on my way, but I had to walk because I don't have a car here." I lied, it bought me like a half an hour while I waited for my lawyer to come into work. Still the phone calls came.
"Where are you?" The detective asked, now angry. "You better not be hiring a lawyer, because if you are I will arrest you. I just want to talk."

At this point I'd just like to comment on how full of crap so many people associated with the law are. First, my mom thinks the detective is lying to me. She thinks if I go into the station, he will arrest me even though he said he wouldn't, isn't that entrapment? Secondly this detective said he will arrest me if I hire a lawyer? Don't I have a right to legal counsel? People just like to make shit up when talking to people who they think have no idea what's going on. Anway.....

At this point I was in the office of the law firm with my lawyer, again I recounted my actions from the previous night, again I got that pooping in mouth dumbfounded look. By now I was freaking out because the detective was really pissed off and said if I wasn't at the station in the next 15 minutes I was under arrest. My lawyer decided to call him. Remember the detective told me not to hire a lawyer. I sat and watched as my lawyer called the detective.

"Hello, detective, I'm calling about my client who you're expecting at your station in a few minutes. He was one of the young men involved with the statue on Wydown and Hanley last night..........no he did not hire me as legal counsel, he works for me, he is my legal clerk..........no he did not hire me"

I couldn't hear what the detective was saying back to my lawyer but it didn't sound good. Luckily my lawyer is a smooth motherfucker and can talk his way in and out of anything. Interesting side note about the lawyer I worked for, he is a stud. He is about 35 and is good friends with Jamal Mayers of the St. Louis Blues. These two liked to hit the town and have lots of sex with lots of really hot skanks. How do I know they were hot you ask? Well that's because my lawyer liked to catalogue his conquests with the camera on his phone. He one day guided my through about eight different naked pictures on his phone while he had nothing to do. That was a good day at work.

My lawyer hung up the phone and told me I needed to go down to the station. Gee fucking whiz isn't that what I was going to do in the first place? I thought. So now I headed over to the Clayton Police Department to speak to a really pissed off detective. I arrived and was guided to the detective's desk. I waited for a moment while he interrogated/motherfucked a car thief. He then turned his unpleasent attention to me. He spent the first 10 minutes of our meeting bitching me out for stringing him along. I tried to explain that several different lawyers, including my mother, told me it was a bad idea and that he was going to arrest me.

"I told you I wasn't going to arrest you." He said angrily.

Fucking great advice I thought. He told me that I caused a lot of damage to the statue. He also told me that the mayor was really pissed off about Skinny and I vandalizing the statue because this was the second time in a month the statue had been fucked with (apparently the first time Clayton High's class of '05 used the statue as a forum to let the world know that they ruled). The mayor was also pissed off because the statue apparently cost a lot whole lot of money. It cost a lot of money because apparently Fernando Botero is a world famous artist. A lot of things were made apparent to me during this meeting. The detective gave me my court date and just as I was about to leave he stopped me.

"Wait." He said cleverly "Let me see your wallet, you said you were drinking, I want to see if you have a fake ID."

I gladly handed over my wallet since my fake was still in Lennie's glove compartment. I had once again committed a crime, gotten caught, and somehow despite having awful luck with everything else managed kept my fake ID away from the police. There was no way I was ever losing this thing. I had court a few months later, the Clayton prosecutor knew my dad and cut me a deal. I basically had a little bit of community service and a year on probation. Not so bad considering I caused a few thousand dollars worth of damage to a priceless piece of art.

This was even bigger than the TP'ing, I was now a full fledged criminal. I was on probation. And I was famous too. Skinny and my's escapade was covered (briefly) by both the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and according to a friend of mine it was mentioned in an art textbook as well. Our names were never mentioned, but our tools were. Both publications made a mention of the BBQ sauce and mayonnaise. It seemed that after only 19 years of life I had already carved out a little piece of immortality for myself.

Senseless Crime Part 1

I had a court case yesterday, for what I won't say. But in light of my recent legal troubles I thought I would reflect on some of my past, similar legal troubles.

Spring 2005

I was 19, naive, but no stranger to the alluring world of crime. I had just gotten a fake ID two days before. The rush from buying alcohol illegally was as intoxicating as the booze itself. I was home for spring break and ready to hang out with friends I hadn't seen in a while. I stopped by my neighborhood Schnucks to pick up a 12 pack. I made my way to the alcohol section, confident yet inconspicuous. I stopped at a rack of Cheez-Its, faking interest to appear like a casual shopper. I then strode over to alcohol aisle. I browsed the different liquors and wines. To show any suspicious employees watching me that I was of age I needed to appear like a drinker of varied and sophisticated tastes. After parousing a section of micro-brews I grabbed a 12 pack of Natural Light and headed for a check out lane. I approached the three or four open lanes carefully weighing my options in terms of cashier. Who looks like a sucker I thought to myself. I came upon a young African-American girl no older than 17.

"They got you working the graveyard shift?" I said, breaking the ice with a conversational joke.
"...I guess" She replied

I tossed the 12 pack onto the conveyor, it slowly carried the beer to the cashier. She grabbed it and passed it over the scanner. The beep from the scanner was quickly followed by a pop up on the screen. It read Check ID. For a second my eyes let down their guard. The lie flashed across them. Quickly though I recovered. My gaze was now hard and again full of confidence. In my stomach however I could still feel the anxiety. The guilt and fear brewed in my belly as the girl asked

"Can I see your ID?"

Coolly I reached for my back pocket. I made a noise as if to sound annoyed, giving the impression that I hadn't been carded in ages. The ploy was genius, it had just come to me. I handed her the ID. As she scanned it I tried to remain steady. I looked down at my watch attempting to further the illusion of annoyance. I looked back up. She was staring directly into my eyes. She was trying to read me. Dammnit I thought to myself. Should I have worn sunglasses? But her eyes had left me as quickly as they came. She punched in the phony birth date and returned the ID. Bingo, I'd done it again. Played another fool. I'll have to remember her for the summer I thought. I looked down at her name tag. It read Tareesha.

"Don't get stuck here too late" I said jovially, continuing the joke from before. Consistency is the key, never break character.
"Mmhm" she retorted, sold that I was 23.

I walked out brimming with confidence and half an erection. I had just committed the perfect crime. But I wanted more.

As I drove out to the house where all my friends were gathered the only thing on my mind was the illegal purchase I had just made. I felt like I was part of drug cartel. I went over the transaction again in my mind, replaying every second of it. Flawless, I thought as I chuckled to myself.

I arrived at the house and walked around back, entering into the screen porch. I was greeted by friends and then sat down and began to drink. The night passed by full of conversation and entertainment. I slowly sipped my Natural Light while enjoying the company. At a point in the night my friend, who for the purpose of the story I will call Sully, began to tell a story about how a group of girls we knew had TP'd his house several years ago. Along with toilet paper these girls also left tampons covered in ketchup on Sully's doorstep. We all laughed as the story was quite amusing. Then Sully came to the part of the story involving me. After these girls had TP'd Sully's house I took it upon myself to exact revenge. Myself and another friend (who was also friends with Sully at the time) called the high school these girls attended. I did the talking. I dialed the principal's voicemail and left a message. The message was as follows

"This is officer Dan Moss with the University City Police Department, I'm calling to report an act of vandalism by three girls who attend your school. Their names are **** *******, ******* *******, and ****** ********. The girls threw toilet paper in the trees and on the house at the address of **** Cornell Avenue in University City. Normally an act like this wouldn't be reported but the graphic sexual nature of the vandalism, I believe, requires attention not only from our department but from the girls' school as well. The girls left several tampons covered in ketchup on the front doorstep of the residence. Clearly this was meant to graphically demonstrate menstrual waste. I'm hoping that perhaps the school could discipline these girls so that we do not have to. Again this is officer Dan Moss with the U. City police department. Thanks. Bye."

That Monday the girls were called down to the office of their high school and were played the voicemail. They incorrectly identified the voice as Sully's and told their principal which school he went to. Sully's principal was then informed and Sully, along with several of his classmates, was called down to his principal's office. They then gave that principal my name. However I too attended a different high school and their principal didn't feel that it was his responsibility to further the investigation. I had impersonated a police officer and gotten away with it. I was only 15 at the time. I had no humble entrance into the criminal underworld.

The memory of this coupled with my brilliant play for alcohol earlier in the night only further fueled my lust for crime. I left the house around 1:30 AM and headed home. There were still six beers left in my 12 pack. I'll keep them for tomorrow I thought. The whole way home I kept my eye out for the law. I wasn't drunk but I was under 21 with 6 beers in my car and 6 beers in my blood. That was trouble I didn't need or want. I made it home at about 2 AM. I plopped down in front of the television with a plate full of pizza rolls ready to call it I night. Although the pizza rolls were satisfying my hunger for food the hunger for crime and excitement was still very much present inside me. There was nothing I could do about it though.
I was about to head up for bed when my phone began to vibrate. It was 2:30 AM, Sully was calling.

"What's up?" I said answering his call.
"Dude what are you doing?" Sully said, his speech slightly slurred.
"About to go to bed."
"Remember how we were talking about how the girls TP'd my house?" asked Sully.

How could I forget, I thought. My craving for crime began to rise.

"Dude lets get them back. Lets TP their houses tonight. Do you have any toilet paper?" Sully sounded excited.
"I don't think there's much at my house right now." I said.
"Oh, well do you want to TP them?" Sully asked me.
"I'm in. Whose driving?" I said coolly.
"JZ, he'll be at my house in like ten minutes"
"Good, I'll bring my beer, call me when you get here." I responded.

This was it. A chance to appease my criminal desires. Twenty minutes later JZ and Sully were at my house. I came outside with the half full 12 pack of Natural Light and got into the car.

"Let's go to Walgreens." I said "We can get toliet paper there."

As we drove to the Walgreens we each cracked open a beer. We knew tonight would be a night to remember. We all wondered what it would be like for those girls and their families to wake up the next morning and see their front yards blanked in TP. Sully claimed he was going to pee on their door knobs. JZ and I laughed. Although light hearted I was focused. Ready to commit yet another brilliant crime and again get away with it. As we pulled up to Walgreens I finished my beer. I reached into the 12 pack, cracked open another and got out of the car.

"What are you doing man?" JZ asked bewildered.
"It's fine" I said, then I turned and walked into Walgreens. JZ and Sully followed.

I didn't care. Drinking a beer in Walgreens was small potatoes to me. I was about to TP houses, no late night Walgreens employee was going to get in the way of that. I felt hard, I felt dangerous and slick. I was Butch Cassidy, I was Clyde, I was Smoky AND the Bandit. Nothing could stop me. As I walked in the cashier looked at me. I glared back taking a drink from my beer. We quickly headed over to the aisle containing toiletries and gathered as much toilet paper as we thought we needed. The three of us went up to the counter, paid, and exited the store. We got back in the car and went on our way.

The drive from the Walgreens to the houses was about ten minutes. Two of the three girls lived on the same block. The other lived a few blocks over. We decided that just getting the two girls was good enough. We went over the plan. Hit the first house fast and quiet, then proceed to house number two maintaining tempo and stealth. We wanted the whole job to take no more than 20 minutes. JZ pulled onto the girls' street, we were silent. The car stopped in front of the first house. We all looked at each other, nodded, and then exited the car. Each of us carried at least four rolls onto the lawn and we began tossing. We aimed high up into the trees. Sully was finished first. After he was out of rolls he went back to the car. I finished next, and then JZ. One house down. We had done a good job. We got back in the car, our hearts were racing.

We were relieved though that no one had heard or seen us. Our tensions eased a bit as we headed to the second house. We had more fun with this one. We again took about four rolls each and proceeded to hit the trees and bushes. Sully went up to the front door, unzipped his fly and began to urinate all over the doorknob. JZ and I meanwhile continued to TP. After Sully was done with the door he took a rolled up newspaper out of its wrapping and tossed it all over the front lawn. We laughed. I felt invincible. Nothing could stop me. The world was mine for the taking. I was about to get away with another crime.

We finished with the house and headed back to the car. We all were drinking a beer and laughing quietly about the thorough TP'ing we had just given the two houses, especially the second house. When we got back to the car we noticed a good amount of toilet paper left over. It seemed we had bought too much. High on two heady brews, Natural Light and danger, we decided that it would be funny to TP our friend who just so happened to live across the street from this girl. We took the rest of the toilet paper and headed for his lawn. Our guards were down. We thought we were in the clear. We haphazardly tossed toilet paper all over his family's trees and lawn. Another job well done. Sully and I were out of toilet paper and headed back to the car. JZ was still working on a specific project he was attempting with a roll. As Sully and I crossed the street back to the car a bright light shined upon us.

"Oh fuck it's the cops" Sully said frightened.
"Dude, not funny." I replied, so sure of my criminal ability that I thought what Sully said had to be a joke. Unfortunately it was not. Sully took off running, I turned, saw the police car, and followed him. We hid behind JZ's car, but it was to no avail. The officer had seen us. JZ was still on the lawn. I sat behind the car, my heart frozen and my brain working a mile a minute. How am I gonna get out of this! I thought frantically. I knew the neighborhood well, I began to plan my escape route. As I tried to figure a way out of there I heard voices.

"Come here now."

It was the police officer. Yeah right, I thought, Not today copper.

"I'm coming." It was JZ's voice. The cop had spotted him on the lawn. He was now walking over to the police car which was only feet from us.
"Turn and put your hands against the car." The cop ordered JZ.
"Okay, we know these people, they're our friends. Just knock on the door and ask them. They know us." JZ pleaded.
"Tell your friends to come out." The cop said, unconcerned with what JZ had to say.
"Guys, come out here." JZ said to us.

No way, I thought. There was no way I was getting caught. Not me. I was a brilliant criminal.

"Let's go dude." Sully whispered to me. I then took full stock of the situation. There was no way I'd be able to run. The cop was young and in shape. I was a smoker wearing Birkenstocks. I cursed myself for the poor footwear decision. As a criminal, I knew better. Sully and I walked out from behind the car.

"Come over here and put your hands on the car." The cop ordered. We complied.
"We know these people, it's no big deal. We'll clean it up right now." Sully said to the cop.
"Put your hands on the car I don't want to hear it." The cop said firmly.

We put our hands on the car. The cop asked us if we had been drinking. Being that we were all under age we said no. The cop then searched our pockets. He found eight Bud Light caps in Sully's pocket. He had been collecting the caps that night to keep track of how much he drank. Our lie was exposed. We then all admitted to drinking a little. I claimed that the caps were all three of ours collectively. Although caught my criminal mind was still at work. I knew by admitting to part of the truth we would seem more believable. And admitting that the caps were all of ours it gave the cop a firm number of how much we drank. No one of us could have had more than three beers. A small amount to drink for anyone our age. I was astonished at myself. You're gonna get out of this you sly Fox, I thought.

Then the cop cuffed us. It was my first time in handcuffs. Being cuffed is an experience every criminal has at least once. I viewed it as my rite of passage. However I was still unnerved. The icy grip of the handcuffs sent chills straight to my soul. As we all stood there silently, cursing ourselves for getting greedy and going after a third house we heard the cop call for back up. Minutes later another police car showed up. Then another. Then another. The final count was seven police cars and ten cops. Apparently this was the crime of the night. Of course I expected this. I knew that if I was ever caught it would be for something big, like this. The large deployment of the police force made sense to me. Congrats boys you got me, I thought, enjoy it now because it's the last time.

The officer that arrested us was now speaking to several of his cohorts. They all mocked us and joked around with each other. They knew the victory they had won. They checked JZ's car and found two more beers out of my 12 pack. Now they came back over and again asked us how much we had been drinking. We said nothing. Then another police car pulled up and an older officer exited the car. He walked straight for us. As he approached the cop who initially caught us asked him what he was to do with us. The older officer looked from him to us.

"You guys are fucked. Book 'em." He said to the cop while staring at us.

And that was it. There was no getting out of this now. I was headed to the big house. They were gonna throw the book at us.

By the time we arrived at the police station it was 3:30 AM. They put us in holding cells and took down our information. They confiscated our wallets, shoes, and cell phones. One cop with a rat face interrogated JZ and Sully. Another cop, a kindly black lady, interrogated me. While Ratty played good cop bad cop with my friends Officer Jemima took a different approach with me. She calmly asked me questions and I calmly responded. She then began to look through my wallet. At first I thought nothing of it but then panic spread over me. My brand new fake ID was in there. She was sure to find it, she was tearing through every inch of the wallet. After a few seconds she pulled it out. She looked it over and said

"This isn't you."

I tightened up inside. Should I lie? I thought. No, you're caught already just give it up and hope they'll go easy on you. My conscience had caught up with me NO! LIE! Lie until you can't lie anymore! Roared back the criminal half of my brain.

"No it's not." I said, desperately trying to think of what to say next. "That...is my friend. I took that from him as a joke.......he'll be pissed if I don't give that back to him."

I was trying to keep as quiet as possible. I didn't want Ratty or any of the other cops to hear our conversation. I knew my criminal charm would work on this cop but the others were sure to see through my act. It worked. Officer Jemima believed me and put the ID back in my wallet. A small victory I thought. Even though I had been caught, I took solace at the fact that my fake ID would make it out of this police station.

After general interrogation each of us were taken off into another room alone for a one on one session. At this point I had nothing to lose. I decided I was going to come clean. I had already tried to call my friends to see if one of them could bail me out but none answered. I was forced to call my parents. They knew I was in jail. They were pissed. From here on out my only goal was to get out of the joint before the night was over. When the cop asked me whose beer was in the car I said it was mine. There is a saying, "no honor amongst thieves", well this criminal wasn't going to let his friends go down for his crime. Incidentally they did anyway. I told the cop the whole story. I was then sent back to my holding cell.

Back in the holding cell JZ, Sully, and I now had company. The police force had rounded up their nightly quota of crack addicts, some of whom they were on a first name basis with, one of them was now sharing a 4x4x8 cell with me. He was a white, thirty something portly fellow with a beard. His breath was awful. He spoke of random, insane things. A petty criminal, I was disgusted by him. He ranted for what seemed like hours but was probably only 30 minutes. He ranted about blacks, how he hated blacks, how whites shouldn't have freed blacks, and about how blacks were monkey like. One rather large muscular black officer took offense to this and while the crack head's fingers were through the bars he beat them with his night stick. The crack head recoiled, teary eyed, fingers bloodied.

Earlier, while we were making our phone calls, JZ had gotten a hold of his boss. Now his boss was here to bail him out and take him home. JZ wouldn't have to tell his parents until the morning. Lucky him. Sully and I weren't so lucky. After JZ left myself and Sully were taken downstairs to the more permanent cells. There were two bunks, the lower of the two was occupied by another crack head who was fast asleep. Frightened of the crack head Sully and I only spoke in whispers. We were tired. It was 4 AM and any buzz we had was long gone by now. Thirty minutes passed and we had stopped speaking, only wanting to sleep. We were sure however that our parents would be there soon to pay our bail and even though we were in a world of trouble we were looking forward to going home. Soon Sully's father came. He paid Sully's bail and Sully was free to go. I however was still stuck there, no end in sight. I soon realized I'd be sleeping the night in jail.

I climbed up to the top bunk, my eyes heavy. As they began to close I recollected about the day that had passed. My life as a criminal had come full circle. I realized that no one could run from the law forever. It was my time to get caught. Now I was paying the price. I fell asleep, dreams of a happier place danced through my head.

Those dreams were suddenly and violently jarred from my mind as I awoke to screaming an hour later. I looked over to the cell next to mine. Several police officers were outside the cell door, night sticks drawn, one fumbling with the keys trying to open the door. They were yelling into the cell, presumably at one of the inmates. What could it be, I thought, A gang fight? Although a hardened criminal I wanted no part of gangs or gang violence. I was an upper class criminal, not a thug. I looked over into the cell and my eyes fixed upon the target of the cops' screams. In there the portly racist crack head with whom I had previously been cell mates was hanging from the top bar of the cell, a ripped T-shirt around his neck. He was trying to hang himself with his own T-shirt. I hate this place, I thought. I turned my head and went back to sleep. At this point I had seen it all, nothing could phase me anymore. I was hard. I was a criminal.

Sports Stuff

Like I said I'll earlier I'll try and post something that isn't Hollister related every once in a while. I did say I would talk about the Braves and Mizzou on this site too. Since I'm sure I've upset my many many readers by posting so few sports topics I will give in to popular demand and post some stuff about sports. Also I have decided to scrap Today's Stuff because I don't feel like doing that every day anymore. If you want to find interesting stories go to the Drudge Report. Without further ado............

Mizzou TE Chase Coffman out 2 weeks

That sucks. Luckily he won't miss the opener against Illinois in St. Louis on August 30th. When I read that headline I almost broke down. With every day that passes I become more and more tense whenever I think about the upcoming college football season. Usually I'm calm and just looking forward to tailgating. Now I simultaneously giggle and hyperventilate when imagining what the season holds for Mizzou.

But back to Chase. This guy is a fucking hoss. He defines hoss. The man is gigantic. I once saw him at the Mizzou RecCenter playing in an intermural basketball league with a bunch of other football players. He isn't a great football player, he's a great athlete. I felt so bad for that poor law school team that had to guard him. Coffman literally dunked over a guy four different times. He's got ups. Check it out. Anyone who watches Mizzou football knows that although Coffman could bulldoze any defender dumb enough to get in his way, he prefers to leap over them. It is unbelievable how high this guy can jump.

He's nimble too. He has great balance and great hands. Oh and like I said before, he's a monster. His pre-game ritual is as follows:

• Eat a live pig
• Slay a vampire (he's a vampire slayer also, did I mention that?)
• Regurgitate half of the pig he ate to stay light so as not to hinder his leaping or speed
• Kidnap the opposing coach's youngest child and hold him/her for ransom
• Make love to eleven Golden Girls (Mizzou cheerleaders for those who don't know)
• Rails a line of powdered Gatorade
• Puts on pads and uniform

He is a beast.


SI's Preview of Mizzou Football

We're number 4 in the country? We have 10 of 11 starters returning on one of the Big 12's best defenses? Chase Daniel will once again compete for the Heisman? Jeremy Maclin is the offspring of the Flash and Carl Lewis? Oh Sports Illustrated you're too much. What's that you say? The Tigers will be competing for the national championship? Stop, really. You're making us blush.

Sweet Jesus I hope I didn't just jinx the season.

FoxSports Agrees with Sports Illustrated

This article just gives a short conference to conference rundown of who they think will be the champ of each conference and why, plus some other bull crap that I didn't read because Mizzou was not mentioned. Anyway it says we're the shit.


Now Onto Much Less Fun Things

I linked an article talking about how the Braves will honor Skip Caray and also who the Braves might be pursuing this offseason. That is all I could find about them online. Although even when they were a winning team it always seemed like they were over looked. No one ever did write much about them. Unfortunately that's because the dawn of sports blogging and online articles came about in the middle of the last Yankee dynasty/ The Sox-Yanks rivalry when the Sox were still cursed.

So in light of this I will give a run down of everything that I think went wrong for the Braves this year. If anyone remembers they were supposed to be a team contending for the NL East crown. Some foolish rapscallions even picked them to win the World Series.

1) No Leo Mazzone

He actually left the team after the 2005 season to be the Baltimore Orioles pitching coach. Brilliant career move asshole. Not so coincidentally this was the last year Atlanta won the division title. Obviously it seems stupid to site something that didn't even happen this year, but honestly it is still affecting the Atlanta Braves. Going to Baltimore really made a lot of people forget that this was the man whose pitching staffs finished 1st or 2nd in the NL in ERA every year for a decade. That is ridiculous. Part of the reason was the sick talent he had on the starting staff (Maddux, Glavine, Smoltz). But what about all those pitchers who massively overperformed for the Braves while the Cy Young Trio anchored the front of the rotation? This is the guy that made the likes of Steve Avery, Denny Neagle, John Burkett, along with a slew of other mediocre pitchers into All Stars. He even got Mike Hampton back on track.

Another overlooked factor is the bullpens he put together. They weren't amazing but they got the job done. Before John Smoltz moved to the 'pen Leo had to deal with a different closer every year. That worked fine for the Braves until he left. Now the Braves' staff (both starters and relievers) is plagued with injuries. A lot of the guys who are in there can't seem to find a groove. Mazzone knew how to help pitchers find and maximize their stuff. He also knew how much to work them over the course of a year. He kept guys healthy. Personally I think that pitching coach is the most important coach on the team (besides the manager obviously). If you don't believe me look at the 2008 St. Louis Cardinals. Look at that pitching staff. Where the hell would they be without Dave Duncan? Now that Mazzone's out of the biz everyone is hopping on the Dave Duncan bandwagon as "best pitching coach in baseball". They're right, he is. But Mazzone was even better. You can't replace a coach like that, and when someone of that caliber leaves the team feels it for a while.

2) Jeff Francoeur and Kelly Johnson are having God-awful years

At the beginning of the year the Braves offense was loaded, supposedly. At the top of the order Yunel Escobar was coming off a rookie campaign that had him hitting well above .300. The middle was stacked as well with switch hitters Chipper Jones and Mark Teixeira hitting 3 and 4 respectively. Brian McCann was in the 5 spot. Rounding out the order was Mark Kotsay, a left field platoon, and the pitcher. Kelly Johnson was penciled in the 2 hole and Frenchy was batting 6th. On paper 1-6 looks pretty darn scary. Lets run through the lineup highlighting an interesting tidbit about each player.

1. Yunel Escobar- played 94 games in 2007, .326 AVG, .385 OBP
2. Kelly Johnson- .375 OBP in 2007, .457 SLG
3. Chipper Jones- future Hall of Famer, finished second in BA in the NL for 2007
4. Mark Teixeira- in 54 games with Atlanta in 2007 hit 17 HRs, and had 56 RBI, .404 OBP, .615 SLG, a .317 AVG
5. Brian McCann- had an off year in 2007, 18 HRs, 92 RBI, .320 OBP, .452 SLG, .270 AVG
6. Jeff Francoeur- somehow had a .338 OBP despite free swinging and a .293 AVG to go along with a .444 SLG
7. Mark Kotsay- coming off an injury year not a bad guy for the seven spot
8. Left Field- The Braves were again going to depend on a platoon for LF, obviously didn't expect big numbers from the 8 spot

We'll start with Kelly Johnson. Kelly's OBP dropped almost 40 points (.375 in 2007 to .339 in 2008). He is batting second in the order for a team that was going to be depending on offense and he stopped getting on base! Look who is hitting behind you man. If you want to help the team then get on base. This year he's been much more of a free swinger. He only has 42 walks so far this year, he definitely won't be reaching his total of 79 that he had last year. Also troubling is his 86 strikeouts. He has twice as many strikeouts as walks, not good. His batting average has dropped 7 points as well, that isn't a huge dip but it certainly isn't helping anything.

On top of all this, when he is getting a hit it usually isn't for extra bases. Not as much as last year anyway. When Johnson came up scouts generally said that Johnson had decent power, he would be a good doubles guy, maybe a 20 HR a year guy. This would be great production from a second baseman/2 hole guy. However his slugging percentage has dropped 56 points from last year to this one. The man is losing his stroke. From what I've seen of him and what his strike out and walk numbers tell me is that he has lost a lot of discipline at the plate. Not good Kelly. Just walk, the other guys will drive you in.

Speaking of crappy plate discipline.....Oh hey Jeff Francoeur! How've you been? Frenchy has literally lost his mind. The man is obsessed with being a 30-40 HR guy. He hit 29 in 2006. He could taste the glory that is power hitting. After posting a very good 2007 Francoeur decided he needed to improve. I thought to myself "Wow what a great ballplayer, always trying to get better. Good for him!" Then I found out he put on 17 lbs of muscle in the offseason training with the Clemson football team. Then I thought to myself "But Jeff, you don't play football, you play baseball....but I guess you know what you're doing because the Braves wouldn't let one of their stars screw up his game." Then I found out there is little the Braves can do to control the 8 year old boy that is Jeff Francoeur.

You see last year Frenchy learned from hitting coach Terry Pendleton that hitting the ball the other way makes you a better and more dangerous hitter. Oddly enough Francoeur listened. He raised his batting average 33 points from .260 to .293. Hell he even took a few extra walks. His OBP was an astounding (for him) .338. Sure he hit ten less HRs but who cares because he hit 16 more doubles than the season before. He was becoming a great hitter. Forgotten in all of this is that Frenchy is also one of the most clutch hitters in baseball. I couldn't find the stat but his batting average with 2 outs and and runners in scoring position has always been phenomenal.

However Jeff Francoeur needed more. Labels like good baseball player just weren't enough for him. He wanted those home runs back. So he headed to Clemson. When he got back to the bigs this year he was ready to swing for the fences. And swing he did....and miss he did. Frenchy had completely forgotten all that hit the ball the other way nonsense. His stats plummeted. His OBP, SLG, and AVG fell to the lowest they have ever been. All because he wanted to hit more home runs.

Personally I think the Brian McCann contract got to him. McCann was given a large contract last year that locked him up for something like 6 years. Also McCann had more HRs than Francoeur last year. The two are best friends and have been for some time. However Francoeur is very competitive and I think he felt a little inadequate. Frenchy had always been the star. But last season they had a role reversal of sorts. It wasn't just McCann getting the money. They kind of switched roles as hitters too. McCann had always been the doubles/gapper kind of guy. Francoeur was the power hitter. Now McCann was hitting more homers and Francoeur was the doubles guy hitting the ball the other way. He wanted to be the star again.

So now lets compare what was expected of the line up to what actually happened:

Pre-Season

1. Yunel Escobar- played 94 games in 2007, .326 AVG, .385 OBP
2. Kelly Johnson- .375 OBP in 2007, .457 SLG
3. Chipper Jones- future Hall of Famer, finished second in BA in the NL for 2007
4. Mark Teixeira- in 54 games with Atlanta in 2007 hit 17 HRs, and had 56 RBI, .404 OBP, .615 SLG, a .317 AVG
5. Brian McCann- had an off year in 2007, 18 HRs, 92 RBI, .320 OBP, .452 SLG, .270 AVG
6. Jeff Francoeur- somehow had a .338 OBP despite free swinging and a .293 AVG to go along with a .444 SLG
7. Mark Kotsay- coming off an injury year not a bad guy for the seven spot
8. Left Field- The Braves were again going to depend on a platoon for LF, obviously didn't expect big numbers from the 8 spot

Current

1. Yunel Escobar- BA (.278) SLG (.373), and OBP (.348) all dropped, but the OBP is still good and has a better ratio between strike outs and walks
   
2. Kelly Johnson- OBP (.339) and SLG (.421) have dropped, and he is striking out a lot more, he was removed from the two spot
   
3. Chipper Jones- hit .400 for a good part of the year, is currently hitting a paltry .370, has been hurt though
   
4. Mark Teixeira- before he was traded he hit 20 HRs and had 78 RBI
   
5. Brian McCann- having a great year .383 OBP, .560 SLG, and a .305 AVG, also has 44 BBs to 48 SO
   
6. Jeff Francoeur- .286 OBP, .347 SLG, .226 AVG, he also will be hitting far fewer doubles than last year and has only 9 HRs
   
7. Mark Kotsay- got hurt for part of the year, has batted all over the order including second, .335 OBP, .403 SLG, .288 AVG
   
8. Left Field- bleh

As you can see Johnson and Francoeur weren't the only people hurting the order. Chipper never hurt the order but they could have used him in more games for sure. Kotsay was a huge risk for the Braves and probably panned out just as they expected him to. At the beginning of the year the Braves expected to bring up hot center field prospect Jordan Schaeffer some time during the season but he was then suspended 50 games for using HGH. Tex had a good year with Atlanta, as did McCann. Escobar's numbers were down from the year before but the Braves didn't expect him to hit as well as he did last year. Regardless Escobar still put up good numbers. The two big holes are Johnson and Francoeur. Two guys the Braves really needed to step up, especially since they physically can play everyday unlike Chipper or McCann (since he is a catcher).

3) Injuries to the Pitching Staff

This kind of goes back to the Mazzone point but I want to get a little more in depth. 4 of the 5 projected starters for the Atlanta Braves at the beginning of the season have missed significant time this season. Here is the Braves original starting five:

1. John Smoltz
2. Tim Hudson
3. Tom Glavine
4. Mike Hampton
5. Jair Jurrjens

Smoltz is out for the year, maybe forever. Hudson is out for the year as of a few weeks ago. Glavine is finally back in the rotation after missing most of the year with his first trip ever to the DL. Mike Hampton is Mike Hampton. He finally returned to the Braves staff halfway through the season. He hasn't been great. Jurrjens has been the Braves' most consistent starter. He's a freakin rookie! He's 11-7 with a 3.18 ERA. Jorge Campillo has been an ample replacement, and Jo Jo Reyes is alright. But when a team loses four of its five starters for significant amounts of time there is no way they are going to win. Unless Dave Duncan is their pitching coach.

Along with this their projected closer Rafael Soriano has been on and off the DL all season. Two years ago he and Mike Gonzalez were supposed to have given the Braves the best bullpen in the NL. Atlanta's offseason priority should have been trying to keep Octavio Dotel. Yet again the Braves bullpen has been full of scrubs who can't hold leads. Nothing is more frustrating to watch than a shitty bullpen.


Well thats about all I can think of right now. In case anyone wants to nit pick what I wrote about the Braves let me say two things. 1) I did not put these reasons for the Braves poor season in any kind of order of importance. 2) The pitching staff situation hurt the Braves more than Francoeur and Johnson sucking, obviously, but there was just more to write about with Francoeur and Johnson. What more do I need to say about the staff than "4 of their 5 starters have been most of the year"?