From Shut Up To Sun Up

By Metstradamus
Posted Saturday, February 16, 2008

Don't get me wrong, I've never been one to wax poetic about the start of spring training. Every team has a chance ... hope springs eternal ... yada yada yada. In fact, after last season, February 14th was the day I had been dreading for a while, and not because it was Valentine's Day (I had to throw that last part in or else my wife would murder me). But to me, there's no better time than right now for pitchers and catchers to report, especially when one of those pitchers is a left handed Cy Young award winner in his prime.

Because really, what a difference a day makes. Wednesday, February 13th was dominated by swearing, hearing, and lying. Roger Clemens and Brian McNamee taking the great sport of baseball to Congress to argue about which weasel is faking it. Here's a hint, boys: You're both liars as far as I'm concerned ... and so are the politicians who substituted getting to the bottom of things with taking another opportunity to remind the world what political party they belong to.

For example: Rep. Virginia Foxx, what is the deal with those pictures? "Ooh Roger, you look the same in all these pictures", as if that's going to convince everyone that Clemens is innocent. Were those pictures supposed to be your bloody glove? I mean, there's a name for people who blow up pictures of random people to bring to a congressional hearing to coo over that person's build ... and that word is "STALKER"! "If he doesn't grow, you must let go!"

Stop it! Just stop it!

And then there's McNamee. Now let's face it, if I saw this guy at a gym wearing a track suit, my first thought would be that he's got an illegal operation going on in the back room. Dude, you have "weasel" written all over you! "Oooh, I saw Debbie Clemens and Jessica Canseco show each other their augmented breasts after I injected Debbie with the prick from my needle which had HGH!" Nah, that's not sleazy at all.

But then there's Roger. Oh ... my ... lord. Now look, I don't want to let the bias that I acquired during Game 2 of the 2000 World Series where Clemens almost committed murder cloud my judgement here. I'm willing to concede that there's a chance ... small as it may be ... that Roger Clemens is innocent of all this. But if Roger Clemens in fact never did take HGH, he's going to need some to repair all that damage he did to his shoulder while patting himself on the back in front of Congress. "When Bud Selig threw out the bat signal, I ran as fast as I could to a phone booth so that I could PUT THE AMERICAN FLAG ON MY CHEST AND SAVE THE SPORT OF BASEBALL FROM THOSE HEATHENS WHO WANTED BONUS MONEY TO PITCH! MY MOTIVES ARE PURE!!!"

With apologies to our own Deb McIver, the words "Just Shut Up" were invented for Roger Clemens.

Now, we go forward one day later, when the entire free world has just about been "hearing impaired" for life. We go forward to a sleepy town called Port St. Lucie. Pitchers with big dreams ... catchers with creaky knees ... all coming together to throw the horsehide around and run some drills. Pedro is there, with Johnny and Ollie and Billy. And over in the other corner, there's Orlando, Feliciano, and Scho. No Paulie, but Brian Schneider is breaking out the futuristic face mask and running drills with the pitchers. And there's Ramon Castro unpacking his big bats and his bigger head.

And there's Johan. Aah, Johan. You see, you may think that hope springs eternal. But after last season, hope wasn't coming out of it's hole to see his shadow unless Johan showed up. But there he was ... throwing warm up tosses in Port Saint Freakin' Lucie. And there was hope close by.

They're all there, playing catch not like the grown men they are, but the kids they once were. And what a difference a day makes: From grown men acting like children to grown men playing a kids game. It's a difference that's subtle yet huge at the same time.

And not a day too soon.