Sunday Stuff

So, who was it that flew the helicopter over the one year anniversary service for the six dead in Kirkwood? On a beautiful, starlit night while the choir was singing, someone, somewhere had the absolute gall to fly a helicopter over the service, drowning out the choir and basically putting the kabosh on a thoughtful service. Many were pissed including myself. What news organization would be so thoughtless as to do something like that? Inconsiderate, reprehensible behaviour on a night where thousands came togther to remember those killed that surreal night 366 days ago. Yes, I knew everyone one of those people including the killer...

Mystery solved, it was the St. Louis County Police, hovering a helicopter in tribute of the fallen officers. All well and good, but there was nothing in the program, nothing noted and no one knew what was up. Not complaining but at least we should have been told

"A picture postcard
A folded stub
A program of the play
File away your photographs
Of your holiday

And your mementos
Will turn to dust
But that's the price you pay
For every year's a souvenir
That slowly fades away
Every year's a souvenir
That slowly fades away"- Billy Joel
**************************************************************************************************************************** I am getting to where I can not stand ESPN. During all of these steriod accusations, where have they been? Coming up with fancy names for themselves, reminding everyone that nothing happens west of Philadelphia and telling us over and over that the biggest basketball rivalry is between Duke and North Carolina ad nauseum. A friend of mine, who goes by the name of Sid Dithers and who writes for a local media website had this to say about the whole A-Fraud deal...and he says it SO much better than I can...
The Entertainment and Sports Programming Network...A PANTHEON of inconsequential blather and entertain-less entertainment, held to a journalistic standard of........well...........NOTHING!!! ESPN...ESPN II...ESPN Desportes...ESPN 360...ESPN News...And about 57 other incarnations of this sham-of-a-franchise that has added the sum total of NOTHING to the fleeting IDEA that IS "sports journalism", an oxymoronic phrase if there ever was one...While it has palpably worsened under the soul-less umbrella of Disney, ESPN has managed to peddle its "style over substance" presentation into a money-printing franchise...And rather than REPORT sports in a way that even approaches true journalism, ESPN has managed to CHANGE the way sports are played by the narcissistic athletes themselves...
***There were NO real, impactful football players like Terrell Owens and the like prior to ESPN...There were no basketball players who learned to do nothing but slam-dunk and chest-thump prior to ESPN...There were VERY FEW unsportsmanlike home run posers in baseball prior to ESPN...Or more specifically, THERE WERE NO ROID-HEADED, JACKED-UP CHEATERS CHEMICALLY-ENHANCED TO HIT NOTHING BUT 700 FOOT HOMERS PRIOR TO ESPN!!!*** Is 'The Sidster' BLAMING ESPN for the steroid scandal in baseball and other sports???...Not exactly, but their ridiculous coverage of the sensationalistic built ratings, increased revenues and allowed teams to spend money faster and with more selfish zeal than does Nancy Pelosi masturbating in the mirror...ALL while instigating the deterioration of sport fundamentals and the promotion of false hope to the disillusioned youth of today, ESPECIALLY the black athlete... But THAT is another thread...What THIS thread is specifically about is Alex Rodriguez and the whole steroid story...And HERE is the gist of Sid's angst...
***WHERE was ESPN in uncovering THIS story, even as far back as 1994???*** As far as I can determine, HERE is what these mindless vermin have "focused" on RATHER than to actually INVESTIGATE "ONE" alleged news story regarding steroids...
*Sitting for hours and days on end, thinking up nicknames for ONE ANOTHER!!!
*Sitting around for MONTHS on end developing NEW "promos", featuring the wacky ESPN "Boss Jocks" as the 'comic relief' they were TRULY hired as...In fact, THIS MONTH, ESPN produced a feature with NOTHING but old ESPN Promos...Does it get ANY BETTER than THAT???
*Hiring one empty-headed, bombshell female after another, to work the sidelines and stalk naked millionaire athletes in the shower after games, adding NOTHING to the broadcasts...Errr..I mean "BROAD"-casts...
***And best of ALL, assembling an ENTIRE staff of jug-headed siccophants who have MADE CAREERS out of MAKING FRIENDS and HANGING OUT WITH THE PLAYERS THEY ARE SUPPOSED TO OBJECTIVELY COVER!!!***
Case and Point...STEROIDS!!!
Over the last decade, as baseball players began to develop biceps larger than a normal baby's torso, NOT ONE investigative piece came from ESPN concerning ANY allegation of steroid use, EVEN BEFORE STEROIDS WERE BANNED!!!... I am NOT referring to QUESTION pieces where lame-*ss, lazy anchors generically pose hypotheticals about a player's size or productivity, but ACTUAL in-your-face reporting designed to uncover the totally naked emperor...I am referring to hounding, tenacious reporting and NOT taking the lies of "NO" for an answer, ruffling feathers in the process...
Are we to believe that the briantrust at ESPN did not SEE what was happening to the modern-day ball player???...Are we to believe that these fraudulent miscreants didnt "hear" things from their "boys" regarding WHO was juicing and who wasnt???...Are we to believe that NOT ONE REPORTER was leaked information about ANYTHING concerning this OBVIOUS and BLATANT story over the course of TEN FRIGGN' YEARS???...Are we to accept that NOT ONE producer or reporter decided to 'go after' just ONE of these New York Yankees or Boston Red Sox who attained sudden and magical home run power or age-defying success on the pitching mound???
WHAT a f*cking JOKE!!! When the A-Rod story broke yesterday, there was comical irony inherent in the announcement...A fat, dumpy woman (which means she's CLEARLY the smartest one in the bunch!) from Sports Illustrated actually followed up on a lead that turned into the confirmation on A-Rod, NOT any of the 'jesters-of-hijinks' from ESPN...In 2003, when he won the American League home run title and the AL Most Valuable Player award as a shortstop for the Texas Rangers, Alex Rodriguez tested positive for two anabolic steroids, four sources have independently told Sports Illustrated...ONLY FOUR (4) sources...No biggie...And it gets better because the ugly, chinless reporter actually hunted A-Rod down to get a quote, working at night yet!!! When approached by the reporter on Thursday at a gym in Miami, Rodriguez declined to discuss his 2003 test results... "You'll have to talk to the union," said Rodriguez, the Yankees' third baseman since his trade to New York in February 2004... When asked if there was an explanation for his positive test, he said, "I'm not saying anything."...No to overstate the obvious, but WHERE was ESPN???...I guess they were all in Hawaii "chillin" at the Pro Bowl...WHEN F*cking Katie Couric is HARDER in interviewing A-Rod than ANY POS at ESPN, you KNOW your department has issues...But they WILL have cool Hawaiin shirts for their overblown broadcast of a NOTHING sporting event...It is important to acknowledge that A-Rod on steroids is NOT NEW "news"...It WAS 'swept under the carpet' NEWS...But since it is NOW "fashionable" to jump on A-Rod because of Joe Torre's recent portrayal of him in his book, it was A-Rod's name being "leaked" as ONE of the 104 guys who tested positive for steroids in 2003...And you can BET that all the maggots at ESPN will LEAP at the opportunity to bury A-Rod now that THEY dont have to worry about breaking the "clubhouse code" of all their *sshole friends in the locker room...
WHAT a bunch of P*SSIES!!!
"Boo-Ya!"..."Scotty" van Pelt-meister!...Pete "I NEVER Criticize a Red Sock" Gammons...Buster "Nothing Exists in America west of NYC" Olney...
"Hey Sid, what about Outside The Lines?...Bob Ley is the "Morley Safer" of ESPN"...
PLEASE!!!...OTL, as well as ANY of the lame bullsh*t from Jeremy Schaap, are mostly puff pieces, a bunch of non-evasive pontificating...Journalism is NOT the rhetorical asking of questions without answers or a forum to opine ad nauseum in the popular, contemporary 'Cliffs Notes-ish One-Sentence Samba' that masquerades as "editorial"...
The bottom line is that the steroids story is the BIGGEST story in the history of sport---ANY sport!!!...And for an ENTIRE NETWORK, a network EXCLUSIVELY dedicated to SPORTS NEWS, to TOTALLY MISS what is essentially 11 or 12 "Watergates" in one place, is spectacularly incompetent and inexcusable...
And furthermore, to be "SCOOPED" by an unattractive female from a fading forum like 'the magazine' is even MORE embarrassing...I have another idea for SI...How's about a story on discriminating hiring practices at ESPN???...Its hard to believe that the females are as incompetent as the males, but they ARE...
But the GOOD news is that Stuey and Scotty and Buster and Pete and Chrissy and Karlster all the roid-headed ex-players who critique the nightly happenings will STILL be able to have cocktails with their "bro's"...And as we ALL know in "sports journalism", THAT is the most important thing!!!
Well done Disney!!!...And way to go ESPN!!!...You NEVER disappoint!!!!
************************************************************************************************************************** The Grammy's are tonight and I am rooting for Robert Plant and Alison Krauss, Coldplay ("Viva La Vida" is their "Dark Side of the Moon"), Burce Springsteen and Ne-Yo.
********************************************************************************************************************** Walter Milton Dwayne Midkiff died the other day. We knew him as Dewey Martin, drummer for The Standells "Dirty Water" and most notably the only drummer that Buffalo Springfield ever had. Martin worked as an itinerant drummer for many of country music's greatest artists, including Carl Perkins, The Everly Brothers, Patsy Cline, Charlie Rich, Faron Young and Roy Orbison among others. In 1963, he travelled to Las Vegas with Faron Young's band and then Los Angeles where he decided to stay. During late March/early April 1966, Martin was working with The Dillards at the Ice House in Pasadena when Doug Dillard told him that his services were no longer needed and gave him a telephone number for a new group that needed a drummer. The band was Buffalo Springfield. Martin became the last member to join the legendary group at its founding. Along with Stephen Stills and Richie Furay, he was one of only three musicians to stay with the group from its inception in April 1966 to its disbandment on May 5, 1968. During his time with the group, Martin also did session work for The Monkees. In concert, he sang covers of Wilson Pickett's In The Midnight Hour and Richie Furay's "Nobody's Fool" and "Good Time Boy". The latter appeared on the band's second album, Buffalo Springfield Again. He also sang Neil Young's "Mr Soul" as the introduction to Young's "Broken Arrow" on the same album and backing vocals on the band's biggest hit, "For What It's Worth". In 2008, Dewey Martin joined the cast of Matt Alan's live Internet radio program, OUTLAW RADIO. His unique personality, fascinating stories and quirky wit soon endeared him to the show's worldwide audience. Martin apparently died on January 31, 2009, and was found dead the next day by a roommate in his Van Nuys apartment, longtime friend Lisa Lenes said. She said Martin had health problems in recent years and she believed he died of natural causes. He was 68. Martin and the groups bassist, Dewey Palmer, have both passed.